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In 2008 Jothan Frakes held an impromptu survey for registry service providers for new gTLDs at the ICANN meeting in Paris. The results were then consolidated into a matrix and published on the Names At Work blog by his friend Antony van Couvering – unfortunately DNN could not locate the information on the site today. Now, two years later and a bit further into the introduction process for new gTLDs- ICANN has published the 4th revision of the Applicant Guidebook for New gTLDs – Jothan Frakes has started a follow-up survey.

In 2008 Jothan Frakes held an impromptu survey for registry service providers for new gTLDs at the ICANN meeting in Paris. The results were then consolidated into a matrix and published on the Names At Work blog by his friend Antony van Couvering – unfortunately DNN could not locate the information on the site today. Now, two years later and a bit further into the introduction process for new gTLDs- ICANN has published the 4th revision of the Applicant Guidebook for New gTLDs – Jothan Frakes has started a follow-up survey.

The first survey also seems to have had a big part in funding of the new gTLD service & consulting company Minds + Machines, which Frakes was part of. Now that he is not with the company any more, he can once again collect data in an independent survey of the registry services industry.

The survey will run until August 4th, 2010 and service providers (for ccTLDs & gTLDs) interested in having their information included can participate here: Registry Service Provider Survey

[Via Jothan Frakes' Blog]

(c) 2010 DomainNameNews.com

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Domain Names jothan frakes, new gTLDs, Registries, registry, Survey

The parent company of Minds + Machines, Top Level Domain Holdings [AIM: TLDH] reported their revenue for the period to the end of April with £32,000 ($49,000), with a loss of £462,000 ($708,000). The company is pretty much in a holding pattern until the release of the new gTLDs by ICANN and is expecting finalization of ICANN’s new gTLD Applicant Guidebook by November and is hoping for the opening of the first round at the ICANN Meeting in December. The company still has almost £4m in cash and equivalents and appears to have been bootstrapping operations. One of the former key-employees, Jothan Frakes, is not with the company any more. Potential threats to the company could be further delays of the release of new gTLDs through litigation.

The parent company of Minds + Machines, Top Level Domain Holdings [AIM: TLDH] reported their revenue for the period to the end of April with £32,000 ($49,000), with a loss of £462,000 ($708,000). The company is pretty much in a holding pattern until the release of the new gTLDs by ICANN and is expecting finalization of ICANN’s new gTLD Applicant Guidebook by November and is hoping for the opening of the first round at the ICANN Meeting in December. The company still has almost £4m in cash and equivalents and appears to have been bootstrapping operations. One of the former key-employees, Jothan Frakes, is not with the company any more. Potential threats to the company could be further delays of the release of new gTLDs through litigation.

[via DomainIncite]

(c) 2010 DomainNameNews.com

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Domain Names icann, jothan frakes, London Stock Exchange, Minds + Machines, new gTLDs, Revenue, TLDH, Top Level Domain Holdings, Up to the Minute

As already rumored by Stephane von Gelder yesterday, ICANN has just published the fourth version of the New gTLD Applicant Guidebook amongst a number of other documents released over the weekend.

As already rumored by Stephane von Gelder yesterday, ICANN has just published the fourth version of the New gTLD Applicant Guidebook amongst a number of other documents released over the weekend.

The release is supposed to give potential applicants and other stakeholders time to review the guidebook before the 38th ICANN meeting to be held in Brussels from June 20-25th. The new version of the guidelines includes changes to the Uniform Rapid Suspension (URS) process, the trademark clearing house and post-delegation dispute resolution, centralized zone file access (ZFA) amongst many other items. Another topic added is the Registry/Registrar separation issue which results in severe restrictions as to who may apply for a new TLD, especially affecting existing industry players. Other modifications seem to make country and continent TLDs close to impossible.

(c) 2010 DomainNameNews.com

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Domain Names applican guidebook, icann, ICANN / Policy, new gTLDs, Uniform Rapid Suspension, Up to the Minute, URS

Sex seems to be a hot topic in domain land. DNN was tipped about an Ebay auction in which a trademark for sex.sex is for sale.

Sex seems to be a hot topic in domain land. DNN was tipped about an Ebay auction in which a trademark for sex.sex is for sale.

