PDA

View Full Version : VeriSign’s Plans for “.Com IDNs” Become Clearer


alpha
26th February 2010, 10:12 PM
Interesting blog post over at DNW.. not sure if Andrew is quoting another article or whether he interviewed Verisign himself.

“Nothing is in concrete yet,” said Chuck Gomes, Vice President of Policy and Compliance for VeriSign Information Services. “But I think it’s a pretty well agreed-to plan.”

“We want the .com name to be a unique experience for .com regardless of what script you do it in,” said Gomes.

The same goes for .net.

“I can say that the business unit is considering applying for ’several’ IDN versions of .com in some of the scripts that are available.”
I read that as not all languages. Assuming Verisign has to pay like all the other gTLD applications, then you can assume only the mainstream languages will be applied for.
Question is, how is that determined, population or current reg levels in com, or GDP.. or something else. Interesting times ahead IMO

Link (http://domainnamewire.com/2010/02/26/verisigns-plans-for-com-idns-become-clearer/)

squirrel
26th February 2010, 10:35 PM
Interesting stuff with respect to landing the IDN TLD contract and losing the ASCII one. Perhaps Verisign has an interest in delaying IDNCOM and IDNNET... ?

alpha
26th February 2010, 10:38 PM
Interesting stuff with respect to landing the IDN TLD contract and losing the ASCII one. Perhaps Verisign has an interest in delaying IDNCOM and IDNNET... ?

actually I was thinking the opposite.. surely landing various IDN TLD contracts strengthens their case for retaining the ASCII one; because a split would be real messy. The ASCII one is up in 2012?

IDNCowboy
26th February 2010, 10:41 PM
actually I was thinking the opposite.. surely landing various IDN TLD contracts strengthens their case for retaining the ASCII one; because a split would be real messy. The ASCII one is up in 2012?

The fact that they need to charge us more is bs.. They are already raising fees in a few months. I guess the crackerjack CEOs of both Verisign and ICANN need new yachts.

alpha
26th February 2010, 10:43 PM
The fact that they need to charge us more is bs.. They are already raising fees in a few months. I guess the crackerjack CEOs of both Verisign and ICANN need new yachts.

who cares. Unless you have domains not worth 2x regfee :lol:

555
26th February 2010, 10:45 PM
It doesn't matter to the registrant. Even if Verisign manages 55%, Afilias manages 12% and Neustar the additional 33% all the variants of my names will resolve where i want them to resolve.
Also, Can anyone explain how this may happen?

sarcle
26th February 2010, 10:45 PM
Interesting stuff with respect to landing the IDN TLD contract and losing the ASCII one. Perhaps Verisign has an interest in delaying IDNCOM and IDNNET... ?

Verisign has no interest in delaying IDNCOM as it doesn't help their bottom line. IDNCOM will be tied to AsciiCOM. They will get two registration fees for the price of one. Hence "MO money MO money MO money!" for them.

Thanks Alpha.

555
26th February 2010, 11:28 PM
Comment from David J Castello:

If I read this correctly, it sounds like a trademark nightmare. In other words, Hotels.com won’t automatically get first ctack at Hotels.com in all non-Latin characters?

blastfromthepast
26th February 2010, 11:29 PM
This is bad news for Runic IDN.IDN. :(

IDNCowboy
26th February 2010, 11:30 PM
Comment from David J Castello:

If I read this correctly, it sounds like a trademark nightmare. In other words, Hotels.com won’t automatically get first ctack at Hotels.com in all non-Latin characters?

why would they want hotels . native language anyway :P

squirrel
26th February 2010, 11:34 PM
Comment from David J Castello:

If I read this correctly, it sounds like a trademark nightmare. In other words, Hotels.com won’t automatically get first ctack at Hotels.com in all non-Latin characters?

uh ?

alpha
26th February 2010, 11:34 PM
why would they want hotels . native language anyway :P

yeah, I'm sure I remember a few years back reading comments from guys like him that IDN was junk anyway.

I could be mistaken of course, my memory isn't what it used to be.

IDNCowboy
26th February 2010, 11:42 PM
yeah, I'm sure I remember a few years back reading comments from guys like him that IDN was junk anyway.

I could be mistaken of course, my memory isn't what it used to be.

These same people are going to go after hotels.com in multiple languages claiming they own them.

alpha
26th February 2010, 11:57 PM
These same people are going to go after hotels.com in multiple languages claiming they own them.

Then they are confused.

I'll borrow the example I think that thefabfive used last time we had this same discussion raised by Castello on a different blog on the same topic last year.

Does the owner of Car.com own Voiture.com (French for Car)
Does the owner of Car.com have a right to Voiture.com

Why would it be any different when dealing with other languages that don't use ascii

It's BS. and smells of desperation.

IDNCowboy
27th February 2010, 12:00 AM
Then they are confused.

