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With the release of applications for the new gTLD process, we asked a number of industry experts for their views of what the information shows.

Gavin Brown

CTO, CentralNic

The Big Reveal Day has come and gone, and seemed strangely anti-climactic for me as I sat in the crowded conference room in London waiting for the list to be made public.

I’ve spent the last couple of years writing RFP responses and application material, meeting clients, and seeing CentralNic’s projected applications list double, and then double again (to a total of 60), all the while having to keep quiet about who we were working with. Once that all-important list entered the public domain, it was actually quite difficult to switch modes and be a bit more open about who our clients were.

The MLS Domains Association (MDA) has joined up with the Canadian Real Estate Association (CREA) to apply for the gTLD dot-mls. Both parties were working on individual applications until they became aware of the other, and under the new agreement CREA will make the application to ICANN, and MDA will provide financial support. MDA will also protect CREA's "Multiple Listing Service" and "MLS" trademarks within Canada and the US and in return has exclusive rights to use dot-mls domains for marketing real estate in the US. The application faces competition from Dublin-based Afilias Limited which has also applied for the domain.

After years of playing the coy .virgin, waiting for the right moment to say yes, the excitement of ICANN's potential suitors is writ large in their .love letters posted in that most unreliable of matchmakers, the TLD Application System (Is that an 18-letter long string in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me working again?)

Not all suitors will be rewarded, and none will get their $185,000 engagement rings back, so it's only fair to award applicants for efforts to stand out in a very crowded room.

In London within a few weeks there's a big sporting event whose name cannot be mentioned in the context of gTLDs. So, taking inspiration from the only successful thing Greece currently can claim credit for (and they need plenty of credit), here are...

The Definitely Not The Oly*pics gTLD Awards

Purely a demonstration sport, so no medals, but a tie between:

.americanexpress (15 characters)

.allfinanzberater (16 characters)

Applications for new Internet extensions make it clear that change is coming, albeit wrapped in the Stars & Stripes

The Internet of tomorrow is here, US-style

At the launch of hundreds of new extensions to the Internet last week, the head of the organization overseeing the process was embarrassed when an audience member pointed out that all the Arabic names appearing on a screen behind him were written backwards.

The CEO, an American, immediately apologized. As did his head of communications, also American. She further pointed out that the incorrect names had been noticed before the event but there hadn't been time to change them, so they went ahead with the wrong versions.

As analogies go, this exchange describes perfectly the seven-year process to create new generic top-level domains, and its end results. With the information finally published, it seems that this is to be a very American revolution.

Predictions, new companies and - finally - the release of information

With just a few hours to go until details of the thousands of applications for new Internet domains is finally released, those that have spent the past five years working up to this day are, tentatively, allowing themselves to get excited.

The process run by ICANN has been one of the more convoluted, painful and at times, downright frustrating experiences that many of the companies in the Internet field have ever experienced. But tomorrow at least everyone will be able to revel in the fact that it has finally happened.

ICANN, and particularly its outgoing CEO, is trying to make as much of the launch as possible. Sadly, the right of ICANN to be excited and proud was lost some time ago - somewhere between the fourth version of the Applicant Guidebook and the six-week delay in closing applications.

The following two letters were sent from ARI Services over ICANN's 'digital archery' plan for splitting new gTLD applications into batches. The first letter was sent on 1 June 2012; the second (which appears first on this post) on 6 June 2012.

To: Cherine Chalaby – Chair Board gTLD committee; ICANN Board; ICANN staff

Dear Cherine,

Re: New gTLD Program – Digital Archery and Batching Processes

06 June 2012

This letter is a request to the Board and staff of ICANN to delay the launch of the digital archery batching mechanism and review, in Prague, the need to batch and the chosen mechanism.

Batching was included in ICANN's thinking because there were an unknown number of applications for new gTLDs. Batching had two major objectives:

• To manage ICANN resources within the New gTLD Program timeline; and
• To govern the number of TLDs added to the root each year.

We suggest that, given the data that is publically available, these two objectives can be met without batching and without a significant or unreasonable impact on timelines.

The following article on ICANN's digital archery system for breaking new gTLD applications into batches was published on Minds+Machines blog and then republished on CircleID on 10 June 2012.

The Biggest Glitch of All - ICANN's Batching Program for New gTLDs

Jun 10, 2012

By Antony Van Couvering

ICANN's batching program, called digital archery, is deeply flawed and should be abandoned before it causes havoc with the new gTLD program. As well as arbitrarily creating winners and losers, creating unfair advantages for certain types of applicants and for certain regions, the program may be suffering from another software "glitch" of the kind that damaged the application process. There is a much better solution: a single batch for all applications.

The following letter was sent from Neustar to ICANN on 7 June 2012 over its 'digital archery' plan to batching new gTLD applications. It was subsequently published on the company's blog.

Neustar Urges Caution to ICANN Before Batching

Neustar has sent the below letter to ICANN. Neustar sent the letter to urge caution to ICANN before launching the batching process to promote competition and choice for consumers in a fair and balanced manner.

Neustar has long been an advocate for the introduction of new generic top level domains. Given the long and sometimes arduous road the ICANN community has traveled to get to this point in the process, we are understandably anxious to avoid unnecessary delay in the launch of new gTLDS. Ironically, perhaps, it is concern about further delay that motivates Neustar to join those who have called upon ICANN to pause briefly before launching the Digital Archery "batching" process.