Industry news from NetNames

The decision means that companies could turn brands into web addresses while individuals could use their names.
Some believe there could be at least 5,000 new top-level domains, but others say there could be demand for billions.
Peter Dengate Thrush, a member of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), said the decision was of "historic importance".
The new system should come in next year, but ICANN admits there will be plenty of problems, and it may have to arbitrate between different organisations seeking the same name.

Jonathan Robinson, Chief Operating Officer at the domain name management specialist NetNames (www.netnames.com) assesses decision’s impact on the industry.

“While it is clear the Internet domain name structure needs to evolve, the ICANN vote in favour of opening up Top Level Domains (TLDs) leads to complex questions for marketers and trademark owners.

“It can be argued that the expansion of available suffixes is the equivalent of opening a can of worms in terms of online infringement and cybersquatting – it seems logical to assume that as domain numbers increase, so too will the levels of speculative activity.   

“Brand owners may find themselves in the position of having to register numerous new domains to protect themselves but, with varying fee estimates that could well turn out to be an untenable marketing expense for some. Nonetheless, the impact on existing domains remains to be seen. In the case of a big brand, presumably any browsers visiting a newly registered domain would be redirected to the original TLD in any case. There will also be question marks over how new domains will affect Search Optimisation and consequent site traffic and PPC advertising rates.

“One thing that does seem clear is, with the final pricing and potential refund and dispute procedures not yet in place for applicants, brand owners and the trademark community will be keeping an extremely close eye on developments in the coming months.

Since 1997 the .nu domain's policies have restricted the registration of number-only and number-with-hyphen domains. Last year, .nu domain modified this policy slightly and began allowing the registration of 1- and 2-character numeric names as part of its launch of a premium domain name service. But as of 10 June, with some exceptions, they have started to permit the general registration of any combination of numbers or numbers-with-hyphens, in the .nu domain name space.

There are now two classes of numeric .nu domain names:
Premium numeric names, comprised only of numeric names using three numbers or numbers in combination with a hyphen (1-4.nu), which will be available to register for a one-year (or greater) term and standard numeric names, comprised of all other numeric and numeric-with-hyphen combinations up to 63 characters long. Names that are five numeric characters long, which are commonly used as postal codes, and certain other numeric names of high public or private interest, including 888.nu, 411.nu, and others will not be released for registration during the 10 June Landrush period. .nu domain will make them available for registration at a later time.
 
Please contact you NetNames Platinum Service account manager with any questions or queries.

For this reason the Registry is currently not accepting new orders, modification or DNS updates, but existing DNS resolution will remain
unaffected. Any orders placed with NetNames will be queued until the Registry re-opens at which point they will be submitted.
Please contact your Platinum Service account manager with any queries.

The University of Puerto Rico previously operated the .kn registry but wanted to divest themselves of the task according to the ICANN board meeting 30 April preliminary report. The report notes the re-delegation request was received from relevant government representatives to move it to the Ministry of Finance, Sustainable Development, Information and Technology of Saint Kitts and Nevis. The operations are to be conducted by the ccTLD operator for .tw (TWNIC).

The Registry is therefore planning to open .mp up to anyone who is interested, however prior to that they are running a Sunrise period to trademark holders until 31 August 2008. They are warning trademark holders that once the domain is opened up to all, that those who have not taken advantage of this Sunrise opportunity may recover trademark derived .mp domain names through UDRP administered by WIPO.
 
.mp Sunrise Eligibility Requirements
In order to be eligible for registration of a .mp domain name during the Sunrise Period, the Applicant must satisfiy the following conditions:

The Applicant is the owner, co-owner, or assignee of a current (non-expired) trademark registration in its name. The Applicant cannot be merely the licensee of a mark covered by a trademark registration. Moreover, a registration in the supplemental register is not sufficient.

The domain name includes textual or word elements which are identical to the trademark registration on which the application is based.

Identity will be deemed to exist also where there is a space between the textual or word elements of the trademark (e.g., "service mark") and, in the domain name, a hyphen is used or the elements are combined (e.g., <service-mark.mp> or <servicemark.mp>). Identity will also be deemed to exist when special characters in the trademark, such as ~!@#$%^&*()_+<>[]{}/\|, spaces, and punctuation (such as :;"',.?), are, in the domain name, eliminated entirely (no space), replaced by hyphens within a domain name, or transcribed in a conveniently accepted way. A trademark registration for "Service&Mark" will be considered identical with <servicemark.mp>, <service-mark.mp>, or <serviceandmark.mp>. If the trademark contains letters which contain additional elements that for technical reasons cannot be reproduced in the domain name, such as ä, é or ñ, the letters concerned must, in the domain name, be reproduced without these elements (such as ä, é or ñ), or must be replaced by conventionally accepted spellings (such as æ for ä). In all other respects, the domain name must include textual or word elements which are identical to the mark, although the domain name may include other terms (e.g. the domain name <servicemarksucks.com> shall be deemed to include textual or word elements which are identical to "service mark").

