Crystal Ball Gazing - Techno Travel

March 21, 2008 · Filed Under Holidays · 10 Comments

Recently I’ve been contacted by two emerging new travel sites - Volette.com and So Much World. Both are very interesting, but quite different in their takes on travel.

Volette is perhaps more aimed at the business traveller, but not only, whereas So Much World is more like an on-line version of my favourite Lonely Planet guides. I know that both sites are still in a development phase, especially Volette.com. Indeed, the brain behind Volette.com, one Joe Tangredi, has several ideas as to the direction he wants to take his internet venture, although I don’t know what they are just yet. Read more

Tags: a list, book, bookmark, computer, eat, future, hotel, idea, Information, interest, interesting, internet, Italy, local knowledge, lovely, meeting, mobile, People, phone, pocket pc, read, rented car, Rome, sea, service, sicily, site, tour, travel, Useful, visit, weather, web, wifi

Registering Domain Names in Italy. Dot com or dot it?

March 9, 2008 · Filed Under Technology and Gadgets · Comment

Recently Carlos, after reading this post possibly, contacted me to ask whether Italian sites use the .com and .it domain names. This was an interesting question and oddly enough I had been looking at the Alexa statistics for Italy’s top 100 Internet sites recently and I noticed that both .com and .it domains are used by Italian organisations for sites aimed at Italians.

The question is why there is this mix of .it and .com domains in Italy. Well, here are my theories.

Firstly, the registration process for a .it domain is fiddly and nowhere near as straightforward as that of registering a .com domain. With a .com domain you can be up and running in less than a day. However, if you go for a .it domain, if you are lucky you can have the domain visible in around 24 hours, if not, it may take much longer, especially if the requisite forms are not completed correctly. .it domains are also more expensive.

OK, so above is a practical reason why Italians may prefer the .com domain, but there is more.

In Italy, after having worked with (taught) many young Italians over the last 5 years or so, I’ve noticed that the .com domain is perhaps held in higher regard than the .it domain, and, although I have no proof of this, it would appear to mean that in the eyes of your average Internet aware Italian, the .com domain is possibly holds more credibility. There is one good example of a major Italian company using a .com domain - Il Sole 24 Ore - the Italian publishing and training group, whose site is a .com - www.il24ore.com Interesting is it not?

I also dropped in to my response to Carlos’ question that it would be possible to register both .com and .it names for the same dominion, as indeed have I for one of my other sites. And because I have become a little more SEO aware recently, I happened to mention that I thought that having the same site with both domains may cause SEO related problems. Although, with apologies to Carlos, I had no real evidence for this supposition. Naughty me.

Well, Carlos picked up on my SEO related assertion and wanted to know more. Whoops! After a quick search on Google I found some evidence to support my supposition: here And from that article it does appear as though country specific domains can cause problems for webmasters who are targeting different geographical areas, so although I shot from the hip, much like the cowboys of old, I did not miss. Let’s say that my assumption was more an ‘educated guess’.

There are also some other issues concerning the registration of .it domains.

With regard to those who wish to register and maintain an Italian domain, it could be said that the .it domain is restricted to Italian citizens and those who live in countries within the European Union. This means, for example, that Americans wishing to register a .it domain would have problems, unless, of course, they have a company registered in Italy or they happen to have an Italian ‘partita IVA’ - VAT registration. To read more about this and to find out more about registering a .it domain, I recommend visiting the English version of the Italian domain name registration authority nic.it

Carlos’ contact raised some very interesting issues, and this is why, with his permission, I’ve written this post. Although I know something about this, I am in no way an expert. So if anyone would like to add anything or contradict me, then please feel free, and I’ll modify this post and credit my sources appropriately.

Tags: .com, .it, Google, interest, interesting, internet, internet domains, Italia, Italian, Italians, Italy, nic, problem, problems, registering domains, search, seo, site

A Sneak Preview - Businessisin

February 14, 2008 · Filed Under Blogging · Comment

This is a new site that I’m working on - Businessisin…Italy. The title is self explanatory, I feel.

Basically, I want to use this site to show off Italian businesses, not the well known ones, and business people, especially young Italians, as well as providing advice on how and where to do business in Italy, and to create some form of networking between businesses abroad and Italian businesses.

And to help others understand what is going on here, I’m going to be running a ‘Press Clippings’ section which will be very brief summaries of Italian business news stories from Italian sites and newspapers, the aim of which is to give non-Italian business people more of an insight into Italy, how it works, and the kind of opportunities it may present.

On the other hand Blog from Italy, where you are now, attempts in part, and in a small way, to show off the end product, whereas Businessisin will try to show off the businesses behind the products, in an attempt to generate more business, investment, profit, and, hopefully, employment.

The site is live, but I have not yet launched it, so to speak. And my ‘business writing style certainly needs more work. But I’d like a little feedback and if you have any suggestions, I’m all ears.

If you’d like to pop over there, then feel free. Very much work in progress, and my ideas are only just starting to take shape.

Once the hectic period I’m going through at the moment calms down a bit, I’ll be dedicating more time to the site.

Tags: blog, Business, businessisin, idea, Italia, Italian, Italians, Italy, networking, news, Newspapers, People, press, product, profit, site, Writing, writing style