The Real Blogger Status

One hot Internet topic, these days, involves specialised ("vanity") domains. The hot names seem to change, by the week. This week, enom is hyping ".family", ".live", ".rocks", and ".social" . Other registrars may have other recommendations. The blog Address (Name) is a key blog identity element , in a well designed blog. It's visible both to people, and to search engine crawlers. The requirement that addresses must be unique is a supposed benefit of vanity top level domains - but vanity TLDs, alone, will not provide blog uniqueness. There will always be competition for some names, in any useful Top Level Domain.

Blogger blog owners, like everybody else, like to save money. Some blog owners prefer to save money when registering a custom domain, for their blogs. We've seen several free domain registration services, providing what is claimed to be a two level Top Level Domain "co.xx" (where "xx" == various country codes). The latest in this ongoing story appears to be "net.tf" - and 13 other "top level domains" . There is also an additional free service offering third-level .tf domains, under the name United Names Organisation. They occupy 14 second-level domains , including .eu.tf, .us.tf, .net.tf , and .edu.tf. They are run by the same company as smartdots.com, and are given away as URL redirections.

One of the features of custom domains, when purchased using " Buy a domain ", was the Transition period. Transition was Blogger, allowing that even with Blogger / Google controlling the domain authoritative servers (which they did, indirectly, by using eNom / GoDaddy as the registrars), and the initial DNS address setup (offered for GoDaddy purchased domains ), the stability of custom domains only starts with the domain authoritative servers, and the Root Name servers . Custom domain published blogs, to be consistently stable, can only rely on the DNS addresses being available on the local DNS servers, on a worldwide basis, 48 to 72 hours after the DNS addresses are added. This built in latency period has nothing to do with how custom domains are designed - and it's an issue over which Blogger and Google have no control.

Blogger blog owners, like everybody else, like to save money. Some blog owners prefer to save money when registering a custom domain, for their blogs. We've seen several free domain registration services, providing what is claimed to be a two level Top Level Domain "co.xx" (where "xx" == various country codes). The latest in this ongoing story appears to be "co.vu".

Some would be domain owners are reporting the sad truth about Google Domains . I tried to use a Google Domains invitation, and got a refusal. We're sorry. You appear to be in a country where Google Domains is not yet available. You may search for domains, but you will not be able to purchase a domain unless you have a U.S. billing address. Learn more Get notified when Google Domains is available in your country. So thanks anyway! Google Domains is currently a beta product - and as of December 2017, it is available in 14 countries.

After too many years of Blogger blog owners struggling with setting up their custom domains, Google is now selling domains - though right now, in a select number of countries . Having ended "Buy a domain", and its problems - and now dealing with blog owners setting up domains purchased through numerous registrars, and those problems - Blogger / Google has cleaned up the domain purchase and setup process . This year, we see Google Domains - where Google actually registers domains , and can control the DNS hosting. And, they have developed a clean and lean dashboard / zone editor, for maintaining their domains.

Some Blogger blog owners, having overlooked the reality of custom domain renewal , discover their mistake too late. We see various queries, in Blogger Help Forum: How Do I? , about domain registration, after it's too late. My blog now displays a search page! Have I been hacked? or maybe My blog is showing content that my kids should not see!

Recently, Google Apps redesigned their desktop GUI. Now, it's easier to maintain auto-renew settings for your custom domain. Of course, "easier" may not be the same as "more initially obvious". Along with the GUI redesign of Google Apps, Google changed payment procedures for domain registrations.

We're seeing some panic today, in Blogger Help Forum: Something Is Broken , from a few blog owners who have received email, which implies that their custom domain registrations are approaching expiration - and can't be renewed. I registered my domain several months ago, through Google. I have the receipt for the payment in my email, my Google Wallet account, and my credit card statement. Why am I getting this email now, some months after registering my domain - but well before my registration should be expiring? Our records indicate that the payment for registering your domain mydomain.com was unsuccessful. Payment failures happen for a variety of reasons (such as insufficient funds or an expired card). You can update your payment information to resolve the issue. Please log in to your account and update your payment information. If you take no action, your domain will not be renewed on . This confusion is especially unfortunate, given the recent discontinuation of...

We're seeing a few reports from confused blog owners, in Blogger Help Forum: Something Is Broken , who want a non BlogSpot URL for their blog. I have tried to follow the guide, but my page does not say the same as the guide. Several blog owners, in trying to use "Add a custom domain" to buy a domain, are observing that there is no "Check Availability" sequence.

Some Blogger blog owners, having experienced the anxiety of custom domain setup , intend to carefully maintain their domain registration. We see a few queries, in Blogger Help Forum: How Do I? , about domain registration renewal. How do I make sure my registration gets renewed? or How do I renew registration before it expires? or, possibly My blog now displays a search page! Have I been hacked?

