Australia could adopt the same approach as Bulgaria; which offers direct registrations under .bg and in September, 2006 introduced 36 seemingly meaningless 2LD domains. These provide 37 separate domain name spaces for registrants to choose from.

Examples of actual .bg registered domains include: pcstore.bg, plasticsurgery.a.bg, and cosmos.1.bg. The introduction of these new spaces reveal two characteristics; firstly the 2LDs won't become less meaningful over time (since they start with no intended meaning) and secondly there is a larger number "good" domain names available for registration (e.g. acme.a.bg, acme.x.bg,acme.1.bg, etc).

Bulgarian 2LD hierarchy
.a.bg .b.bg .c.bg .d.bg .e.bg .f.bg 
.g.bg .h.bg .i.bg .j.bg .k.bg .l.bg 
.m.bg .n.bg .o.bg .p.bg .q.bg .r.bg
.s.bg .t.bg .u.bg .v.bg .w.bg .x.bg 
.y.bg .z.bg .0.bg .1.bg .2.bg .3.bg
.4.bg .5.bg .6.bg .7.bg .8.bg .9.bg


Josh
--
http://josh.id.au/

On Fri, Jun 29, 2007 at 12:24:25PM +1000, info§enigmaticminds.com.au wrote:
> To point things in a completely different direction, rather than moving 
> to the model of direct registration of .au domains, which in effect 
> closes the .au namespace to any further 2LDs, I think it makes far more 
> sense to open the .au namespace up even further by introducing more 2LDs.
> 
> For example, a model based on industry classification - i.e. 
> name.industry.au
> 
> For example:
> - anz.bank.au
> - abc.tv.au
> - mmm.radio.au
> - bigpond.isp.au
> - telstra.tel.au / telstra.telco.au
> - johns.plumbing.au
> 
> The greater the number of 2LDs and the more specific they are, the more 
> open the .au namespace is, the greater the room to grow and more 
> importantly, the fewer IP issues and domain conflicts. There is no 
> conflict between xyz.bank.au and xyz.plumbing.au but there is when both 
> want xyz.com.au
> 
> Andrew