New era for domain names?

Well interesting news in the media this week with the ICANN (the internet regulator) voting unanimously in favour on rules governing domain names.

Simply put this will allow companies to turn their brands into web addresses it also will permit individuals to use their own names.

At the moment, top-level domains are currently limited to individual countries, such as .uk or .it (for Italy), as well as to commerce, .com, and to institutional organisations, such as .net, or .org

The .com suffix is by far the most expensive.

The process of introducing the new system will start in 2009, with the first websites possibly coming online in the final quarter of the year.

The new plan means that new domains can be based on any sequence of letters using any script. Domains will also be able to be registered in individuals names but they must be able to show a business reason for doing so.

In a nutshell meaning companies will be able to secure domain names based on their intellectual property. The most likely result being millions of new web addresses.

The cost of setting up a domain in this way will mostly likely be quite expensive. So whether smaller companies choose to change remains to be seen.

It could also lead to bidding wars on generic names such as .news or .sport.

Time will tell whether or not this will be feasible for businesses, however if it provides more competition in the market and helps to lower the cost of .com domains then it may well be a change for the better.