Some Blogger blog owners, trying to setup a new blog, discover the hard way that other people are trying to do the same thing. When I try to use "Create a blog", I keep seeing This name is not available. or Blogger is saying it's available - but as I begin to register, it says that it has already received a request for this name. Other blog owners discover that the competition between Blogger blog owners, when using " Create a blog ", also applies to "Buy a domain". And worse yet, "Buy a domain" involves competition with would be website owners outside Blogger / Google.

As custom domain publishing becomes more popular with Blogger blog owners, it's inevitable that people outside the USA would start using it, routinely. Questions about payment options are seen regularly, in Blogger Help Forum: How Do I? . How much does a domain cost? This used to have a simple answer . $10 US, charged against a major bank issued credit card. With the internationalisation of Blogger, the answer becomes significantly more complex.

Some Blogger blog owners, trying to save a few dollars while publishing their blogs to a non BlogSpot URL, have used the free service "co.cc" for registering their domains. As "co.cc" increased its base of "customers", their reputation for providing free registration grew - and they became popular with scammers and spammers. Last year, Google, weary of the overall poor search engine reputation of co.cc customers, de indexed all websites registered by co.cc . This week, co.cc apparently stopped serving DNS information for its "customer domains".

Now that custom domain publishing is once again available , though without the option to buy a domain through Blogger , too many anxious Blogger blog owners are asking the obvious question How do I buy a domain? Not a lot of blog owners want to be told Contact the registrar of your choice. The backup to "Buy a domain" would be to buy a domain directly from a registrar - however, this presents too many challenges to the casual blog owner. (Update 2012/10/09): "Buy a domain for your blog" is once again part of the Publishing wizard. Fortunately, there is a substitute to "Buy a domain", available through Google. Google Apps - which is the support organisation for "Buy a domain" itself - provides the option to buy a domain, along with the Google Apps Dashboard. Google Apps does not use easy to remember URLs, unfortunately.

We're seeing evidence of confusion, in Blogger Help Forums, from blog owners who read the out of date instructions, about using "Buy a domain". We see considerable confusion, where people using that feature insist that they don't have to add a "CNAME" . In other cases, people using the Blogger / GoDaddy DNS Configuration wizard will think that the second "CNAME" is being added for them. (Update 2013/09): The second "CNAME" won't be required, in all cases. If you don't see instructions for adding a second "CNAME", focus your efforts on getting the domain working, with righteous base DNS addresses ,

As we sift through the wreckage of the blogs damaged by the recent Blogger custom domain security issue, we note a significant omission. The " Buy a Domain For Your Blog " wizard is conspicuous in its absence. When I click on the Settings - Publishing options, I don't even have the option to check availability or purchase a domain name. Where is the "Buy a domain" display? Right now, it appears that "Buy a domain" was sacrificed, so that the general custom domain publishing feature could be restored more promptly (though not promptly enough , for many blog owners). There are several tasks that must be completed by "Buy a domain", which are complex - and the necessary coding simply could not be completed by Tuesday of this week. I saw one message of hope. We will be restoring the ability to purchase a custom domain from Blogger soon. We'll simply have to have faith, that they are working on this feature as we lament its current abs...

After a very stressful week , Blogger Engineering has restored the custom domain publishing option . Last week we encountered an issue that could affect Blogger users in the process of configuring a custom domain, during the verification of ownership of domains between the provider and Blogger. Blogs with previously configured custom domains were not affected. With the reason for disabling custom domain publishing being security, Blogger Engineering has added a step in the publishing process , to add a random token as a "CNAME", and verify your right to publish to your domain, from Blogger. You get the random token from the "settings instructions" document, " How do I use a custom domain name for my blog? ".

One of the odder examples of naivete, seen occasionally in Blogger Help Forum: How Do I? , involves the custom domain purchase. How do I buy a domain from Blogger? or alternately How do I have Google host my domain? The immediate answer, properly stated, is simple. You cannot buy a domain from Blogger. Neither Blogger, nor Google, is a registrar. The full answer, however, is a bit more complex.

One of the saddest problems reports, seen in Blogger Help Forum: Something Is Broken , and mentioning the custom domain purchase process , starts with I had a problem with my credit card, and had to get my bank to allow my purchase. But now, I see We found an existing order for this domain. Please contact support. or maybe I had to answer the phone after I started my purchase, and now the domain that I wanted isn't available. How do I get the domain that should be mine? These problem reports are from people who did not understand how simple the domain purchase process is. Select an available domain. Provide registration and payment information. That simplicity is based on a monolithic restriction. The purchase process does not allow for interruption. It is to your advantage, when purchasing your domain, to complete the purchase, quickly .