catflap.org Online Dictionary Query

  vanity domain
       
           A domain you register for the sole purpose of
          having your own domain so you can have an easily remembered
          URL and e-mail address.  The domain is usually served
          (often vhosted) off someone else's machines.
       
          This is as opposed to a domain you register because you have
          machines of your own which are already on the Internet and
          which you want to make addressable via something other than
          dot addresses.
       
          Whereas vanity domains were almost unheard-of in 1980s, since
          the invention and popularisation of the Web in the mid-1990s
          and the desire for URLs which consist only of memorable
          domain names (e.g., "http://www.pbs.org") for everything from
          movies to car wax, vanity domains have come to be the rule
          instead of the exception.
       
          (1997-09-11)