I'll borrow the example I think that thefabfive used last time we had this same discussion raised by Castello on a different blog on the same topic last year.

Does the owner of Car.com own Voiture.com (French for Car)
Does the owner of Car.com have a right to Voiture.com

Why would it be any different when dealing with other languages that don't use ascii

It's BS. and smells of desperation.

He does not seem educated in the subject matter unfortunately.... With all of the conventions (Traffic, DomainFest) he goes to you would think he would know more about it. I thought these conventions were attended by some of the brightest in the industry.

jose
27th February 2010, 12:01 AM
Best part: "As of right now, that looks like a good bet." when referring to our portfolios

Worts part: "It creates some complications". IN ICANN LANGUAGE THIS TRANSLATES IN MANY, MANY DRAFTS, WORKSHOPS, COMMISSIONS, DISCUSSION GROUPS, PAPERS, HELL and BACK... YEARS, YEARS, YEARS... oh God....

jose
27th February 2010, 12:05 AM
Then they are confused.

I'll borrow the example I think that thefabfive used last time we had this same discussion raised by Castello on a different blog on the same topic last year.

Does the owner of Car.com own Voiture.com (French for Car)
Does the owner of Car.com have a right to Voiture.com

Why would it be any different when dealing with other languages that don't use ascii

It's BS. and smells of desperation.

How about this: グーグル ? :)

I've heard some have "car.com" trademarks.

Rubber Duck
27th February 2010, 12:20 AM
who cares. Unless you have domains not worth 2x regfee :lol:

Exactly. Once this takes off, we will care about as much as those paying $35 dollars at Netsol.

Rubber Duck
27th February 2010, 12:23 AM
Comment from David J Castello:

If I read this correctly, it sounds like a trademark nightmare. In other words, Hotels.com won’t automatically get first ctack at Hotels.com in all non-Latin characters?

This guy needs to stop inhaling through a straw.

Rubber Duck
27th February 2010, 12:26 AM
yeah, I'm sure I remember a few years back reading comments from guys like him that IDN was junk anyway.

I could be mistaken of course, my memory isn't what it used to be.

No but they will be on record out there somewhere, which would just about scupper any attempts at WIPO they might aspire to.

Rubber Duck
27th February 2010, 12:27 AM
He does not seem educated in the subject matter unfortunately.... With all of the conventions he goes to you would think he would know more about it. I thought these conventions were attended by some of the brightest in the industry.

I am sorry. You must be confused. These guys went to TRAFFICS.

IDNCowboy
27th February 2010, 12:32 AM
I am sorry. You must be confused. These guys went to TRAFFICS.

know more about IDNs...

I know they go to TRAFFIC...

NameYourself
27th February 2010, 12:33 AM
So essentially, verisign would be applying for new gTLDs for every .com translation? I can see how this would make leaving certain lesser used languages out of that mix as the application fee for a new gTLD started in the six figures.. In a way Verisign is pretty much claiming their .com ascii gTLD in new gTLDs.. just like how russia already has .ru but now is applying for .РФ as a separate tld. Seems like the same thing but in that verisign is trying to maintain a global aspect that ccTLDs won't cover in that they can offer pretty much all major languages for their .com, whereas most others will probably just be ascii (.ru) + the local native script (.РФ).. .com is trying to be the truly global one though.. does this take on it seem to be the perception of others on here?

IDNCowboy
27th February 2010, 12:36 AM
So essentially, verisign would be applying for new gTLDs for every .com translation? I can see how this would make leaving certain lesser used languages out of that mix as the application fee for a new gTLD started in the six figures.. In a way Verisign is pretty much claiming their .com ascii gTLD in new gTLDs.. just like how russia already has .ru but now is applying for .РФ as a separate tld. Seems like the same thing but in that verisign is trying to maintain a global aspect that ccTLDs won't cover in that they can offer pretty much all major languages for their .com, whereas most others will probably just be ascii (.ru) + the local native script (.РФ).. .com is trying to be the truly global one though.. does this take on it seem to be the perception of others on here?


They are going to shut out afrikaans and waloon.

It is going to be a PR mess.

alpha
27th February 2010, 12:41 AM
They are going to shut out afrikaans and waloon.

It is going to be a PR mess.

Sure. But not for Verisign, they have a business to run, and will simply be crunching the numbers vs the 6 fig application fee.

As usual you can blame ICANN for setting such a high price tag to start with. The only way out of this PR nightmare is to have a different process/price for existing gTLDs so that more languages are included.

This is why the old dname option was a favourite. (damn. I really didn't want to be the first person to mention dname in this thread)

555
27th February 2010, 12:48 AM
Where is the currently registered chart from a few months ago?

1st Batch imo will at least include Chinese,Japanese,Russian but probably many more. It's not really 180k, it's more $1800 yearly for the next 100 yrs :)

alpha
27th February 2010, 12:51 AM
Where is the currently registered chart from a few months ago?

Figures are current as of today.

