DNS News ..

Everyone appears to be talking about New.net recently. The company is currently offering twenty "new" domain suffixes, such as .xxx, .shop and .kids, but operates outside the control of ICANN.

Apparently there are 16 million users who now have access to New.net domain names. Registrants must activate their Internet browsers to recognise the new domain names by downloading a special browser plug-in. This will automatically add a ".new.net" suffix to the end of the name, therefore in effect simply creating a sub-domain.

Critics argue that there is nothing new about New.net's idea, which is actually in conflict with a number of long-standing alternative DNS ideas. Others are excited about the idea, as patience is wearing thin now that ICANN have announced there will be delays with the introduction of the new official gTLDs.

ICANN Update ..

Well the ICANN meeting in Melbourne is now over. What happened over there? In brief:

• The ICANN Board passed a resolution to complete negotiations with the seven operators of the new top-level domains "as soon as feasible".
• Revision of the original agreements between ICANN, VeriSign, (formerly Network Solutions) and the US Department of Commerce are open for public comment. All members of the Internet Community are invited to comment before March 31, 2001.
• Formal agreements between ccTLD administrators and ICANN are to be drafted.

An ICANN internal working group will be set-up in order to explore current internationalisation efforts (i.e. multilingual domains), and report their findings back to the Board in June.

Industry Update ..

Israel stops cybersquatter

Cybersquatters in Israel were dealt a severe blow this week after the Israeli Internet Society (ISOC-IL) ruled against an individual holding the snapple.co.il domain name. The Snapple Beverage Company challenged the legitimacy of the individual holding the domain name, particularly as she had also registered domain names under several other well-known trademarks, such as coke.co.il and hersheys.co.il. The individual had argued that no misrepresentation was involved because a message on the site states explicitly that the site was not related to the beverage company, however the ISOC ruled in the company's favour.

Healthy URLs up for sale

Internet healthcare site PlanetRX has put up for sale a variety of high profile web sites which it hopes could net it up to $1 million per name. The domains, include acne.com, diabetes.com, obesity.com and birth.com. GreatDomains, the company selling the domains says that it has received a great deal of interest from pharmaceutical companies interested in acquiring the domains.

Fact of the Week..

UK Internet penetration

Research this week from LINX, a non-profit making group linking 120 Internet Service Providers shows that that the equivalent of 360,000 email messages are sent every second in Britain, underlying the spectacular growth of the Internet. The figure marks 20% growth in Internet traffic over the past 2 months. According to LINX, the peak level of traffic is reached in late afternoon and early evening, reflecting the growth of home users. 7.8 million households in the UK now have web access, a 5% increase on the previous quarter. Meanwhile Net penetration in the EU now stands at 55% of all households.

Tip of the Week..

Following the ICANN meeting this week in Melbourne, the launch of .info is set to happen this summer. You can register your interest in this and the other new domains at www.gtld.com.

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