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1 character domains coming to .MOBI and .COOP?
Friday, May 30. 2008
They're considered the most precious of all domain commodities: 1-character names.
But they've been unavailable for years in all the major generic extensions (GTLDs). In fact, all 16 gTLD registries are obligated under the terms of their contracts with ICANN to reserve single character names so that they may not be registered.
But there are plans afoot to change that. Last year, ICANN's Generic Names Supporting Organization (GNSO) recommended that 1 and 2 character domains be released in existing and future gTLDs. ICANN itself controls all but 6 of the possible 144 single character names (letters and numbers) in .COM, .NET, .EDU and .ORG (the exceptions are q.com, x.com, z.com, i.net, q.net, and x.org) and is known to be considering auctioning off the single character .COMs.
Can't say I'm a big fan of registry-run auctions, or auctions run by others with a monopoly over the resource they're selling, which is why I was encouraged to read .MOBI and .COOP's May 29th registry requests to ICANN for the release of single character (and 2 character in .COOP's case) domains.
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Bientôt des noms à 1 caractère en .MOBI et .COOP ?
Friday, May 30. 2008
C'est le Sacré Graal des noms de domaine : les noms à un caractère de type "a.com". Considérés comme les plus désirables de tous, ils ont selon certains experts une valeur parfois inestimable. Traditionnellement, ces noms sont néanmoins bloqués par les registres eux-mêmes, ce qui ajoute bien entendu à l'effet spéculatif. C'est une obligation contractuelle entre les 16 registres d'extensions génériques (gTLD) et l'ICANN.
Mais il y a depuis quelques temps un courant vers leur déblocage. Ainsi en mai 2007, le Comité de Soutien Générique de l'ICANN (GNSO) avait-il conseillé au Conseil d'administration d'autoriser le déblocage des noms à un et deux caractères (généralement également bloqués) pour les gTLDs actuels et futurs. L'ICANN étudie d'ailleurs un projet d'enchères sur les noms mono-caractère en .COM puisque 138 des 144 noms de ce type possibles (lettre ou chiffre) pour chacune des extensions .COM, .NET, .EDU et .ORG sont directement sous son contrôle (les six exceptions étant : q.com, x.com, z.com, i.net, q.net, and x.org).
C'est dans ce contexte que les registres du .MOBI et du .COOP viennent (le 29 mai) de demander à l'ICANN l'autorisation de commercialiser les noms mono- caractère (la demande du .COOP porte également sur les noms à 2 caractères). Et pour quelqu'un qui n'apprécie pas les enchères organisées par les registres, j'ai été très agréablement surpris par les méthodes d'attribution proposées.
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It's Requirements Panel time again!
Wednesday, May 28. 2008
Next week I'm back in Brussels at .EU registry EURid's headquarters for a day. It's the fourth .EU Requirements Panel (RP) meeting, where representatives from 7 registrars meet with EURid staff to work on improving .EU.
The panel looks at "requirements" and sorts them in order of priority so that EURid's development team can then include them in their schedule. I consider the RP a fine example of a registry working in an intelligent manner to improve itself and its product (.EU in this case) by involving its sales network (the registrars).
The RP is a EURid initiative, and EURid controls it. But having already taken part in 3 meetings, I can say that the registrars' views are what counts. Membership on the RP was by invitation only, and EURid has tried to put together a panel that would be a good representation of its registrar community as a whole. The 7 registrars are: Ascio, Ezone, Home, Key Systems, Registerit, Strato and us.
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Failed domain blackmailing attempt
Tuesday, May 27. 2008
Interested to read a story in Thanh Nien, a Vietnamese news site, about a failed attempt at blackmailing a local steel company through an infringing domain name.
The company, called the Hoa Sen Group and which is also known as the Lotus Steel Sheet Company (LSSC), had refused to buy the domain tonhoasen.com from 24 year old IT graduate Huynh Chi Hieu, who had registered the name and asked them around USD 3,000 for it.
Undeterred, the cybersquatter then proceeded to put a fake LSSC website behind the domain and contacted the company again. This time, they agreed to buy (for USD 2,500).
But unbeknownst to the web crook, LSSC also contacted the police. When Hieu went to LSSC's office to collect the money, he ended up being "collected" by the cops instead.
Don't know if the story's true (tonhoasen.com does point to what looks like the official Lotus Steel website now, but the name's Whois doesn't seem to have been updated), but I certainly hope it is. Considering what it feels like to be held hostage by some Internet scammer, it's great to see one brought to justice every now and then…
Getting revved up about .CAR
Friday, May 23. 2008
Let me start this post by saying that I am a total car nut. That might help you understand why I'm so excited to hear about a proposal for a new gTLD that would be called .CAR.
The proposal comes from ATX, a firm I'd never heard of (and perhaps that's also the point of the .CAR proposal: a publicity stunt) but which claims to be "the world's largest independent telematics services provider to the automotive industry", whatever that means.
The rationale behind .CAR is very similar to .MOBI's. The idea is to have an extension for content designed specifically for use in the automotive environment. "Browsing the Internet in the vehicle is a unique environment with unique characteristics," says ATX. The proposal also stretches to the possible use of .CAT sites in conjunction with onboard vehicle data such as performance, maintenance or location data.