Total # of IDNs registered in .com, .net, .org, .info, .biz:
964,894

By extension:

.com - 699,737 (72.51%)
.net - 197,037 (20.42%)
.org - 18,736 (1.94%)
.info - 25,851 (2.68%)
.biz - 23,533 (2.44%)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

.com & .net figures for language (These are not accurate so allow ±% and a lot of languages are not represented as they got swallowed up in other languages )

.com:
Latin: 164,848 (23.50%)
Greek: 2,712 (0.40%)
Cyrillic: 29,284 (4.20%)
Hebrew: 19,399 (2.70%)
Arabic / Persian etc: 25,795 (3.70%)
India: 3,533 (0.50%)
Thai: 7,022 (1%)
Hiragana / Katakana: 30,464 (4.35%)
Korean: 87,687 (12.50%)
Chinese / Kanji: 322,282 (46%)
Misc.: 6,711 (0.95%)

.net
Latin: 41,857 (21.20%)
Greek: 578 (0.30%)
Cyrillic: 6,624 (3.40%)
Hebrew: 5,665 (2.90%)
Arabic / Persian etc: 11,856 (6%)
India: 732 (0.40%)
Thai: 1,622 (0.80%)
Hiragana / Katakana: 11,287 (5.70%)
Korean: 23,393 (11.90%)
Chinese / Kanji: 91,983 (46.60%)
Misc.: 1,440 (0.73%)
.

IDNCowboy
27th February 2010, 01:07 AM
Actually the brains at ICANN will spend hours going over which languages sell the most. They will see their #1 figure is AFRIKAANS since it is the first language tag.. All of my idns are AFRIKAANS

thefabfive
27th February 2010, 01:15 AM
Actually the brains at ICANN will spend hours going over which languages sell the most. They will see their #1 figure is AFRIKAANS since it is the first language tag.. All of my idns are AFRIKAANS

Tags are not saved. Another IDN myth.
Posted via Mobile Device

IDNCowboy
27th February 2010, 01:22 AM
Tags are not saved. Another IDN myth.
Posted via Mobile Device

I was kidding but still what was the purpose

555
27th February 2010, 01:36 AM
Andrew just confirmed to Yanni that he interviewed Chuck Gomez earlier today.

thefabfive
27th February 2010, 02:17 AM
Andrew just confirmed to Yanni that he interviewed Chuck Gomez earlier today.

Nice. Now if we could just get the process started.

Hopefully ICANN will reveal the procedure for IDN gTLDs once a couple of ccTLDs are live. But I wouldn't hold my breath.
Posted via Mobile Device

NameYourself
27th February 2010, 02:22 AM
They will probably come out with a plan about a proposed procedure which will follow a hypothetical timeline to be developed on Someday, in town called Nowhere.

sarcle
27th February 2010, 02:22 AM
Now if we could just get the process started.


Like this? Let's get it started (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dX54zNjcpXc).

555
27th February 2010, 02:33 AM
Nice. Now if we could just get the process started.

Hopefully ICANN will reveal the procedure for IDN gTLDs once a couple of ccTLDs are live. But I wouldn't hold my breath.

There is a general understanding and it was clearly stated that both IDN ccTLD's and IDN gTLD's need to be a parallel process with neither delaying the other. ICANN didn't allow any IDN ccTLD delays even though it knew IDN gTLD's are going to get considerable delays if they remain restricted to the new ASCII gTLD process which is why an IDN gTLD Fast Track is discussed and if eventually we will see IDN ccTLD's live prior to IDN gTLD's, this unfair advantage will carry consequences.

http://www.icann.org/en/topics/new-gtlds/summary-analysis-eoi-15feb10-en.pdf

555
27th February 2010, 02:55 AM
http://gnso.icann.org/meetings/minutes-gnso-31jan08.html

Proposed GNSO response: There should be no formal precedence given to IDN ccTLDs over IDN gTLDs or vice versa. In the event that IDN gTLDs are ready before IDN ccTLDs, the interests of the IDN community should be protected by liberal use of the objection mechanism proposed in the new gTLD process (see reference 5 above). Likewise if IDN ccTLDs are ready for deployment before IDN gTLDs there should be an equivalent objection mechanism available for the rest of the community. The GNSO worked diligently and openly for over a year and a half to develop procedures for the introduction of new gTLDs including IDN gTLDs. The IDN gTLD process should not be put on hold unless there are technical reasons for doing so (i.e., the IDNA protocol revision is not yet finished).

________________________________


1. IDN-labeled TLDs (whether considered gTLDs or TLDs associated with countries or territories) should be introduced as soon as practicable after technical requirements and tests are successfully completed.
4. If IDN-labeled TLDs associated with one SO are ready for introduction before IDN-labeled TLDs for the other SO, procedures should be developed to avoid possible conflicts.

