Internet Group Broadens Web Address Names
By SAM HOLMES
Source: The Wall Street Journal
SINGAPORE—The dot-com era is over. Welcome to the dot-anything age.
The organization that regulates the world's Internet domain names Monday approved changes that will allow companies and individuals to potentially register any name they like in almost any language as a Web address, a step that could change the way users navigate the Web. Under the new rules, those who register names can use suffixes beyond the traditional .com or .net—or simply have a one-word Internet address.
Not-for-profit Internet Corp. for Assigned Names and Numbers, known as Icann, said the much more open—and potentially much messier—approach to domain name registration will spur a new rush of innovation. Companies could establish an identifying suffix for brand purposes, and experts say it could help banks or others keen to boost their online security credentials. It may also provide entrepreneurs an opportunity to generate new business by selling second-level domains.
Agence France-Presse/Getty Images
Peter Dengate Thrush, standing, chairman of Internet Corp. for Assigned Names and Numbers, at an Icann meeting in Singapore on Monday with Rod Beckstrom, the organization's president and chief executive.
"This may be the dawn of a new age of online innovation in the domain-name space," said Icann Chief Executive Rod Beckstrom in Singapore Monday, adding, "the Internet's addressing system has just been opened up to the limitless possibilities of human imagination and creativity."
Adrian Kinderis, chief executive of Melbourne-based AusRegistry International—registrar for the country domains of Australia (.au), Oman (.om), Qatar (.qa) and United Arab Emirates (.ae)—is helping clients prepare their application for top level domains. He said the majority of applicants are either corporations looking to secure their brand identity or entrepreneurs looking for a valuable plot of cyber real estate.
For example, the registrar of the .doctor domain could make money by selling what are known as second-level domains—yourname.doctor, for example—only to licensed doctors. "I could sell those for $1,000 a throw because you're adding value into the verification mechanism that exists within top-level domains," Mr. Kinderis said.
A top-level domain name of up to 63 characters of just about any string of letters can be registered, Icann said. For instance, someone could turn "asknotwhatyourcountrycandoforyouaskwhatyoucandoforyourcountry" into a domain, with no suffix. Applicants will need to spend $185,000 upfront just to apply for such a unique name, however, though traditional addresses would still cost a small fraction of that.
Icann will accept the first round of applications for addresses under the new rules from Jan. 12 to April 12. The first of the new domains could be online by late 2012.
Icann said the hefty fee is based on the estimated cost of processing the applications, including possible litigation involving name disputes and other contingencies, although the auction process could potentially generate some sizeable revenue that would go into the organization's reserves.
The winner will be determined by a panel that will decide on the appropriateness of an applicant according to a series of criteria such as how the applicant plans to use the domain and whether the business model is sustainable.
Applicants will be refunded according to how early they withdraw their application ahead of the announcement of the winning applicant.
Icann will reject applicants that look like cyber squatters looking to take advantage of brand names or trademarks that clearly don't belong to them, so in theory only one applicant would realistically be eligible to buy a domain such as .cocacola.
Where it gets trickier but potentially more lucrative for Icann is with more semantically generic domains such as .anything.
If Icann can't decide on the single most appropriate candidate out of a group for a particular name, the process moves to an auction, in which case the winner will likely be the one with the deepest pockets.
The organization's chairman, Peter Dengate Thrush, said at the media briefing he expects most fights would be settled outside the application process before they reach the auction stage.
"But if they do [go to auction] then that money would go back to the [Icann] community for good work," he said, without specifying how Icann could spend the money.
This is not the first time Icann has sought to expand the number of generic domain names. Early last decade a handful of generic domain names such as .info, .biz and .museum were introduced to ease demand for the more popular tags, though the reception for these new names was generally lukewarm.
Corrections & Amplifications:
A top-level domain name of up to 63 characters of just about any string of letters can be registered, Icann said. An earlier version of this article incorrectly said a domain name could include numbers.
A top-level domain name of up to 63 characters of just about any string of letters can be registered, Icann said. An earlier version of this article incorrectly said a domain name could include numbers.
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