I actually disagree with the blog. I don't work for Google but I think my parents would be better served with just knowing which domain name they're on rather than having to parse through a huge url.
If that was the case, then emphasizing the domain name within the url would address their needs, while preserving the full url for anyone who needs/wants it. I'm looking at Firefox's url bar as I type this, and the url text is all medium grey except for ycombinator.com, which is black. There is absolutely no confusion about what site I'm on, and no need to parse through a huge url.
