ICANN Seeking New Net-Naming Convention
N E W Y O R K, Aug. 4 -- The Internet’s oversight body will beginaccepting proposals next month to expand the pool of addresses usedto find Web sites.
New domain names such as “.movie” or “.travel” would helprelieve the crowded field of dot-coms. They would be the firstglobal suffixes added since the 1980s, when Net use was limited toacademics and bureaucrats.
“We’re within striking distance,” Andrew McLaughlin, chiefpolicy officer for the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names andNumbers, said Thursday. “Barring some disasters, we’ll startseeing new names early next year.”
As the Internet grows, the pool of short, simple names shrinks.So the Internet needs new domain suffixes, the same way the phonesystem often requires new area codes.
Names Needed for New Economy
At stake is a New Economy increasingly dependent on the Net andon customers’ ability to easily find Web sites.
ICANN will issue formal guidelines as early as today. For a$50,000 application fee, any company or organization may propose anew suffix. Applications will be accepted Sept. 5-Oct. 2, and twoweeks of public commenting will follow.
The Net organization will review the proposals and approve ahalf dozen or so new names at its annual meeting in November.
Several questions remain on how the new names would blend withexisting ones. For instance, would Ford Motor Co., the owner ofFord.com, automatically have the right to any new name, even ifformer President Gerald Ford wants it for a presidential library?And would a name like “.museum” be open to anyone, or only toexhibitors?
ICANN has not made any decision on these or many other issues,and has asked applicants to propose solutions. Many critics believeICANN should have settled these matters ahead of time.
Is ICANN Too Late?
But McLaughlin said the group wanted input from the Internetcommunity to avoid appearing “top down and heavy-handed.”
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