[LINK] New generic tlds

[stephen at melbpc.org.au]

'.afl, .cba, .auspost': Australian organisations apply for generic top 
level domain names 

June 14, 2012. http://www.smh.com.au


Australian banks, universities and sporting organisations are among 40 
Australian organisations and thousands of global organisations that have 
applied for generic top-level domain names.

In the first ever issue of generic names (to replace .com or .com.au) 
Australian Football League looks set to get .afl, but Tennis Australia 
has gone after the .tennis domain and will have to go through an 
evaluation period before securing the domain.

The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers is running the 
process and will evaluate all applications. 

Tennis may have to go through an auction process to secure the domain if 
ICANN cannot decide which applicant most deserves the .tennis domain. 

Three of the four big banks (Commonwealth Bank, ANZ and NAB) went after, 
and were likely to get, their branded domains.

Commonwealth Bank has gone for three (.cba, .commbank and .netbank) and 
NAB has gone for .nab and .ubank. AMP also applied for the same domain 
name as its brand, but Westpac was not involved at all.

In Australian media, Seven West Media went for .seven and SBS went 
after .sbs.

Challenger telco iiNet was the only internet provider in Australia to go 
for its own domain, although Telstra submitted an application only for 
its subsidiary Sensis - for .yellowpages, the only application for that 
name.

Australia Post continues its push into cyber services with an application 
for .auspost.

"This is an amazing platform for innovation and it clearly suits those 
brands that are prepared to take these steps," chief executive of 
Melbourne-based ARI Registry Services, Adrian Kinderis, said.

ARI helped 161 companies from all around the world with their 
applications for domains 
including .ibm, .catholic, .virgin, .seek, .barclays, .abudhabi and two 
Australian cities - .melbourne and .sydney. Neither of these cities is 
likely to face contention for the names as they were the only applicants. 
ARI's success means it is now looking to open up offices in the Middle 
East and expand its operations, Mr Kinderis said. 

ICANN will start evaluating batches of applications next month. 

Organisations that have applied for a unique name may be allocated that 
domain as early as May 2013. But if more than one organisation has gone 
for a domain name, ICANN will start a dispute resolution process that 
could take up to 20 months. A successful application costs $US185,000 and 
organisations need to demonstrate they have the technical capabilities to 
maintain a domain. 

"This is only the end of the beginning. There is a lot of work to do. 
Applications have to go through an evaluation process and ... they may 
have to go to auction," Mr Kinderis said.

After helping companies with applications, ARI has also locked all its 
successful applicants into long-term hosting contracts.

Another Australian company, listed-firm Melbourne IT, processed 146 
applications from around the world and expects to see significant flow-on 
hosting opportunities.

Mr Kinderis said he was impressed to see Australian-based universities 
dominated the applications for domains, including RMIT, Monash, La Trobe, 
Bond University and the Open University, which went after .courses 
and .study.

British newspaper The Guardian has gone after five domains 
including .theguardian, .observer, .guardianmedia, .gdn and .guardian.

"The benefits of owning your own brand name as a domain goes beyond 
prestige or bragging rights.  It means the company controls its own piece 
of the internet and that gives marketing benefits and provides consumer 
trust. 

"This is why we have seen three of the major banks in Australia embrace 
it – the trust element is a big plus for them, given consumer worries 
about online fraud. 

"With a new .brand domain, it is a very simple message for someone like 
the ANZ to say to consumers that if you go to a website that doesn't end 
in .anz, then it isn't us and don't trust it," chief executive and 
managing director of Melbourne IT, Theo Hnarakis, said.

There is likely to be a lot of contention for generic names with 13 
applications for .app, 11 for .inc and 11 for .home and 10 applications 
for .art.

Google has gone for 101 domains under the name Charleston Road Registry 
including its brand name, 
and .blog, .boo, .drive, .android, .free, .family .love.

Amazon went after 76 domains, but the world's biggest computer maker, 
Apple, went after only a single branded domain name.



Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/it-pro/business-it/afl-cba-auspost-
australian-organisations-apply-for-generic-top-level-domain-names-
20120614-20bo5.html#ixzz1y3uVvlhC

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