ICANN adds .jobs and .travel to Internet names

ICANN, the group in charge of regulating top level domain (TLD) names, has approved two new TLDs — .jobs and .travel — to come on stream later this year. At the 22nd ICANN International Conference in Mar del Plata, Argentina, on Friday the organisation approved Tralliance to operate the .travel domain and Employ Media to operate .jobs. Registration for both domains will start in a couple of months, and both should be live by the end of 2005. Prices have yet to be decided.

Tralliance, a private company set up to operate the .travel domain, said that it would work in conjunction with The Travel Partnership Corporation (TTPC), which brings together more than 100 international travel trade associations. Registrants will be limited to bona fide travel companies who already have an Internet presence under their own names.

Employ Media, also a private company set up to operate its domain, will work with the US Society for Human Resource Management. It will promote the .jobs domain to companies looking for workers, with the intention that they add a .jobs employment site to their existing Web presence. Recruitment agencies will also be able to register. Employ Media said that it intends to change its name to .jobs during the run-up to the domain going live.

ICANN has ten applications on the go for other top-level domains, and is currently in talks with groups wanting to offer .cat, .post and .mobi domains, the organisation said in a press release. Others being examined include .asia, .tel and .XXX. ICANN has also approved Mauritius-based AfriNIC as the regional Internet registry for Africa.