ICANN’s recent release of the Applicant Guidebook for public comment seems to be an indication—or maybe just a hint– that the much debated “new domain extensions” may be approved at the next ICANN Meeting in Singapore this summer.  ICANN stated that they will collect public comments over the next 30 days and will have a completed Applicant Guidebook ready for Board review at the end of May.  The ICANN Board indicated after the San Francisco meeting in March that approval of the new TLD application process could come as early as the June 2011 meeting and as of now it appears they will hit that target. Perhaps another “hint” is that ICANN has removed the word “Draft” from correspondence related to the Application Guidebook.  What does this mean? If new TLDs are approved in June, ICANN has stated that a four month global communication period will be held and the application period for new generic Top Level Domain extensions could start as early as late October 2011.

If you would like to review and/or post a comment on the Applicant Guidebook, please visit the ICANN web site http://www.icann.org/en/topics/new-gtlds/comments-6-en.htm. 

Additionally, if you have any questions about applying for a new domain extension or how you can prepare your company for the potential launch of new TLDs, you can contact us at Safenames in the US, +1.703.574.5313 and [email protected], or at Safenames in the UK at +44 1908 200022 and [email protected].