ICANN Approves Historic Plan for New Top Level Domains

Posted on June 22, 2011 by Stuart Campbell

By David M. Silverman and Catherine E. Maxson

At its meeting in Singapore this week, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) approved a historic plan to allow unlimited numbers of generic top-level domains (gTLDs) to join the ranks of .com, .org, .net, and .biz. Currently, there are only 22 such gTLDs plus the country code TLDs (ccTLDs) such as .us and .ca (Canada).

Top level domains are the string of letters that come immediately after the last period in a domain name. Originally, there were only eight gTLDs, the most common of which is .com. New gTLDs were approved by ICANN in 2000 and 2004, including .mobi, .tel and .info. However, this is the first time that private companies, institutions and organizations will be allowed to establish their own gTLDs. (ICANN will not accept applications from individuals.)

About Stuart Campbell

Stuart handles transactional matters primarily for emerging technology and other high-growth companies. He has particular focus in representing companies in the wireless, Internet and game spaces. He has extensive experience representing founders, investors and companies in: entity formation; over 150 venture capital and angel financings; mergers and acquisitions, including distressed acquisitions and 363 bankruptcy sales; joint ventures, strategic alliances, and technology transfer and licensing matters. Stuart also advises clients on corporate governance matters.
This entry was posted in Business/Corporate Law. Bookmark the permalink.