Aussies picked in gTLD lotto
After receiving 1,930 applications for generic top-level domain (gTLD) names in June this year, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) decided to hold a lottery to decide who would get their application processed first, and a number of Australians were lucky enough to make the first cut for 2013.
The companies, which forked over US$185,000 for the application, agreed to pay another US$100 for a ticket in the lottery, which was drawn overnight.
Of the 41 Australian applicants, a total of eight made it into the top 500, with 24 making the top 1,000.
iSelect's .select domain name will be the first Australian gTLD processed, coming in at 173, followed by .CEO and .Monash. Melbourne will be the first Australian city processed, coming in at 350. Sydney wasn't so lucky, with .Sydney coming in at 1,352.
Commonwealth Bank's .CBA, AMP's .AMP and National Australia Bank's .UBANK also made the cut. iiNet came in at 1,199.
McDonald's, Cisco, Virgin, Epson, and Dell all made the top 500, and .microsoft came in at 475. Microsoft also managed to get a number of other names, including .xbox, .live, and .skydrive picked before that.
IBM's gTLD for .IBM came in at 928, and Apple's own .apple gTLD came in at 948.
The gTLD process has not been without its share of controversy. The Australian Department of Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy (DBCDE) acting on behalf of the Australian government has topped the list of countries that are complaining about what it deems as inappropriate gTLDs.
Australia made 124 out of the total 260 complaints, and objected to gTLDs such as .wtf, .sucks, .fail, .dentist, and .engineer.