Domain Name Registrars for Canadians

This will be kind of a mind-dump of a post, more like logging my strategies for my own future reference.

I want my own domain name for my blog here, which is hosted by Google's Blogger service.  I've never tried registering for a domain name before, so here's my attempt at finding a decent registrar.

Looking for reviews
I found some reviews of various domain registrars:

• http://www.jonlee.ca/domain-registrar-review/
• http://www.jonlee.ca/domain-registrar-review-canadian-edition/
• http://www.jonlee.ca/domain-registrar-review-canadian-edition/comment-page-1/#comment-221925

That then turned up these two Registrars I found interesting:

• Names Pro http://www.namespro.ca/
• Netfirms http://www.netfirms.ca/

I also found out that .ca domain names are all managed by the CIRA:
http://ro.cira.ca

Checking up BBB
And I also started checking out BBB for Registrars:

• BBB Find Business Reviews
• BBB reviews Netfirms
• BBB reviews Go Daddy
• BBB reviews Webnames
• BBB reviews EasyDNS

Go Daddy has "nice" ads but I've heard lots of horror stories about them too, but of course with any big company there'll be those amongst the many more good stories that no one hears.  BBB says they're good but there's lots of complaints regardless.  Tough to say what value BBB records really have though.

I tried another tactic, i.e. to find bad things about Netfirms.  For instance, I dig up WordPress hosting woes.  So it might suck for WordPress hosting due to server issues.  Nothing about domain name registration though that I could see.

This is my first real attempt at finding a domain registrar, and I'm realizing that I'm just trying to optimize along too many dimensions, so I asked a friend for a recommendation.

Asking for a friendly recommendation
My friend reminds me that if I need web hosting service in addition to needing DNS service, then Dotster or Network Solutions can be worth the extra money.  Otherwise, Domainsatcost, Dotster, or Go Daddy, would all work.

• http://www.domainsatcost.ca/
• http://www.dotster.com/domain/
• http://www.networksolutions.com/

All I need is DNS service, not web hosting.  Specifically for Blogger custom domain services, I need to be able to set custom CNAMES and A NAMES records for my domain name.  (See http://www.google.com/support/blogger/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=55373)

I also went back to looking up BBB on these companies that were suggested to me:

• Domains At Cost
• Dotster
• Network Solutions

So the word of mouth suggestion from someone I'd tend to place more confidence on is for one company that has a F score on BBB, and one with seemingly quite expensive plans that has an A score on BBB.  Both are actually quite expensive compared to, say Go Daddy though.

Decisions, decisions...

What do big sites do?
I try another tactic.  I checked out some major sites (several major universities, news papers, etc.) thru whois (http://whois.cira.ca/) to see where they register through.  Many come up using Webnames.ca.  I check it out and it's expensive!  So if you don't mind the cost, I guess it must be pretty good if many major institutions use it (or maybe they cater to major clients with other services?).

Decisions

After looking at all the available data, I'm going with GoDaddy.  It's inexpensive enough, and offers enough features, and apparently is good at resolving complaints.