Nominet to release one-letter domains
Nominet, the .uk registry, is thinking about releasing previously restricted domains for registration, including one and two-letter domains and domains that match existing TLDs.
If the scheme goes ahead, it would mean hundreds of domains such as com.co.uk, mobi.co.uk and de.co.uk, which contain strings currently used at the top level, could be auctioned off.
Essentially all ccTLD strings would be made available, as well as …continue reading
ICANN chief slams African monopolies
ICANN may have been handed a lemon when it discovered six African nations will be crashing its party in Nairobi, but CEO Rod Beckstrom today sought to make lemonade.
Beckstrom “threw down the gauntlet” and invited IGAD nation leaders to “shatter telecom monopolies” and make high-speed internet access more affordable to the average African. …continue reading
Oscar winners show desire for .movie
As a bit of a film buff, I’ve always thought the case for a .movie gTLD was a slam-dunk.
I’d really rather see movie posters containing URLs like sherlock.movie rather than sherlock-holmes-movie.warnerbros.com.
I thought I’d figure out how many of last night’s Oscar nominees managed to secure movietitle.tld for their official web sites and how many went for other options. …continue reading
Cyber cop wants Whois privacy shake-up
Registrars should be made to police Whois so cops can take down illegal sites faster, even if domain name prices have to go up as a result, ICANN’s Government Advisory Committee has been told.
Speaking at the GAC hearing on new gTLDs in Nairobi this afternoon, Paul Hoare of the UK’s Serious and Organised Crime Agency called for …continue reading
Gossip: Geldof, China and Site Finder
Eight Sunday morning tidbits.
- Bob Geldof was on the BBC’s Andrew Marr Show this morning, via satellite from Nairobi. It seems likely he’s there in relation to to IGAD conference on east-African drought, which is being held at the same venue as the ICANN meeting, which kicked off today. Let’s hope he’s …continue reading
Contested TLDs by the social media numbers
There are a surprising number of new TLD proposals with two or more would-be applicants. Quite a few are also playing the social media marketing game to win support.
A quick and dirty analysis of the contested TLDs show that .gay and .eco have the largest show of popular support, while some TLDs have seemingly no following at all.
The numbers are not earth-shattering, but I’ve made the table now so I may as well share it.
…continue reading
Political hell to descend on ICANN meeting
Forget terrorists, in-person attendees at ICANN’s Nairobi meeting will now have to contend with something potentially much worse: politicians.
About 200 civil servants and security goons from six east-African nations will descend on the Kenyatta International Conference Centre on Monday, just as ICANN’s 37th get-together gets together …continue reading
Gossip: No booth babes for domainers
Eight interesting things collected from interesting web sites:
- No booth babes? No magicians? No speakers? No Powerpoint malfunctions? What the hell kind of tech conference is DOMAINFest Europe? At least the beer will be cheap.
- Speaking of Prague, you can add UDRP to …continue reading
ICANN expects 400+ gTLD applications
If you’ve been wondering how many new gTLDs could be launching under the new streamlined ICANN approval process, ICANN has provided a partial answer.
According to a report into server load by the Root Server System Advisory Committee “demand in the initial round will be …continue reading
Will .xxx be a slam dunk in Nairobi?
When .xxx appeared on the agenda (kinda) for ICANN’s Nairobi board meeting, it didn’t look to me like particularly spiriting news for ICM Registry.
The agenda item coyly reads “Consideration of the Independent Review Panel Declaration ICM Registry v. ICANN”.
This could quite be easily interpreted as a rather dry picking-over of the legal implications of the IRP’s findings; the board could still brush the ruling aside as “advisory” and hope Stuart Lawley isn’t waiting outside with a gang of armed …continue reading
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