The owner of the trademark believes that his mark for sex.sex , filed in July 2008 with a claimed first use in commerce of March 2009, will provide a leg up in the inevitable quest to capture the new TLD .sex

The owner states in the Ebay auction description :

The sex.sex trademark is valuable because:

* The bidding for the TLD .SEX won’t just be about the highest price – it must also reflect existing trademarks and business names. We believe that owning the sex.sex trademark will provide an advantage when ICANN make their decision.
* If a bidder is successful in obtaining the TLD .SEX without ownership of sex.sex, they should be obliged to allow the sex.sex trademark holder to register www.sex.sex on their system.
* Registering a trademark is complicated, there are lenghty approval process and proof of usage issues.

Is sex.sex the best word combination if there were a .sex gTLD ?  We can think of quite a few words that go before the .sex that would make more sense and seem to be much more targeted than this.

Trademarking of popular phrases occurred with the release of .EU and other extensions, and we suspect there will be more filings of trademarks and claims like this when other new gTLDs actually go live.  There was also a great deal of trouble getting .xxx approved, so why would a .sex TLD be any easier to get approved.

Domain Names .sex, new gTLDs, sex.sex

The ICANN board has voted down the community proposal for Expressions of Interest for new gTLD applicants, requiring a $55,000 application fee. The proposal was mainly driven by proponents and applicants for new gTLDs with the hopes of speeding up the process.

The ICANN board has voted down the community proposal for Expressions of Interest for new gTLD applicants, requiring a $55,000 application fee. The proposal was mainly driven by proponents and applicants for new gTLDs with the hopes of speeding up the process.

(c) 2009 DomainNameNews.com

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Domain Names EOI, Expressions of Interests, icann, new gTLDs, Up to the Minute

Google has just launched a Public DNS service according to a post on the Official Google Blog. The goal of the service is “to benefit users worldwide while also helping the tens of thousands of DNS resolvers improve their services, ultimately making the web faster for everyone“. On their product page they promise that the service is more secure as well as faster than many traditional domain name service resolved provided by the ISPs.

Google has just launched a Public DNS service according to a post on the Official Google Blog. The goal of the service is “to benefit users worldwide while also helping the tens of thousands of DNS resolvers improve their services, ultimately making the web faster for everyone“. On their product page they promise that the service is more secure as well as faster than many traditional domain name service resolved provided by the ISPs.

The OpenDNS like service will as a side benefit Google would also be able to see and track DNS queries of the users on the service and potentially redirect unresolved searches into Google Searches, similar to what many ISPs already do today. The company does promised not to use the data for anything else, but does state that non personal data will be stored for an indefinite period.

Google would also be able to block sites through the service that are for example suspected phishing sites. Depending on adaption the service could even introduce alternative TLDs, comparable to alternative root systems like new.net. For now their policy states that their service “never blocks, filters, or redirects users“. ICANN has recently issued an memorandum speaking out against NXdomain resolution for new gTLDs.

(c) 2009 DomainNameNews.com

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Domain Names google, icann, new gTLDs, nxdomain, public dns, resolver, Search Engines, wildcarding

According to our contacts at the current ICANN meeting in South Korea ICANN staff has announced that the schedule for new gTLDs will be pushed out even beyond Q2/2010 due to the controversy and amount of different opinions and comments from the community.

According to our contacts at the current ICANN meeting in South Korea ICANN staff has announced that the schedule for new gTLDs will be pushed out even beyond Q2/2010 due to the controversy and amount of different opinions and comments from the community.

In the meantime other working groups are pushing ahead to introduce IDN ccTLDs. When the the expansion of the root zones came up, there were no concerns to add as many as 100 zones in a short period of time.

Another topic of discussion is DNSSEC, the signing of the root zones published by the registry as a protection against DNS poisoning attacks.

We also expect the registrar/registry separation to be another big topic at the event. Interestingly enough Afilias seems to be one of the registries pushing to see this issue addressed – the registry operating company running .INFO and .ORG, which is owned by several registrars.

(c) 2009 DomainNameNews.com

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Domain Names icann, ICANN / Policy, IDN ccTLDs, new gTLDs

According to the New York Times, The Dot Gay Alliance (dotgay.org) of New York City and dotGay (dotgay.com) of San Francisco are both planning to apply to ICANN for the .GAY TLD. And while they haven’t closed the door to joining forces, they aren’t exactly planning to work together as of yet.

