The domain name expansion has arrived. The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) announced that four new generic top-level domains (gTLDs) have officially been delegated, introduced to the Internet's Root Zone (the database for the Internet's DNS).
The four new gTLDs are in Arabic, Chinese and Cyrillic scripts. The four strings/suffixes delegated are "web/network" in Arabic (Registry: International Domain Registry Pty. Ltd.). "online" and "site" in Cyrillic (Registry: CORE Association), "game(s)" in Chinese (Registry: Spring Fields, LLC)
"It's happening - the biggest change to the Internet since its inception," said Akram Atallah, president of ICANN's Generic Domains Division. "In the weeks and months ahead, we will see new domain names coming online from all corners of the world, bringing people, communities and businesses together in ways we never imagined. It's this type of innovation that will continue to drive our global society."
ICANN indicated that it would take at least 30 days for people to start accessing the domains. Following a mandatory 20-day sunrise period, registry operators will be free to make their domains available to the public.
