[ga] .berlin and .nyc

[Danny Younger <dannyyounger@xxxxxxxxx>]

Whether there should be new TLDs...

The Saturday Public Forum gave rise to a request from
Dirk Krischenowski on behalf of a .berlin initiative: 


"WE ARE PRESENT HERE IN VANCOUVER AT THE ICANN MEETING
AS REPRESENTATIVES OF THE COMMUNITY IN BERLIN, AND I
WANT TO CALL ATTENTION THAT BERLIN'S SIZABLE COMMUNITY
HAS A DEMAND IN USING THEIR OWN LOCAL TLD AND WANTS TO
APPLY FOR IT. 

WE THINK THAT A DOTBERLIN TLD IS A LOGICAL CHOICE
SINCE OUR COMMUNITY IS A COMMUNITY BY NATURE. 

WE ALSO BELIEVE THAT A DOTBERLIN TLD OFFERS CERTAINTY
AND MEANING TO THE GLOBAL INTERNET COMMUNITY AND
DOESN'T HARM OTHER TLDS OR THE DNS. 

THEREFORE, WE ASK ICANN TO OPEN UP A WINDOW FOR NEW
TLD APPLICANTS AS SOON AS POSSIBLE AND TO MAKE
DOTBERLIN AND OTHER TLD COMMUNITIES AVAILABLE. 

WE ADDITIONALLY THINK THAT THERE SHOULD BE NO ROUNDS
BUT AN ONGOING NEW TLD PROCESS. AND IMPORTANTLY, WE
ASK ICANN TO SPEED UP THE ONGOING PROCESS OF NEW TLDS
AND MAKE IT RELIABLE FOR NEW TLD APPLICANTS. 

This request reminded me of an earlier and similar
proposal for a .nyc TLD:

The following resolution was passed by Community Board
3, Queens, 
the City of New York, on April 19, 2001. 


Top Level Domains (TLD): .COM, .GOV, .EDU, .ORG, .NET,
.MIL, and soon .NYC 

Background 

For a people to be independent and self-governing,
they must control the basic communication tools of the
society they inhabit. 

As we enter a time where most person-to-person,
person-to-group, business, and government
communication takes place over the Internet, an
independent, vibrant, self-governing community must
control the fundamental elements of that communication
network. Domain names are a key part of that control. 

In 1984, a contractor working on an experimental
communications project for the U.S. Defense
Department, created several top level domains (called
TLDs) to help differentiate distinct Internet uses.
Six names were issued: 

.mil for use by the U.S. military 
.gov for all other U.S. government units 
.com for commercial organizations 
.org for non profit organizations 
.net for those offering network services 
.edu for educational organizations 

Additionally, beginning in 1984 "country codes" have
been issued for use by nation-states, e.g., .US for
the United States, .CA for Canada, .UK for the United
Kingdom, .RU for Russia? 

If we can gain control of the .NYC domain for the
residents of New York City, we will be Internet
empowered, and receive benefits like: 

Revenue - How much is the hotels.nyc domain name
worth? Tours.nyc, shows.nyc, schools.nyc Licensing
these .nyc domain names could raise tens of millions
of dollars. 
Marketing Power - Imagine the ease of selling our city
to prospective residents, tourists, and businesses
with websites like: jobs.nyc, shows.nyc, hotels.nyc,
officespace.nyc, etc. 
Quality of Life - Imagine navigating the Internet
using .nyc. Want a library? Go to library.nyc and find
links to the QBPL, NYPL, Carnegie Library Visit
schools.nyc and link to our public schools, our
private schools, universities, etc And you'll find a
local business far easier searching in .nyc than on
the global .com web. 

The .NYC domain will enable us to shape our existence
using domain names like: 

Schools.nyc 
Shopping.nyc 
Corona.nyc 
Plays.nyc 
Conventions.nyc 
Jobs.nyc 
Events.nyc 
Banks.nyc 
Museums.nyc 
Hotels.nyc 
Tours.nyc 
Officespace.nyc 
Libraries.nyc 
Government.nyc 

Additionally, having a Top Level Domain name for our
city will put us on par with other global cities that
have Top Level Domain names: Singapore (.SG), Hong
Kong (.HK), the Vatican (.VA), and Los Angeles (.LA) -
note: Los Angeles uses the domain name originally
issued to Laos. 

Resolution 

Having a .NYC TLD will make our community more
governable, provide opportunities for small
businesses, raise city revenue, and make navigating
the Internet easier for our residents, prospective
tourists, and businesses. 

Therefore, we recommend that the U.S. Department of
Commerce facilitate granting the .NYC Top Level Domain
to the city of New York's Commission on Public
Information & Communication or another broad based
public interest organization. 

Copies of this resolution are to be sent to our city,
state, and federal elected officials
End 

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It appears as if there continues to be public demand
on the part of municipalities for distinctive namespace.


		
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