April 14, 1999: Wired publishes a story announcing “that the .com versions of nearly all popular words have been taken.” A spot check of over 25,000 English-language dictionary words reveals fewer than 1,800 still available at the time.
March 10, 2000: The dot-com bubble bursts. Dot-com domain names walk away with a few scratches, bruises, and cuts, but most of the companies that they grew to represent do not.
2002: Marks the first year that the number of active dot-com domain names shrinks. December 31, 2001 sees 23,198,677 active dot-com domains while December 31, 2002 sees just 21,991,795. By December 31, 2003, the number is back up to 26,207,928 active dot-com names.
October 2006: The process of transferring domain names finally gets simplified, relying on a relatively simple unlock code passed between the old registrar and new registrant. The previous method involved getting a notary public involved, which is about the least high-tech way to do anything.
November 2007: All combinations of four-letter dot-com domain names are sold out. That’s 456,976 possible combinations.
October 9, 2009: Insure.com becomes the most expensive domain name ever sold, fetching a price of $16 million and dethroning the 2006 sale of Sex.com for somewhere between $12 million and $14 million.
March 15, 2010: Dot-com turns 25, requests ice cream cake.
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