Since returning from the ICANN meeting in Seoul, I’ve received a lot of good questions about the Internationalized Domain Name (IDN) announcement made there.

The announcement garnered a lot of attention from our resellers and international media alike. It essentially approves the introduction of IDNs “after the dot” for country code Top Level Domains (ccTLDs). Currently, IDNs are only available “before the dot”, so the extension “after the dot” (such as .CN or .IN) has to remain in latin characters. Not so under the new ccTLD IDN structure.

So the question is, what has changed since the announcement? The answer is: nothing yet. ICANN’s announcement only opened the door for applications, and did not actually result in any new extensions being introduced to the domain name system just yet. Individual country representatives and ccTLD operators still have to apply for their IDN extensions, and systems will need to be adjusted (both by registrars and registries) to make the names available. As a registrar, we will start evaluating them as the ccTLDs we support start introducing them, but there are few time-lines available just yet. As we get more information, we’ll definitely be providing details.

In the meantime, ICANN has more information on the IDN fast track process for those looking to learn more.