FYI

 

 

FYI:

 

A major topic of discussion at ICANN is the introduction of “IDN TLDs”  -- internationalized versions of top-level domain (TLD) labels such as “.COM”, “.NET”, “.ORG”, etc.  This means that in the future, a whole domain name – both to the left and the right of the last dot – may be internationalized.  (Currently only characters to the left of the dot may be internationalized.)  Imagine “.COM” rendered in and functional in many different scripts: Chinese, Devanagari, Japanese, Cyrillic, Tamil, etc. etc. 

 

This topic will have impact on applications.  There are also policy issues, such as management of the various “versions” of a TLD.  

 

This topic will be discussed at the upcoming ICANN meeting in San Juan, Puerto Rico on June 25-29, 2007.  There is currently work underway in ICANN committees and at the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF).

 

As part of the effort, ICANN has posted a set of draft procedures describing how IANA will manage the insertion, administration, and removal of internationalized top-level labels in the DNS root zone. ICANN’s announcement is at:

http://www.icann.org/announcements/announcement-02jun07.htm

A public comment period is open until June 22, 2007.

 

ICANN has also published a new version of its IDN Guidelines, which for the first time makes specific reference to IDN in top-level labels. It is anticipated to be amended and supplemented in subsequent drafts in preparation for the release of internationalized top-level labels in the production environment.  This document is currently open to public comment:

http://www.icann.org/announcements/announcement-2-11may07.htm

 

With best wishes,

--Greg Aaron