Fictitious domain name

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A fictitious domain name is a domain name used in a work of fiction or popular culture to refer to an Internet address that does not actually exist. This is similar in concept to 555 telephone numbers. RFC 2606 specifies particular reserved domains. Essentially, all versions of "example," among several others, are to be reserved, such as .example, example.com, example.org, example.edu, example.us, etc. for the purpose of providing a fictional domain name that is not actually used by anyone.

However, domain names that become popular in works of fiction have a tendency to become registered in real life (if possible). So it is difficult for any particular domain to be both popularly known and fictional. (Even example.com, mentioned above, is actually registered to the IANA,^[1] although not used for anything.) This phenomenon prompted NBC to purchase the domain name Hornymanatee.com after talk-show host Conan O'Brien spoke the name while ad-libbing on his show. O'Brien subsequently created a real website based around the concept and used it as a running gag on the show.^[2]

[edit] IP addresses

When IP addresses are called for in a script, some TV shows, like 24, use numbers that are over 255 (which are invalid addresses). The movie Swordfish uses an IP of 293.xx.xxx.xx in one scene, and the comic strip Narbonic referenced the fictitious IP 132.513.151.319. In Antitrust, several addresses in the 10.x.x.x range are shown; this is an RFC 1918 private network area. The CSI series uses addresses in the 5.xxx.xxx.xxx range, which is officially designated "reserved."^[3] The IP address range 192.0.2.x is called "TEST-NET" and designated by RFC 3330 as being "for use in documentation and example code".