5. Neither the introduction of IDN gTLDs or IDN ccTLDs should be delayed because of readiness specific to one category.

6. The situation of IDN ccTLDs becoming de facto “IDN gTLDs”, as has happened with some ASCII ccTLDs historically, should be avoided.

The GNSO council supports efforts to determine the feasibility of a fast track process to enable the assignment of a few non controversial IDN ccTLDs in the interim. These should be limited to one IDN ccTLD per ISO 3166-1 territory, except in those cases where governmental policy makes selecting a single script impossible.

However, before any policy regarding new IDN ccTLDs can be finalized, criteria must be developed to determine how TLDs will be apportioned into the ccNSO and GNSO for policy development purposes.

This clearly demonstrates that the GNSO does not intend to slow down the introduction of fast track names or IDN gTLDs.

It is crucial to recognize that decisions like the above must be made by the full ICANN naming community. It would not be appropriate for either the GNSO or the ccNSO to primarily take the lead in this task but both supporting organizations should participate equally along with open participation by the impacted community members outside of the two supporting organizations.

domainguru
27th February 2010, 06:43 AM
Interesting blog post over at DNW.. not sure if Andrew is quoting another article or whether he interviewed Verisign himself.

Link (http://domainnamewire.com/2010/02/26/verisigns-plans-for-com-idns-become-clearer/)

Andrew interviewed Chuck on the phone. Andrew asked me for a few questions to answer Chuck. It was late Friday night so I wasn't quite "on my game" though :p

Fka200
27th February 2010, 09:08 AM
But I wouldn't hold my breath.


Damn, I should start inhaling sometime soon. Been holding my breath for a while... this is getting exhausting :-).

Rubber Duck
27th February 2010, 09:25 AM
Sure. But not for Verisign, they have a business to run, and will simply be crunching the numbers vs the 6 fig application fee.

As usual you can blame ICANN for setting such a high price tag to start with. The only way out of this PR nightmare is to have a different process/price for existing gTLDs so that more languages are included.

This is why the old dname option was a favourite. (damn. I really didn't want to be the first person to mention dname in this thread)

Forget DNAME that is now dead as far as aliasing within the DNS is concerned. BNAMES is a protocol derived from the DNAME principle that is designed for Bundled Names. Aliasing is definitely coming.

bumblebee man
27th February 2010, 11:47 AM
Then they are confused.

I'll borrow the example I think that thefabfive used last time we had this same discussion raised by Castello on a different blog on the same topic last year.

Does the owner of Car.com own Voiture.com (French for Car)
Does the owner of Car.com have a right to Voiture.com

Why would it be any different when dealing with other languages that don't use ascii

It's BS. and smells of desperation.

It really should be the other way round. If I owned Gold.com in Urdu I should have the right to own the English equivalent. :yes:

DomainNameWire
1st March 2010, 07:06 PM
I thought I'd give my latest analysis of the IDN situation above and beyond my recent blog post, and join the conversation here on IDNForums.

As a way of background, most of you know more about IDNs than I do. But I've done a lot to learn about them, including sitting down with Tina Dam, who runs the IDN show for ICANN, to understand what I didn't know and try to learn it. I also have a good knowledge of the ICANN process and new TLDs. When you marry those two I think I have a pretty good handle on what's going on.

.Com equivalents will be part of new gTLD process: At this point I think the odds are slim-to-none that IDN ccTLDs will get any special treatment prior to opening up the new gTLD process. I realize that certain constituent groups want IDN gTLDs to be run alongside IDN ccTLD, but that is unlikely to happen. The same overarching issues for regular gTLDs (trademarks, root zone scaling, etc.) apply to IDNs, and will need to be resolved before they are issued.

.Com Variants are still a ways off: On a recent panel I led during Domainer Mardi Gras, the panelists thought the earliest new TLDs will be available is Spring 2011, the latest guess was late 2012. These were all people intimately involved in the process; several of which are applying of new TLDs.

I think we're a good two years off from new TLDs actually becoming available. Which would mean you're a couple years away from IDN.com-as-IDN.

Also keep in mind that registrars will have to build a new registration/activation process with verification of ownership into their business. This could present delays.

VeriSign will probably apply for a lot of variants: Who knows what the company means by "Several". But the $185,000 application cost is nothing to VeriSign. VeriSign grosses over a half billion dollars a year from .com. So I expect VeriSign to apply for many of them. Of course, it will be a business decision. So the larger opportunities are safer bet. I suspect they'll do the same ones for .net, although the .net opportunity is smaller. The good news is that If ICANN's current "Expressions of Interest" idea comes to fruition, you might know what variants VeriSign will apply for later this year.

Chuck Gomes doesn't run the business show at VeriSign: Chuck Gomes only handles the policy side. He isn't involved with business decisions, so he's not the final authority on it.

How much do you think VeriSign will charge for them? The easiest thing is for VeriSign to charge the typical .com price. That way regardless of which .com variant you pick up first, registrars' shopping cart systems can keep a fixed price.

