Despite last-minute push backs from the FTC and Senator Rockerfeller it looks like ICANN is pushing ahead with the opening of the application period for new gTLD’s on January 12th.
ICANN announced on its Facebook page today:
“In just 13 days, the application window for new generic top-level domains opens! ”
“Check out the new gTLDs tab on our Facebook page for more details on the benefits, risks and application process.”
“Click share to help spread the word!”
If if you think everyone is against the new gTLD program, well there are over 1,900 likes for this story from today, a pretty good showing for any Facebook story.
By the time everyone is back from the new years weekend it will be January 2nd and there will only be 9 more days until the application window opens.
Stay tuned.
I’m sure the application provides no guarantees of inclusion in the root (too tired to look up the exact page number; I’ll leave it as an exercise for the reader). If ICANN waits until after applications are made to do a reversal, it’ll have to refund the money. So, January 12th is not “special” to opponents of new TLDs.
George
Once money hits the table and someone has paid consideration for something I think the game changes.
I think taking money on Jan 12th is an important development
GoDaddy’s latest statement on SOPA is educational:
“Go Daddy opposes SOPA because the legislation has not fulfilled its basic requirement to build a consensus among stake-holders in the technology and Internet communities.”
Replace “GoDaddy” and “SOPA” with “ICANN Board and “the current new TLD program” and that’s the verbatim statement that ICANN should release, sooner or later.
ICANN could cause it’s own downfall by pushing its luck too far selling more and more smoke aka domain namespace? Some might doubt it. Too big (entrenched) too fail.
But GK is correct. SOPA aka Hollywood may be the one to precipitate the end of ICANN’s domain names business. Though that might not be the intended outcome.
Because when they target centralised DNS, the internet’s serious users will inevitably work around this, as they have in every other instance of an obstacle; centralised DNS just won’t make much sense anymore.
The internet can function just fine with ICANN. Never forget that DNS is only a convenience. What makes the internet work for everyone is not a central root (the com servers are arguably much more important), it’s the almost universal adoption of TCP/UDP/IP.
But most loyal followers won’t know that until ICANN fades away. If it comes to pass…
s/with/without
gradual weakening and decline of .com
winners and the biggest beneficiaries will be short meaningful recognizable domains like
.Co
So ICANN are accepting money for something they knowingly may not be capable of delivering?
Quote-
“So ICANN are accepting money for something they knowingly
may not be capable of delivering?”
When you say it like that, it sounds like fraud.
(I realize that is what you are implying.)
CB
ICANN is accepting money to apply for a new gTLD under a program which they approved under their authority given by the US government to run the domain name system.
While there have been calls for ICANN to stop, amend or roll back the program no ICANN appears to be moving ahead.
“under authority to run the domain name system”
should really be
“under authority to run a domain name system”
The one ICANN runs is by far the most popular.
But if SOPA or PROTECTIP passes and America begins censoring domain names in the US-based ICANN DNS, that could change.
Today we see an exodus from GoDaddy.
In the future we may see an exodus from all US-based registrars and registries to offshore alternatives.
Of course if this legislation passes, the locus of the registrar or registry would make little difference for Americans. They could be shut off from accessing certain domain names and IP addresses by their US-based ISP. They could be firewalled off from the rest of the world, by authority of the US government.
Quite a battle going on with the future of the internet at stake. I’m certainly a proponent of more domains as it should help level the playing field across the internet. ICANN has every right to take applications and push on with this expansion, it’s not like they just sprung this on everybody at the last minute. Everyone has just waited to the last minute to now start complaining. The only real concern may be that it could drive an online bubble in internet domains, but that bubble doesn’t seem anywhere near over inflation yet…not when you see new extensions selling out at 99 buck annual renewals.
Uhh… no, there’s far more “real” concerns than that… and it isn’t like everyone waited until after it was too late… but ICANN does not ever listen to any concerns conflicting with the interest of ICANN.
Please explain what are the “real” concerns. I’m not following
well, perhaps you should research that yourself… since you’ve obviously not been following.
Brand holders hate this, and for good reason – research that… But this is a billion dollar play for ICANN, so they are going to do whatever they want on whatever timeline pleases them for self interest.
So, your probably not thinking that ICANN is going to be selling .pepsi to coke but more in the lines of large brand holders being somewhat forced to buy their own extension for a large sum of money like after pepsi buys .pepsi…. it would put a lot of pressure on coke to buy .coke
Then Coke then might want to get ahead by buying .refreshment, .drinks, .cola ect… to help corner additional markets. It’s definitely a little crazy since few of these extensions are going to have broad keyword appeal and sound more like private extensions.
But, why has it taken so long to raise opposition to this. From what I’ve read new tld’s have been a point of discussion for some time now.