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ICANN Newsletter | Week ending 23 September 2011

News from the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers

Announcements This Week

ICANN Names Award-Winning Broadcast News Veteran as Senior Director of Communications [PDF, 246 KB]

20 September 2011 | The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers has named Jim Trengrove as its Senior Director of Communications.

Pre-Dakar ICANN Policy Update Webinar Invitation

20 September 2011 | Whether you plan to participate in the upcoming ICANN meeting in Dakar remotely or in person, you're invited to a quick reminder of the background and current status of each major policy issue currently under discussion in ICANN.

ICANN Unveils Online Site, Applicant Guidebook for New Generic Top-Level Domains [PDF, 244 KB]

19 September 2011 | ICANN today launched a micro website for new generic Top-Level Domains (gTLDs), a program that heralds one of the biggest changes to the Internet in its history.

New gTLD Applicant Guidebook 2011 Sept 19

19 September 2011 | Having concluded the detailed stakeholder discussions on policy and implementation for the New gTLD Program, ICANN is preparing for its launch: applications for new gTLDs are planned to be accepted 12 January – 12 April 2012. (Note: all applicants must at least register in the online application system by 29 March 2012.)

Supporting New gTLD Applicants, Including Those From Developing Economies

19 September 2011 | This program seeks to facilitate partnerships with those seeking assistance in launching a new gTLD with those in the community able and eager to provide assistance.

ICANN Launches New Online Information Center for New Generic Top-Level Domains

19 September 2011 | ICANN has just launched a new "micro-site" as the online home for information about the New Generic Top-Level Domain (New gTLDs) Program. The micro-site is designed to help everyone interested in new gTLDs, regardless of their level of knowledge.

WHOIS Policy Review Team Meeting: 20-21 September 2011 Marina del Rey

19 September 2011 | With a view to issuing a draft final report by the ICANN Dakar meeting, the WHOIS Policy Review Team will hold a two-day face-to-face meeting in Marina del Rey (Los Angeles) on 20-21 September 2011.

Upcoming Events

23 - 28 October 2011: 42nd International Public ICANN Meeting - Dakar

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Domain Name System
Internationalized Domain Name ,IDN,"IDNs are domain names that include characters used in the local representation of languages that are not written with the twenty-six letters of the basic Latin alphabet ""a-z"". An IDN can contain Latin letters with diacritical marks, as required by many European languages, or may consist of characters from non-Latin scripts such as Arabic or Chinese. Many languages also use other types of digits than the European ""0-9"". The basic Latin alphabet together with the European-Arabic digits are, for the purpose of domain names, termed ""ASCII characters"" (ASCII = American Standard Code for Information Interchange). These are also included in the broader range of ""Unicode characters"" that provides the basis for IDNs. The ""hostname rule"" requires that all domain names of the type under consideration here are stored in the DNS using only the ASCII characters listed above, with the one further addition of the hyphen ""-"". The Unicode form of an IDN therefore requires special encoding before it is entered into the DNS. The following terminology is used when distinguishing between these forms: A domain name consists of a series of ""labels"" (separated by ""dots""). The ASCII form of an IDN label is termed an ""A-label"". All operations defined in the DNS protocol use A-labels exclusively. The Unicode form, which a user expects to be displayed, is termed a ""U-label"". The difference may be illustrated with the Hindi word for ""test"" — परीका — appearing here as a U-label would (in the Devanagari script). A special form of ""ASCII compatible encoding"" (abbreviated ACE) is applied to this to produce the corresponding A-label: xn--11b5bs1di. A domain name that only includes ASCII letters, digits, and hyphens is termed an ""LDH label"". Although the definitions of A-labels and LDH-labels overlap, a name consisting exclusively of LDH labels, such as""icann.org"" is not an IDN."