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ICANN Newsletter | Week ending 28 October 2011

News from the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers

Announcements This Week

CEO Search Process Announcement

28 October 2011 | Following the announcement by ICANN CEO Rod Beckstrom that he will be departing ICANN at the end of his three year term on July 1, 2012, the ICANN Board of Directors established a search committee to plan and execute a strategy to identify CEO candidates for submission to the Board.

ICANN Board Focuses on Assistance for Developing Economies [PDF, 282 KB]

28 October 2011 | The ICANN Board of Directors today passed a resolution to review a proposal from a special working group that would create a support system for deserving applicants of new gTLDs, many of whom are expected to be in developing countries.

L-Root Goes Live in Dakar

27 October 2011 | As part of an ongoing trial project to expand the distribution of L-Root globally into under-served regions, L-Root went live in Dakar today.

Internet Root Server Goes Online in Senegal [PDF, 285 KB]

27 October 2011 | The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) today announced that a new L-Root server, an important part of the Internet's infrastructure, has gone live in Senegal.

Protecting Trademark Rights in New gTLDs: ICANN Invites Participation on Assistance Group for Trademark Clearinghouse Implementation

26 October 2011 | ICANN is inviting interested stakeholder participants to take part in an Implementation Assistance Group ("IAG"), working with ICANN in implementing the specified processes to be supported by the Trademark Clearinghouse.

ICANN Formalizes Relations with French Top-Level Domain Manager [PDF, 300 KB]

26 October 2011 | The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) today formalized its relationship with the French Network Information Centre (AFNIC), the non-profit association that serves as the Internet registry for the ".fr" Top Level Domain in France.

ICANN Dakar Meeting Opens with Calls for Greater Internet Access for Africans [PDF, 296 KB]

24 October 2011 | Rod Beckstrom, ICANN's President and Chief Executive Officer said today that there is a real need to increase Internet access across the African continent.

Top-Level Domain Application System (TAS) Interactive Demonstration Now Available

23 October 2011 | Thinking of applying for a new generic top-level domain? An interactive demonstration of the online application system is now available on ICANN's new gTLD microsite.

Public Comment: IDN ccPDP WG 2 – Draft Final Report

22 October 2011 | The IDN ccPDP WG 2 is seeking public comment on its draft Final Report which includes recommendations on changes to the ICANN Bylaws to include IDN ccTLD's in the ccNSO.

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11 - 16 March 2012: 43rd International Public ICANN Meeting - Costa Rica

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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."