What happens to traffic when these variants go live: The million dollar question. Obviously those of you investing think traffic will go up (or you're very happy with the traffic now). It certainly won't go down, but I don't think an IDN that gets zero traffic today will suddenly get a lot when this happens. It's not like a million people are boycotting visiting your idn.com today because they have to type in '.com'. It will be an improvement, but it will take some time.

There's actually a bit of risk on the horizon given that IDN ccTLDs are coming out before IDN gTLDs. If people within the country start gravitating to these new IDN ccTLDs, they could get mindshare before the .com equivalent comes out.

What I'd look for is the day when someone registers Chinese.com-in-chinese and doesn't bother to register the corresponding chinese.com. Then you know your IDNs have arrived.

IDN ccTLDs: While on the topic of ccTLDs, keep a close eye on how this works out. ICANN's position is that there's not always a direct translation between a ccTLD and an IDN ccTLD. The group that runs an existing ccTLD may not even be awarded the country's IDN ccTLD. To understand this, you need to know the history of how ccTLDs were handed out. Pre-ICANN, in the early days, these were handed out to any breathing person who knew what the web was in each country for management.

Hence why they're often mismanaged.

But as these fast track IDN ccTLDs come out, keep an eye out on the traffic to your IDN ccTLDs. If it shoots up, that's a good sign for your IDN.coms.

What if VeriSign loses the .com contract? I think this is an important question. Here's the deal:

VeriSign operates the .com registry under contract. Its agreement goes through 2012. It was awarded the most recent contract with guaranteed price increases and a presumptive ongoing renewal as a result of a lawsuit over VeriSign's "SiteFinder" service.

There's an ongoing lawsuit against VeriSign over how it was awarded this contract. It should have been put out to bid.

My guess is VeriSign keeps the .com contract in 2012 and ongoing. It's worth too much to them. By getting all of these variants, it might actually make it easier for them to win the contract because people will realize what a cluster it will be if they split these up.

If they were split up, VeriSign could decide to not offer you the exact variant of your IDN.com domains. They could register each one separately.
Even if this isn't a big risk for .com, it's a big risk for other TLDs. Hopefully someone will pay attention to this in the gTLD application process. Unlike what happened last time, when VeriSign created SiteFinder and caught everyone on its heels.

...OK, there's my brain dump.

jose
1st March 2010, 07:17 PM
Welcome!

Rubber Duck
1st March 2010, 07:19 PM
Well, you will excuse me if I am not in awe of ASCII domaining credentials. Vis a Vis IDN those guys have got too much wrong for too long to take my breath away. However, it is good news that you are here putting candid opinions about the IDN and New TLD situation, even if I do not entirely agree with them. But nobody will know anything for sure until the policy is passed by the Board. However, I would say that I do not lie awake worrying about where this is going. I concluded a long time ago that only one outcome is really possible. The big unknown is just how long ICANN can justify its prevarication.

IDNCowboy
1st March 2010, 07:38 PM
I still think traffic will go way up once the .com equivalents are released.. Why do you think there are so many number .com's in China.

phio
1st March 2010, 07:39 PM
Thanks for the post DomainNameWire. :)

There are some additional points I'd like to make.

1) IDNs have been on the web space for quite some time. There are sites up and running that get daily traffic and many holders are taking the time to develop now.

2) 2 years before IDN.IDN as Gtld means another 2 years head start for IDN.com and IDN.net holders to continue to develop, which means that they will continue to be the standard. We don't know the time frame, but IDN.IDN as GTLD may come out before Verisign re-applies for their contract.

3) IDN.IDNcctlds will have a limited registration; meaning that all GEOs, Adult, and some other domain names will not be allowed to be registered, giving the IDN.Gtld holder an advantage.

4) IDN.Gtlds are easy to use now. There is no language switching required.
i.e. type чайник into the browser bar and hit cntl-enter

5) The demand for IDN.IDN as Gtld will be greatest for languages spread out among different countries, for example in Arabic speaking countries. Russian and Spanish are also spoken in multiple countries etc.

6) IDN.com and IDN.net traffic is growing; Naturally.

7) Within a month or two, we will see the first set of IDN.IDNcctlds launched. This will make news all over the world. And just as Germans and Americans and Brits have been regging domains like crazy during the past 8 years. Many foreigners will see this as a great opportunity, and once the word spreads, registrations will grow. IDN.IDNcctld awareness means IDN.Gtld because you can register both at the same time on the Registrars web page.

Many will see getting the .com or .net version of an IDN as necessary to protect their investment -- that is if the .com and .net are not taken already.

Drewbert
1st March 2010, 07:48 PM
Welcome, Andrew.

"At this point I think the odds are slim-to-none that IDN ccTLDs will get any special treatment prior to opening up the new gTLD process"

This threw me a bit, do you mean "IDN gTLD's"?

