So I got hold of a domain that shows my exact full name. I thought it would be useful for showing up as “professional” when working in IT and sending resumes.
I got some mail forwarded using the domain registrar. I also made a small static website, which only has hello world for now but soon will get the contents filled up.
But then… what? I suppose I can host anything I want, but then there’s the whole “real name - gotta look professional” aspect that makes me weary of hosting a Lemmy instance, for example, when the domain without my name attached wouldn’t.
I suppose having personal domains were cool in the 90s where people were barely learning about “the internets”. Not so anymore?
Is there a usefulness in having a domain name with your real name attached on this age?
Personally, I have firstname@secondname.email That was a domain I set up when I was self employed, contracting for people, trying to look ‘professional’ I still use it to this day, though the professional requirement is gone now since I’m employed by a company. Still, it’s catchy and not that expensive, so I keep it, and renew for long periods of time.
Then I have another domain, not personally identifiable, for whatever stuff I want to host/play with. This one is a three letter .ac domain, I got 10 years for $200 ish. The three letters are my initials
So you say, is there usefulness in having a real name domain? Not unless it’s your business. For me, when I was contracting, it was a simple attempt to get clients to remember me over the hundreds of others
To me, ones like joeblacktechnicalservices@gmail.com always seem like a lazy attempt, for a ‘business’
Its very ingrained on me that a proper business should be able to spare a few on a domain for themselves, as I remember it before the dot-com bubble.
Now? Websites have been displaced by social media altogether and many small business simply prefer having an Instagram profile, for example.
You should never depend 100% on another platform for your only business presence. You can get banned on Instagram, Facebook etc. very easily. Treat them like a billboard not like your home.
Amen