Why is IDN.com seemingly kept secret by ICANN?

[bwhhisc]

http://public.icann.org/node/347

Lots of traffic to the ICANN site with their meeting in New Delhi.
I posted this up, hopefully someone from ICANN will answer my question:

Submitted by bwhhisc on Fri, 2008-02-15 02:46.
Why is IDN.com a secret?
ICANN always speaks about IDNs as if they are something off into the future. Of course what they refer to is the idn.idn (unicode.unicode)

IDN.com, IDN.net have been registered by Verisign since 2000', and are functioning on the internet and in use today. Now that IE7 is out, all computers running that can resolve idn.com

I an curious why with all the recent IDN publicity, idn.idn tests etc. it is NEVER mentioned by ICANN or Tina Dam, Head of IDN program that IDN.com, IDN.net, IDN.biz, IDN.tv etc. etc. are online and resolving fine

[alpha]

a valiant effort Bill, but looking at that "community" page, there are many awkward questions that are seemingly ignored and go uncommented by ICANN - I wouldn't expect a reply.

[Steve Clarke]

Thanks, Bill.

Hopefully a few will notice your post.....and start asking the same question.

Obviously ICANN is not wanting to share that information.

[sarcle]

They have answered it in the manner of a politican. Basically, no answer at all; and they won't answer it.

"introducing IDNs at the top level does not mean elimination of any existing TLDs. However, when it comes to DNAME or aliaising (as i prefer having the discussion about since ethe functionality of DNAME has not been proven at the top level to work) is not yet decided and that is the sole reason you are not seeing a solution/answer from ICANN yet."

Tina Dam


Final summation. NONE.

The way I see it; they are going to milk this cash cow.

[555]

The way I see it; they are going to milk this cash cow.
Fine. As long as we are being milked first.

[touchring]

The way I see it; they are going to milk this cash cow.



ya, they are preserving the publicity for idn.idn.

[sarcle]

ya, they are preserving the publicity for idn.idn.

exactly.

[jose]

Great post! Thanks Bill!

[Drewbert]

You should have mentioned the ccTLD's who are already offering IDN's like .de and .es

:^)

[bwhhisc]

You should have mentioned the ccTLD's who are already offering IDN's like .de and .es :^)

Thanks Drew, your absolutely right. It's a super easy procedure to log in and put up a blog post for anyone else that is interested in asking questions. You can comment on other peoples posts as well. I see RD and BurnInternet posts on other topics.

[markits]

These people are paid to deal with idn.idns. For their own bread purpose, they would prefer to keep the existing idn.com/net etc as a secret.

[idnowner]

Touting IDN.coms, at this time, would create confusion and even more questions, that they don't want to answer, because that would lead to even more questions and more confusion. It's a can of worms, complicated by politics between a number of entities with their own interestes in mind. It will simply be easier to explain IDN.com, and how they work (or don't work) with IDN.IDN, once IDN.IDN is implemented.

[blackops]

I an curious why with all the recent IDN publicity, idn.idn tests etc. it is NEVER mentioned by ICANN or Tina Dam, Head of IDN program that IDN.com, IDN.net, IDN.biz, IDN.tv etc. etc. are online and resolving fine

Yes it would be valid to mention this, but as idnowner has said, doing so would open up a can of worms... political and technical questions, both of which I can see ICANN wishing to avoid.

idn.cn will become idn.idn, that much is clear.. but even mentioning idn.cn could be confusing for many at this point...

[Jay]

These people are paid to deal with idn.idns. For their own bread purpose, they would prefer to keep the existing idn.com/net etc as a secret.

This is just a theory (it could be reading too much into things), but possibly they are trying to equalise the field a bit by giving the new extensions a head start. One of ICANN's main concerns with aliasing is that it will provide Verisign (and other existing operators) with an unfair market advantage. The really odd thing in all of this is that Verisign have also been very quiet in promoting IDN.com. Perhaps that is what has to happen in order for the GNSO to feel that there is enough of a level playing field to move forward with aliasing, and Verisign know this. Either that or ICANN are blind and Verisign are very poor at marketing.

[Rubber Duck]

I think it is true that Verisign is keeping quiet as the stage is set for them to clean up. Trumpeting their obvious built in advantage at this stage would only be likely to blow up in their faces. Once all the policy has been rubber stamped by the Board, the marketing will begin in earnest.

This is just a theory (it could be reading too much into things), but possibly they are trying to equalise the field a bit by giving the new extensions a head start. One of ICANN's main concerns with aliasing is that it will provide Verisign (and other existing operators) with an unfair market advantage. The really odd thing in all of this is that Verisign have also been very quiet in promoting IDN.com. Perhaps that is what has to happen in order for the GNSO to feel that there is enough of a level playing field to move forward with aliasing, and Verisign know this. Either that or ICANN are blind and Verisign are very poor at marketing.