Underscore ("_" symbol) is not allowed. The only allowed characters are alphabets [a-z] (case INSENSITIVE), numbers[0-9] and dash ("-" symbol). International characters are accepted too but they are technically translated back to ASCII.

Besides length (the shorter, the better), existing traffic for common words or popular keywords is also a factor in selecting a domain, but it's more complicated in getting one especially the ones with an English word or keyword. There are however, a number of tools that can make your like much easier...

Examples? You may have know about brouhahas regarding sex.com, business.com, wine.com etc, but don't forget about highly potential malay words/keywords, too:-

rumah.com
lagu.com
xpdc.com
bskl.com
sitinurhaliza.com
malaysia.com
selangor.com
cari.com
wanita.com
lelaki.com
majalah.com
masjid.com

etc.

These domains get constant stream of daily visitors with ZERO promotion.

Another important rule is to always register variations of your domain name: ie. non-dashed for dashed names, matching .com even if you prefer .net/org/com.my or any other tld, potentially mispelled names, bad names, ie. yournamesuck.com etc, abbreviation or your organization etc.

I've seen many Malaysians making these mistakes, and end up losing considerable traffic.

More tools and tips at webpod.net...

Happy hunting!

__________________
N S @ bp.PP.my
Since 1993.