According to the New York Times, The Dot Gay Alliance (dotgay.org) of New York City and dotGay (dotgay.com) of San Francisco are both planning to apply to ICANN for the .GAY TLD. And while they haven’t closed the door to joining forces, they aren’t exactly planning to work together as of yet.

The Dot Gay Alliance application is spearheaded by Joe Dolce, a longtime gay activist who got the idea for a .GAY domain when he was working with Minds + Machines. The .ECO project caught his attention when Al Gore said he would only support the TLD if half the proceeds from the registration would go towards environmental groups. Because of this, Dolce is planning to use 51% of the proceeds from the extension to fund gay causes.

“This could be a significant source of funding for organizations fighting, doing very good, important work,” said Dolce. “It’s a very novel way that doesn’t involve putting your hand out, doesn’t involve another benefit or charity function. This is a community that has to sustain itself.”

A number of gay activists from the local New York community — including City Council speaker Christine C. Quinn and State Assemblyman Daniel J. O’Donnell — have written letters of support for the Dot Gay Alliance.

On the other hand, the dotGay application is lead by Alexander Schubert, a heterosexual who hasn’t yet rounded up any formal support from the local Bay Area community. He does, however, have experience in applying for new TLDs as he was the co-founder of a group which pushed for .BERLIN.

“All these years, I thought about the perfect top-level domain,” said Schubert, who was born and raised in Berlin, the gay capital of Europe. “I came to the conclusion that it should be a community like the gay community.”

And although Schubert plans to give more than half of the proceeds to gay causes,  Dolce doesn’t think he should be applying.

“If you’re launching a purely for-profit venture called dotGay and you are heterosexual, then you are in a way continuing a legacy of straight people earning a lot of money off of gay people that has gone on,” said Dolce. “I want to create a community which is run by the community and gives money back to the community.”

Both groups will attend the ICANN meeting in Seoul, South Korea, that starts on today.

(c) 2009 DomainNameNews.com

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Domain Names .eco, .GAY, al gore, Alexander Schubert, icann, Joe Dolce, Minds + Machines, new gTLDs, New York Times

A new Reuters article focused on a survey which concluded that most businesses don’t know about new gTLDs. The research, which only surveyed 100 business, and was sponsored by registrar Gandi.net doesn’t really lend itself to a whole lot of credibility.  The firm of Future Laboratory conducted the survey and comes to many conclusions based on the small bits of information they gathered.

A new Reuters article focused on a survey which concluded that most businesses don’t know about new gTLDs. The research, which only surveyed 100 business, and was sponsored by registrar Gandi.net doesn’t really lend itself to a whole lot of credibility.  The firm of Future Laboratory conducted the survey and comes to many conclusions based on the small bits of information they gathered.

We have no doubts about the conclusion that many small corporations have little knowledge of the possibility to own their domain name extension, we would venture to guess all except the global corporations really care about this prospect.  Most global brands have a team of IP lawyers and marketing directors who are likely aware of the issues and have made plans accordingly.  In fact some of these global brands are participating in changing domain name policy as part of the IRT team(pdf), are concerned with trademark issues with the new TLDs and have put up a stink about new TLD roll-outs.  If brands don’t know about the new TLDs why are they fighting them and trying to change the policies ?

Tom Savigar of Future Laboratory also concludes “(Owning their domain) could secure a higher level of credibility and recognition.”  Really a new domain is going to give global brands credibility and recognition that they don’t already have ?  A brand is a brand because it already has credibility and recognition. No domain name necessary.

Registrars obviously benefit from corporations who would want to protect their trademarks and would need to register multiple domains in all of the new extensions, so it is no big surprise to see some of these conclusions reached from “research” that does nothing to lead you to those conclusions. We would like to hear from a global corporation directly and see what they have to say about the new TLD prospects. . .of course after they review the expenses of running a new TLD and talk to their attorneys about the potential liablities.

ICANN was put on the ropes at the recent Congressional hearings and we’ve already seen ICANN consultants pushing forward the new TLD agenda. This article and “research” sure seems to wreak of a similar exercise of spin to push forward the idea that new TLDs are a good thing.

Domain Names gandi.net, icann, Miscellaneous, new gTLDs, Registrars