As for a special process to fasttrack IDN equivalents for existing gTLD's, I think they might have a case. I'm surprised that .info and .biz (for example) haven't got behind it more strongly.

.info, as a shortened version of information, doesn't do well in many countries. This is the opportunity for them to go and get the chinese, japanese and korean equivalents of "information" (rather than an abbreviation) which could do very well in those locations.

.biz has the same argument, but even stronger. "biz" is such a sucky abbreviation - born out by registration numbers. .business in chinese, japanese and korean could possibly give .company a run for it's money. If I was the .biz registry, I'd be going for those gTLD's like it was the only thing that was going to save my .biz

IDNCowboy
1st March 2010, 07:50 PM
Not to mention there are a few big Japanese companies that have very popular sites. They also have registrars that register IDNs..

Paperboy&co

GMO Internet

555
1st March 2010, 08:33 PM
Welcome to IDNForums Andrew, Good to see you here.


.Com equivalents will be part of new gTLD process:

The GNSO is strongly supporting that neither IDN ccTLD's or IDN gTLD's will be delayed unless it is for technical reasons.
The gTLD's are paying for all the ccTLD's as it is, i don't think they will agree to risking all they have on the line in potentially millions of fresh registrations by allowing a market lead to the IDN ccTLD. In addition that many ccTLD's are under strict rules which limit user selection in choice and usage.

The same overarching issues for regular gTLDs (trademarks, root zone scaling, etc.) apply to IDNs,

I don't think a specific dispute over a 2nd level domain, 1 of millions in the TLD is the same like a dispute over the TLD itself.

WIPO works (better for some then others) for years and handles disputes for ascii and IDN domains, any future TM issues will be treated like any other ascii domain under legit dispute or reverse hijacking attack. Some companies registered the idn's they wanted as early as 2001 (Chanel in Cyrillic and Remy martin in French are a couple examples)

I think it is for political reasons that the registries are so quiet about what they have planned, it is not making sense verisign is out the door and the Chinese,Russian governments will have to wait a couple months.

Rubber Duck
1st March 2010, 09:08 PM
I think the issue of contract renewal is a complete red-herring. Will there be contract renewal for all the New gTLDs? Of course there bloody won't. Contract renewal is a dead duck. Only disqualification as a registry will cause Verisign to lose dot com now.

Versign will retain the contract because they can offer DNSSEC which is their brain child on a schedule that nobody else can compete with. ICANN would not even risk letting anyone else make this major innovation within the DNS.

Rubber Duck
1st March 2010, 09:17 PM
And what is more, big commerce needs DNSSEC and will not entrust their business to anyone else, not even most of the big ccTLD operators.

Frankly the DomainNameWire predictions totally underestimate the complexity of the revolution that is about to ensue in the DNS. To imagine that any of this could be undertaken by some wannabee registry is to completely lose the plot.

DomainNameWire
1st March 2010, 10:03 PM
"At this point I think the odds are slim-to-none that IDN ccTLDs will get any special treatment prior to opening up the new gTLD process"

This threw me a bit, do you mean "IDN gTLD's"?


Yes, sorry about that.

As for a special process to fasttrack IDN equivalents for existing gTLD's, I think they might have a case. I'm surprised that .info and .biz (for example) haven't got behind it more strongly.

I think these guys are just trying to get new TLDs passed in any way, shape, or form, and don't want to add another issue to the table. .Biz is more interested in variable pricing than IDNs, too.

DomainNameWire
1st March 2010, 10:08 PM
The GNSO is strongly supporting that neither IDN ccTLD's or IDN gTLD's will be delayed unless it is for technical reasons.
The gTLD's are paying for all the ccTLD's as it is, i don't think they will agree to risking all they have on the line in potentially millions of fresh registrations by allowing a market lead to the IDN ccTLD. In addition that many ccTLD's are under strict rules which limit user selection in choice and usage.

That's just the GNSO. There are so many factions at work on new TLDs. I haven't seen much debate at all in the new TLD process (at large) about this.



I don't think a specific dispute over a 2nd level domain, 1 of millions in the TLD is the same like a dispute over the TLD itself.

But that's the thing. These .com variants will be new TLDs, technically. So the trademark interests will be scared. In fact, they'll probably be more scared since they don't understand it as much :)

DomainNameWire
1st March 2010, 10:10 PM
Frankly the DomainNameWire predictions totally underestimate the complexity of the revolution that is about to ensue in the DNS. To imagine that any of this could be undertaken by some wannabee registry is to completely lose the plot.

It's highly unlikely that it would happen to VeriSign, unless a court ruled that .com had to go out to competitive bid. It is more likely to happen in another domain/registry. ICANN needs to at least consider this so it doesn't get trapped like it did last time with VeriSign and Site Finder.

