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Eurovision deploys dot-brand for ludicrous song contest

It isn’t making a song and dance about it, but the European Broadcasting Union is promoting is annual Eurovision Song Contest using its new dot-brand gTLD, .eurovision.
The default registry domain, nic.eurovision, is mirroring its regular web site — found at eurovision.tv — ahead on Friday night’s televised show.
It’s the only domain in the .eurovision zone so far; the EBU does not seem to be properly promoting the dot-brand yet.
That’s a pity for the domain industry, as Eurovision has a TV viewership measured in the hundreds of millions.
For those outside of the EBU’s 40 participating countries… Eurovision is an annual song competition contested by singers from mostly European nations, viewed in the UK largely as an excuse to have a bit of a mildly derisive giggle at our beloved neighbors’ taste in music, dress, culture, language, and so on.
Last year it was won by an Austrian drag queen with a beard. It’s like that, you understand.

The 60th annual televised Eurovision final takes place on Friday Saturday night.

.radio is now a contested gTLD

Kevin Murphy, March 29, 2012, Domain Registries

The proposed .radio generic top-level domain is now officially contested, after the European Broadcasting Union confirmed that it plans to apply for the gTLD.
It’s the second .radio candidate to publicly reveal its intentions after BRS Media’s long-public bid.
The Executive Board of the EBU met in London yesterday – cutting it pretty fine given ICANN’s deadlines – and officially approved the bid, according to an EBU announcement.
The organization said in a statement:

the .radio TLD would allow the EBU to create an internet-based platform where the world’s radio broadcasters could assemble. Closer networking ‘under one roof’ would also bolster their position as an indispensible media sector, whose development would be accelerated by new radio services.

The EBU said its bid is supported by the Asia-Pacific Broadcasting Union (ABU); Arab States Broadcasting Union (ASBU); African Union of Broadcasting (AUB); Caribbean Broadcasting Union (CBU); International Association of Broadcasting (IAB); North American Broadcasters Association (NABA); Organizacion de Telecomunicaciones Iberoamericanas (OTI).
The EBU is a Swiss trade association comprising national broadcasters, mostly based in Europe.
It’s also known for its annual Eurovision Song Contest broadcast, a singing competition which is known at least in the UK as a bit of tacky joke.
Oh, and the EBU has confirmed that it is going to apply for .eurovision, which appears to be the first example – but certainly not the last – of a probably wholly unnecessary dot-brand.
BRS Media, which also has longstanding plans to apply for .radio, is the current registry operator for the repurposed ccTLDs .am and .fm.
BRS still plans to apply for .radio, according to CEO George Bundy.
“We always felt that our knowledge of the On-Air AND Online Radio marketplace, backed with 15 years of real (.FM/.AM) registry experience provides us with a much better understanding in managing, marketing and operating an Industry specific top-level domain, like .Radio,” he said.