ICANN To Reveal New Top Level Domains

Since the beginning of the year, ICANN, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, has been taking applications for custom generic TLD's or top level domains, which will enable companies to have their own brand as a domain, rather than the standard .com or .co.za. Coming in at $185,000 per application, and an annual fee of $25,000, custom domain names are not cheap. But ICANN has reported that they have received over 2,000 applications. This round of applications for generic TLD's closes today, and on the 13th of June, ICANN will annouce the proposed new names.

Challenges To gTLD's

Once the proposed domain names have been announced, the public will have the opportunity to contest their approval. Unchallenged domain names may be approved within 9 months, while contested names may require as much as two years for the resolution necessary before approval and implementation can occur.

A New Round Of Applications

ICANN has already announced that they will open another round of applications at an unspecified later date.