December 2021 Gandi Newsletter
Welcome to the December 2021 Gandi newsletter. Each month, we deliver our best and most relevant articles from our news site, our YouTube channel, and beyond. In this month’s newsletter: register or renew your .io domain before prices go up at the end of the month, learn how to export DNS records, read our top 3 WordPress themes, find out how much a website really costs, secure your email account, and play our Advent Calendar game to win prizes! From around the web this month, we’re reading about the limits of “free” software, domain endings preferred (or not) for cybercriminals, and how to edit images from a command line.
Happy holidays and happy reading!
- Price increase on .io in January
- Export your DNS records in just a few clicks
- Top 3 best WordPress themes in 2021
- But actually, how much does a website cost?
- Help! My email mailbox has been compromised!
- Gandi Advent Calendar: join the holiday fun on our social media
- What we’re reading this month
- Promo roundup
- Events calendar
Price increase on .io in January
A new registry is taking over the management of the .io domain ending, which means, as is often the case, the price will be increasing starting December 31, 2021. We encourage you to renew your domain names before that date in order to benefit from the current price for the longest possible period.
Tutorial of the month
Export your DNS records in just a few clicks!
Ensuring you keep your DNS zones clean means making sure you secure your sensitive data.
Whether you need to orgnize your DNS records, need to identify which of your domain names point to a particular IP address, or just need to make bulk backups, our DNS export feature is your new best friend.
Top 3 best WordPress themes in 2021
One of the main advantages of WordPress is that you have choices, many, many choices. Whether that’s in terms of plugins or themes, you’re free to customize your webite as you see fit. Sometimes what feels like too many choices. That’s why we summarized the top 3 best WordPress themes of 2021 for you!
But actually, how much does a website cost?
You’re there. You’re ready to make your website idea into a reality. But have you been able to properly budget for it? From domain name to DNS, from designing and developing your website, and not least of all web hosting, here’s our recap of all the costs you can expect when launching your website.
Help! My email mailbox has been compromised!
Is your email mailbox exhibiting some strange behaviors and you think it might have been compromised? Learn how to recognize the tell-tale signs and how to protect your email address using two-factor authentication (2FA) and DKIM.
Gandi Advent Calendar: join the holiday fun on our social media
The countdown has begun! Every day until December 24, come open a new window in the Gandi Advent Calendar by answering the question of the day. Earn the most points and you have a chance to win an Oculus Quest 2 128 GB VR headset, a Gandi hoodie or t-shirt, or a .art, .org, .me, .site, .online, .tech, or .store domain name!
What we’re reading this month
More Software Isn’t Better Software
The values of free, open source software are close to the values that undergirded the early days of the web — that working together on common problems is fundamentally good.
But today, much open source development is funded by large tech companies. As the author of this piece puts it: “A project once meant to help the little players is now propping up the biggest of them,” and “beyond matters of coding, free software was been inert.”
By “inert,” they mean unable to meaningfully intervene on questions like misinformation and online harassement. The proposed solution is to begin limiting open source licenses to non-commercial uses. The problems posed are real.
But fighting the power of those who would abuse open source means more power to developers themselves. That might mean less power to commercial open source users, but not necessarily removing commercial uses from the equation altogether.
These are the top-level domains threat actors like the most
Just 25 top-level domains (#TLDs) account for 90% of all malicious websites. According to this study, certain categories of TLDs map onto certain types of threats.
The article points to ccTLDs from small countries like .tk, .pw, and .ws, who offer very cheap registrations. But many ccTLDs in the list correspond to large, technologically developed countries like China (.cn), Russia (.ru), and the UK (.uk).
4 ways to edit photos on the Linux command line
“Image editing” and “Linux command line” might not be two ideas you usually associate with one another. Thanks to the ImageMagick open source software suite, you can make collages, resize, and even automate image processing with a bash script.
You’re not going to be doing high-level image editing, sure, but this bit of fun shows how advanced “just” a command line can get.
While registry pricing policy is certainly a factor, it seems the ability to pass off a URL as “legitimate” is at least as important.
Promo roundup
Last Chance! These promos end in December:
- .io — $32.18 for the first year (regular price $42.18)
- .org — $9.99 for the first year (regular price $17.20)
- .global — $19.99 for the first year (regular price $80.79)
- .paris — $33.00 for the first year (regular price $52.00)
- .life and .live — $3.99 for the first year (regular price $33.61 and $40.26, respectively)
- .best — $8.00 for the first year (regular price $28.86)
- .cloud — $9.99 for the first year (regular price $24.29)
- .club — $3.00 for the first year (regular price $17.36)
- Seven domain endings from Donuts (including .digital, .team, and .world) starting at $3.99
- .eu — $6.00 for the first year (normal price: $15.00 per year)
- Seven domain endings from GRS (including .faith, .review, and .science) starting at $5.00 for the first year
- .link — $5.99 for the first year (regular price: $13.66 per year)
- .me — $6.00 for the first year (regular price: $24.00 per year)
- .party, .trade, .win, and .stream — $9.99 for the first year
- Ten domain endings from Radix (including .online, .site, .store and .tech) starting at $3.00 for the first year
- .shop — $9.99 for the first year (regular price: $49.95 per year)
*all regular prices indicated are Grid A prices
You can find all our promotions listed on the Promotions page of our website.
Calendar
Past |
Upcoming |
| December 2 — GoLive (General Availability) for .zuerich |
|
| January 1 — Price increase on .io | |
| January 1 — Price increase on .wien, .ac, .sh, .ch, and .li |
That’s all for this month! Thanks for reading. If you see something wrong, missing, or other ways your experience of this newsletter could be improved, please feel free to contact us. We really do read each and every one of your emails.
And if you’re satisifed with Gandi and our services, please help spread the word by leaving a review at Hostadvice.com and Trustpilot.com.