DomainNameWire
1st March 2010, 10:24 PM
BTW, here's a link to the latest draft applicant guide book for new TLDs, including IDN TLDs.

http://icann.org/en/topics/new-gtlds/dag-en.htm

sbe18
2nd March 2010, 01:10 AM
Andrew,
as one of the IDNF partners welcome to the forum.

I look forward to your participation, since many of us will be adding your RSS postings frequently going forward, and will comment on your blog as well I am sure.

Thank you for your blog posting with Tina Dam and Chuck Gomes and thread of your postings here.

Gomes is co-chairman of the GNSO this year, and it is no fluke.

re: our community here.

Drew, Gary, David/rd, and Michael/555 are extremely important voices on the forum.

Many of us still have vibrant memories of being very poorly treated on ascii domain forums.

Being called a moron, idiot, moonie, asshat etc by prominent and famous domainers was not something that was warranted in the slightest by any of us over the last 5 years +.

And we are still treated with comments ....

"I own genericwhatever.com in English so (Verisign/ICANN who ever) should give me all the generic IDN's straightup...."

uh..No... they shouldn't and they won't.

You want it from me. Pay me. thanks.

Vonnegut wrote : and so it goes....

My comments on your comment :

"What I'd look for is the day when someone registers Chinese.com-in-chinese and doesn't bother to register the corresponding chinese.com. Then you know your IDNs have arrived."

This is the wrong timeframe for China, since 650 million Chinese use dot com on mobile phones every day.

IDN dot com have been used as Billboard operating Ad copy for years,
even though the ASCII web address is printed on the bottom.

dot com is a global brand and a true chinese language brand used in ads and articles where
Chinese characters dot com are used in advertising by firms that do not even own the IDN they are essentially promoting...
this happens in Korea and Japan as well.

Humorously, many of the IDNers here own some of these ghost generic IDN's that are on famous ad copy etc.

I own 5 or 6 that I know of.

With millions of chinese language websites with ascii dot com / ascii dot com dot cn addresses, 350 million Internet users and 650 million mobile WAP users have been lightly comfortable to key in ascii dot com for a generation now.

baidu.com in China gets multiple X traffic in China than the baidu.cn
and at the same time 95% of all PRC govt sites are now IDN.IDN cctld
inside the Great Firewall so that the sites work internally flawlessly.



As most of the long time IDNers will tell you, IDN dot IDN for (dot com) is essential and imperative for the right to left languages.

Arabic, Urdu, Hebrew, and Farsi ...

David/ rd alone must have dozens of posts in the archive on this point.

But for smartphones and mobile browser s/w around the world, all are now IDN compliant (utf-8) and 99% are sold with default ascii dot com on
localized keyboards and 2ndary input keyboards.

ascii dot cctld's are not default keys on any mobile browser keyboard.
If present, they are side by side with a dot com touch or drop down key.

and you are also missing the legitimization of IDN's by the German's
in dot com/ and dot de

In the EU, the enormous growth accurate Spanish / French/ Portuguese/ Italian IDN dot com's are having based on type-ins of actual accurate national language spelling after 15 years etc is a blessing for high school teachers and for us IDNers.

My Spanish IDN.com's traffic are 10X from 6 months ago:
from the dozens/month to the hundreds.

( EU schools have been bemoaning texting spelling conventions for more than a decade)


Accurate IDN dot com/ net for Spanish for global terms will be fine investments very soon relative to dot es or dot mx or
the incorrect accent-less spelled domain names.


Verisign dot com IDN variants are coming.

Adding what 6 to a dozen of us have paid Verisign for reg's and renewals:
IDNF members have paid the $185 K fees for quite a few. (ugh)


But where your comment with an edit is correct.

In my opinion, when Russians register the dot KOM first and let the dot com sit blocked and unpaid for, will be the 'Rapture' for many here...grin.




rgds,

Steve

Drewbert
2nd March 2010, 01:10 AM
.Biz is more interested in variable pricing than IDNs, too.


That scares the bejeezuz out of me.

Drewbert
2nd March 2010, 01:13 AM
Drew, Gary, David/rd, and Michael/555 are extremely important voices on the forum.

Many of us still have vibrant memories of being very poorly treated on ascii domain forums.

Being called a moron, idiot, moonie, asshat etc by prominent and famous domainers was not something that was warranted in the slightest by any of us over the last 5 years +.


Errrrr. Did you just lump me in with a bunch of moonies?

Retraction required, if so.

phio
2nd March 2010, 02:14 AM
Drew, Gary, David/rd, and Michael/555 are extremely important voices on the forum.

Many of us still have vibrant memories of being very poorly treated on ascii domain forums.

Being called a moron, idiot, moonie, asshat etc by prominent and famous domainers was not something that was warranted in the slightest by any of us over the last 5 years +.