The trademark registration on which the application is based is of national effect, and its relevant textual or word elements have not been disclaimed. For example, United States federal trademark registrations and European Community trademarks meet the condition of national effect, but United States state trademark registrations (e.g., New York) do not.

The trademark on which the application is based was registered or applied for in the name of the applicant, prior to July 1, 2007 with the trademark authority with which the trademark is registered. It is also sufficient if the applicant had applied for the trademark before that date, provided that the trademark is registered by the time of the domain name application.

The domain name is not already reserved.

Please contact your NetNames Platinum Service account manager for further information or email http://platinum@netnames.com.

During this quiet period all Sunrise applications will be reviewed and domains with multiple valid applicants will be assigned through an auction among the applicants that passed the validation. NetNames is now accepting Land rush orders.

.ME Launch schedule;
May 1 2008 15:00 UTC (Universal Coordinated Time) - May 6 2008 17:00 UTC: Montenegrin Sunrise -  now closed
May 6 2008 17:00 UTC - May 20 2008 17:00 UTC: General Sunrise – now closed
May 20 2008 17:00 UTC - June 6 2008 15:00 UTC: Quiet period - in progress
June 6 2008 15:00 UTC - June 26 2008 17:00 UTC: Land rush
June 26 2008 17:00 UTC - July 17 2008 15:00 UTC: Quiet period
July 17 2008 15:00 UTC: Open registration (Domain names are registered on a first-come, first-served basis)
September 2008 (“Premium Names? auctions expected to begin).

Please contact your NetNames Platinum Service account manager or contact platinum@netnames.com for further information.

• The existing 20-domain-per-registrant limit will be lifted; there will be no more limits on how many .si domains each registrant may own.  
Natural persons will be able to register .si domain names (now only legal entities were allowed to register .si domain names).

• Residence of the registrants will no longer be limited i.e. non-Slovenian entities (both legal as well as natural persons) will also be allowed to register .si domain names

• Registrations and renewals will be possible for more than 1 year; the registry will allow renewals for up to 5 years

• Ownership changes (both registrar and registrant) will become a payable transaction. Ownership change will, however, no longer reset the domain's expiration date as it does now

• Domain's expiration date will stay the same after the transfer

• Natural persons will have the option to "return" the domain name within 15 days from the registration date. Legal entities will not have this option.

The exact date the new rules will come into effect is not yet published, but we have been advised that it is likely to be October 9th, 2008.
Once we have further information it will be puclished.
For further details contact your NetNames Platinum Service account manager or contact platinum@netnames.com.

pr -  Puerto Rico introduce Internationalised Domain Names (IDN's). 
The Puerto Rican Registry has announced that applicants can now register .pr domain names using Internationalised Domain Names (IDN's). The introduction of these new domain names now enables Spanish, French, German and Portuguese speakers to register using words commonly used in those languages such as muñeca.pr, teléfonos.pr, garçon.pr, schön.pr, or amanhã.pr.
 
There is an IDN converter at: www.netnames.com/idn. Please contact your account manager to place an order, or call 0870 458 9401

It comes as no surprise that today there is an estimated $2 billion domain name industry. The buying and selling of domain names and pay-per-click advertising revenue for the owners of premium domain names has been growing like wildfire. Verisign claims that worldwide, an estimated that 90,000 new domain names are being registered every day. According to industry experts, the domain industry’s market value could reach $4 billion by 2010. At least 128 million domain names had been registered worldwide by March 2007, a 31 percent increase over the previous year, according to VeriSign. Jerry Nolte, managing partner of Domainer’s Magazine said it best, “This industry is like the wild, wild west right now and people have no idea how fast it’s growing."

On October 25th, the .us TLD registry contract with current oprator NeuStar is set to expire. And now the U.S. Department of Commerce files a Request For Quotations (RFQ) to manage and operate the .us domain registry. All relevant links are listed below:

http://www.ntia.doc.gov/vendors/usTLD01_070707.htm
http://www.ntia.doc.gov/vendors/usTLD_RFQ_070707.pdf

During the Sunrise period last year there were some comments questioning that EURid accepted domain names based on a prior right to a name including an ampersand or other special characters. When that name was made into a domain name (without the ampersand) it became a word for which others also showed an interest. Now a Belgian court has decided that EURid’s interpretation of the Sunrise rules (to accept ampersand names) indeed was correct.

It was all about article 11 of the Regulation that provided that where the name for which prior rights were claimed contains special characters, spaces or punctuations, these should be eliminated entirely from the corresponding domain name, replaced with hyphens or, if possible, rewritten. Some wanted EURid to reject the ampersand applications since the applicant was not free to eliminate the ampersand if he could rewrite or replace it.

The Court now confirmed that the applicant was completely free to choose one of the three options mentioned in article 11 of the Regulation. It was not up to EURid to question this choice.