Furious Fight Arises in Registration of Chinese Domain Names

Domain name registration became a hot issue in China when China Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC) began registering domain names in Chinese characters early this month.

Days later, the world's top domain name registration agent, Network Solutions Inc (NSI) and i-DNS, also declared to accept the registration of Chinese domain names.

Other competitors include Australian INWW, who also plans to provide such a service, according to domestic media reports.

Domain names are considered as invisible assets and are becoming as important as trademarks and brand names.

In the past when only English domain names were registered, some companies did not realize the value of a domain name, and often risked the name being used by someone else.

The CNNIC now accepts Chinese domain names in the mode of Chinese.cn or Chinese words: //. and the US-based NSI accepts the registration of Chinese domain names, with the words to the right of the dot remaining in English, such as ".com", ".net" and ".org".

Under such circumstances, a company which plans to protect its on-line trademarks must register at least three or four Chinese domains, with different suffixes, not to say registering domain names for its subsidiaries.

Legend Group, a well-known Chinese computer producer, has now registered more than 70 Chinese domain names, for which, it has to pay registration fees of more than 100,000 yuan every year.

In an effort to create a sound environment for Chinese character domain names, the Ministry of Information Industry (MII) released a new regulation last week.

According to the regulation, without MII's approval, no organization or individual can be involved in any business related to domain name registration, related services or agent registration.

Organizations, enterprises and individuals are required to submit applications to the Telecom Administrative Bureau of the MII for approval.

Any enterprise or individual running Chinese character domain names, who fail to obtain a license within 60 days, will be suspended and punished according to the related laws and regulations, the circular said.

CNNIC is now the only management organization approved by the MII.

Insiders noted that the fight on domain names is, in fact, a fight for economic interests among different countries and different companies.

Statistics show that so far, the number of International top domain names has reached 20 million and English domain name resources have been on vanishing. The non-English domain names are considered more profitable.

"We hope to have a say in the management of Chinese domains," said an official from the CNNIC who refuses to give his name, "we hold that the non-English domain should be managed by the language users, which will ensure effectiveness of management."

The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), the non-profit International domain names management organization, has not put forward specific suggestions on management of domain names in multiple languages. The MII is now discussing with the ICANN on the issue of Chinese domain management.



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