Domain names: Internet takes big step toward end of .com era

In what evidently marked a big step for the Internet in the direction of the end of the .com era in domain names, the International Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) Thursday decided to open up the potential for hundreds of new suffixes - other than .com, .edu, or the other 20-odd familiar Internet suffixes – dubbed top-level domain names.

The first round of expansion of suffixes for domain names will witness ICANN, which is a nonprofit organization in charge of online registry, processing nearly 500 applications for the registration of new names.

Applicants for the top domain names need to shell out $185,000, and also bear monthly as well as yearly charges. In addition, they also need to show that they are capable of handling the administration pertaining to the servicing of their own domain name --- a move that is apparently aimed at keeping frivolous or malicious domain owners at bay.

On the basis of ICANN’s beginning of the first round of expansion – a round which will run through April 12 -, it is being projected that the first of the new domain names will likely be up and running by 2012-end.

As of now, there is a mixed response to the ICANN’s move of expansion of the universe of domain names – while some people are of the opinion that the change would apparently not have much of an impact because most websites will still be inclined towards .com; others feel that the expansion may lead to Internet confusion even without any malicious intentions.