.ARAB with IDN to come

[GOLDENIDN.COM]

There's a lot of talk about the possible types of new TLDs that could be made available on the Internet in the near future.

Just days ago, stories coming out of Dubai, where ICANN has just held one of its outreach meetings, mentioned a possible .ARAB or .ARABIA for the region.

I've also been hearing of possible "linguistic" TLDs like .RUSSIAN, .CHINESE or .GREEK. The idea remains one of pushing for a more regional Internet, where local flavours are brought to the fore. And it's also a great way of pushing for IDN use, as obviously if we're talking regional or linguistic TLDs, they would need to be useable in the areas or languages they represent. In short, a perfect solution for killing two birds with one stone, both IDNs and the launch of new TLDs being hot topics at ICANN right now.

But the "fad" of the moment remains the "City TLDs" or "cTLDs" for short. Projects such as .BERLIN and .PARIS are known to be underway and would obviously be the first on the table should ICANN start a new official round of request for new TLD proposals.

When might that be? By latest estimates, not before the start of 2009…

Source :Extensions - Stephane Van Gelder

Dabsi (عربي.com = arab.com)

[touchring]

Nothing new. .city IDN already exists in china. You can register names like domain.shanghai.cn in IDN format and they work for 90% of users regardless of browser.

[phio]

I think having cities as extensions misses the point of extensions.

There are hundreds of thousands of cities in the world, and if Paris gets one then Nice will want one too . . . ICANN will have a hard time when all the other cities of the world want there own extensions. There is such a 'me too' attitude in the world.

It doesn't really enhance the user experience having thousands of extensions, because with more extensions to type the harder it will be to find the site he/she wants. The flexibility of the domain name rests in the name, not in the extension. How many domains already have the words 'Paris' or 'Berlin' in them?

[bwhhisc]

Didn't ICANN state that each language would get only "one" idn.idn TLD for the initial go rollout?

The rest could come from the ability for other Registrars to adapt .idn versions for each language (.jp, .cn, .com, .net, .biz etc. equivalents) if they choose.

No doubt ICANN would add more regional .idn tlds down the road to make "everyone" including their own pocketbook, happy.

[Fka200]

Originally Posted by bwhhisc

Didn't ICANN state that each language would get only "one" idn.idn TLD for the initial go rollout?

The rest could come from the ability for other Registrars to adapt .idn versions for each language (.jp, .cn, .com, .net, .biz etc. equivalents) if they choose.

No doubt ICANN would add more regional .idn tlds down the road to make "everyone" including their own pocketbook, happy.

There was a lot of discussion about how many .IDNs a country would get. India was especially worried about this situation, but in the end it boiled down to each country getting an appropriate number of .IDN depending on the country's main languages... Not sure on recent development, but that was the case a couple months ago.

[Drewbert]

Originally Posted by bwhhisc

Didn't ICANN state that each language would get only "one" idn.idn TLD for the initial go rollout?

The rest could come from the ability for other Registrars to adapt .idn versions for each language (.jp, .cn, .com, .net, .biz etc. equivalents) if they choose.

No doubt ICANN would add more regional .idn tlds down the road to make "everyone" including their own pocketbook, happy.

I think this .arab discussion is more gTLD than ccTLD related.

[Guix]

Yes it's a bit like .asia but in IDN.

[touchring]

.asia is a total failure.

You can't just come out with a new extension, regardless of langauge, and expect it to work. Every extension requires tens of millions of dollars, if not hundreds of millions to take off. It's all about money.

[Gee]

arab refused the costs of .arab or .arabic (idns) or any new idn extension

and if arabic cctld is also going to cost them much money ...so it will not going to happen....

[Muhammad Mustafa]

even if .arab/.arabic see the light, IMHO it will NEVER success!
Arab believe in .com, respect .net, the rest is crap for 90% of them!