Consider it a blessing. It kept a lot of people out of IDNs for quite a while. If the famous domainers went all in in 2005 or 2006, everything would have been gone by 2007. :cool:

Rubber Duck
2nd March 2010, 05:01 AM
But that's the thing. These .com variants will be new TLDs, technically. So the trademark interests will be scared. In fact, they'll probably be more scared since they don't understand it as much :)

Yes, but essentially those that don't understand it, those that think they can market to the Chinese in English, simply don't have any legitimate Trade Mark interests, despite what the half whit twins try to tell us.

Rubber Duck
2nd March 2010, 05:05 AM
It's highly unlikely that it would happen to VeriSign, unless a court ruled that .com had to go out to competitive bid. It is more likely to happen in another domain/registry. ICANN needs to at least consider this so it doesn't get trapped like it did last time with VeriSign and Site Finder.

You seem to forget that US has given up Governance of ICANN. No court really has that level of jurisdiction, at least not one that is going to listen to a bunch of Anglophile Supremacists.

Rubber Duck
2nd March 2010, 05:09 AM
BTW, here's a link to the latest draft applicant guide book for new TLDs, including IDN TLDs.

http://icann.org/en/topics/new-gtlds/dag-en.htm

Do you seriously imagine that we have not been analyzing each and every draft document that comes out. This isn't bloody Namepros!

Rubber Duck
2nd March 2010, 05:12 AM
That scares the bejeezuz out of me.

The argument is that other gTLDs should be able to follow the example of Dot TV.

There is of course a problem in that dot TV is not a gTLD.

The other thing is that if it were taken as any kind of a precedent then variable pricing could only be applied to domains that do not currently have a valid registration, i.e. New Regs and Drops.

If this is Bizness plan, then it sign of pure desperation.

phio
2nd March 2010, 05:23 AM
Anglophile Supremacists. In Chinese it translates to: 亲英派至上主义 :whistling:

alpha
2nd March 2010, 06:27 AM
Do you seriously imagine that we have not been analyzing each and every draft document that comes out. This isn't bloody Namepros!

RD.. lets show a little less hostility. Andrew is actually one of the old guard domainers that unlike some of his peers, has always shown to have peripheral vision re the international scene.

Welcome Andrew. Hope you feel welcome here, and looking forward to an engaging dialogue and a measured dose of banter.

IDNCowboy
2nd March 2010, 06:31 AM
Welcome Andrew,

I see that you have now encountered the duck.. He welcomes you to the forums. ;)

seamo
2nd March 2010, 07:17 AM
Hi Andrew, and welcome...let your mantra be 'like water off a Duck's back' :p

DomainNameWire
2nd March 2010, 02:40 PM
Steve - thanks for your analysis on this. So it sounds like getting these variants will be more important for some languages than others.

I do think that VeriSign will go "all out" on this because of the relatively low cost.

DomainNameWire
2nd March 2010, 02:43 PM
Rubber Duck -

The idea that the U.S. no longer has control over the domain name system is a bit of PR spin. Yes, they don't have control over ICANN. But they still manage the IANA contract, which is the most important one.


Do you seriously imagine that we have not been analyzing each and every draft document that comes out. This isn't bloody Namepros!

I hate reading them myself. But what's going on in these documents could have a profound affect on what we all do -- how much we pay for domain name registrations, what rights overzealous trademark holders have to go after generic domains (in IDNs, too!) etc.

sprewellpj
2nd March 2010, 04:06 PM
@Andrew - Welcome. Many thanks for all of your favorable IDN articles, and it is a great addition to see you on these forums.

Rubber Duck
2nd March 2010, 04:45 PM
Rubber Duck -

The idea that the U.S. no longer has control over the domain name system is a bit of PR spin. Yes, they don't have control over ICANN. But they still manage the IANA contract, which is the most important one.


Well not in this case. IANA is about IP address allocation and Root Zone Management. Which may explain why the US got far more than it share of IP addresses. But in this instance we are talking allocation of registry contracts. That is very much the ICANN remit that is now legally beyond the control of the US Government. Politically, they could never hope to dictate such policy to the rest of the World, but they have been very successful over the years at throwing a spanner in the works. However, their paymasters will tolerate it no longer. If you want to see an insolvent Federal Government, then just go right ahead and try. :lol:

Drewbert
2nd March 2010, 08:51 PM
Rubber Duck -

The idea that the U.S. no longer has control over the domain name system is a bit of PR spin. Yes, they don't have control over ICANN.

Well, except via California non-profit legal requirements. :)

Explorer
9th March 2010, 12:29 PM
.Com Variants are still a ways off: On a recent panel I led during Domainer Mardi Gras, the panelists thought the earliest new TLDs will be available is Spring 2011, the latest guess was late 2012. These were all people intimately involved in the process; several of which are applying of new TLDs.

I think we're a good two years off from new TLDs actually becoming available. Which would mean you're a couple years away from IDN.com-as-IDN.


This latest draft from Icann implies the same time frame as well.
http://www.icann.org/en/topics/new-gtlds/anticipated-delegation-rate-model-25feb10-en.pdf