Don't know how serious .CAR, but I love the idea of web content designed specifically for in-car browsing…
The strange case of the .ASIA auctions
Monday, May 19. 2008
Did Pool, auction operator for the .ASIA Sunrise, rig some of the auctions to secure valuable names for itself or its CEO Richard Schreier?
Both Pool and .ASIA registry DotAsia have had to go into major damage control after being accused of auction rigging by Thomas Rucker and his company Madunia. On his website, Rucker claims that Schreier built up a complex network of shadow companies (see photo) to preempt the .ASIA Sunrise auctions and secure valuable names like porn.asia, insurance.asia or girls.asia.
In an email sent to DomainNews.com, Schreier responded by revealing that Rucker may be not squeaky clean himself: "We believe the actions taken by Thomas Rucker and Madunia Modellbau GmbH are a retaliation by Reucker/Madunia as a result of their exclusion from certain DotAsia auctions (which Reucker/Madunia itself discloses on the "notes" section of the website). This exclusion was the result of the investigation by Pool.com and the DotAsia Organisation into possible bid rigging (…) This investigation is proper and warranted. We will resist all efforts to interfere in this investigation or otherwise undermine the integrity of the .ASIA auctions."
The plot thickens…
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Guide to Paris ICANN conference up on ICANNWiki
Wednesday, May 14. 2008
There's a great resource for ICANN followers and meeting participants alike: the ICANNWiki.
An independent initiative, over the years it has become the default stop for information on who's who in the community, what's going on and where it's happening. For each major event, like an ICANN meeting (the wiki also covers other events like domain conferences), a guide is put up to help people find their way around.
At INDOM, we're great fans of the wiki. As it relies on sponsorship and volunteers, we decided to put our money where our mouth was and help with the Paris meeting pages.
So we've written and provided content for the wiki's Paris meeting guide pages. Check them out and if there's any other bits of useful info you'd like to see up there and we haven't thought of, please let us know!
Cairo chosen for 3rd 2008 ICANN meeting
Wednesday, May 7. 2008
The ICANN Board met by teleconference on April 30th and discussed the issue of ICANN's international meetings at some length. Cairo was officially designated as the host city for the third and final ICANN meeting of the year.
Budgets were also discussed at length. The Paris meeting budget, which stood at USD 1.54 million when I last mentioned this topic, has now grown to USD 1.81 million. Cairo promises to be even more expensive with the Board approving a USD 2.03 million budget.
The Board also spent some time on the proposal to cut the number of annual ICANN meetings to 2 per year from the current 3. The minutes make fascinating reading. ICANN VP Paul Levins providing some clear and sensible explanations as to why this is being considered. ICANN clearly understands that with so many in the community devoting a fairly large amount of time and money to attending meetings, it might be a good idea to look at alternatives.
When asked if cost reduction was the main motivation, Paul Levins is quoted as saying that this is partly the case, but that it "was mainly about reform to the meetings process and the investment of time and anecdotal information received from the community that up to 20 days per year is a big investment in community time in meeting time, especially for a volunteer community many of whom had to rely upon their place of employment to support them."
Jobs.ca, Canada's record sale
Tuesday, May 6. 2008
Confirming the current trend for bigger and bigger sales of ccTLD domains, Internet real-estate developer Ogopogo Media has confirmed its 600,000 USD purchase of jobs.ca.
The name will become the core "of a planned job network, which will include JobSearch.ca and Resumes.ca that will cover all the needs of both job seekers and employers," claims the buyer.
This sale sets a new record for Canada's extension. It also provides clear confirmation (if any was needed) of the growing interest in ccTLDs. Investors are flocking to country codes for obvious reasons. The suffixes are less crowded that generics like .COM, giving them better chances of finding names that are still available. Furthermore, those names that are already taken tend to be cheaper to buy.
At INDOM, we're getting more and more volume buyers coming to us for ccTLDs. Their logic is sound. 600,000 might sound like a lot, but when you compare the sale price of .CA's most expensive domain ever to that of the record-setting .COM domains, there's obviously still a lot of potential left in going national rather than international for your choice of suffixes.
World watching French "registry campaign"
Sunday, May 4. 2008
Several sites and blogs around the world have picked on the public consultation launched by the French government to determine the best way in which .FR should be run and what the upcoming Request For Proposals to run the French registry should focus on.
This process is bound to be fascinating to follow worldwide for people interested in the domain name industry. France has often shown itself to be as modern and innovative as it is set in its ways and hard to decipher.
On this issue, seeing a government asking in a very public way the question – "has our Internet suffix been run right and what could be done to improve it?" – has to appear very positive. Especially when that government puts the position of registry up for grabs after a decade with an existing organisation, AFNIC, who's always seemed as safe as houses.
All well and good, but only if the French government's intent really is to launch a fair RFP in which every candidate has an equal chance. If this turns out to be just a "make-up" exercise to consolidate AFNIC's position as the French registry, then the French authorities will have lost a lot of credibility as far as the worldwide Internet community is concerned.
But let's not draw any hasty conclusions here. The first step in the process, the current consultation, has a June 24 deadline. No date has yet been announced for publication of the answers that will be sent in, but I for one can't wait to read them. Here's hoping some will come from outside France…
Oh, and BTW, a quick wave to the guys at Domainnews.com who ran my previous post on the consultation and to Michele who also mentioned it in an great post about the current "fun and games" in the ccTLD wolrd 
