Saturday, June 25, 2005
New redlight district
It is final now. The red light areas on the net are getting a new district. The new red light district on the net shall have the domain name that ends with .xxx instead of .com. The Board of Directors of Internet Corporation of Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) has formally approved the demand of a separate domain name for adult
oriented websites.
So many of the the million odd (yes, one million) adult websites would get new addresses. Though it does not mean that all adult sites with hosted at a .com or .net domain would automatically migrate to the new domain. But the new extension gives an immediate branding to all adult sites.
ICANN made a formal announcement early this week. A similar proposal was mooted almost five years ago, but was rejected by ICANN at that time. New domains are contentious issues and it takes long before such issues are finalised.
Net watchers hoped that such a move would help protect children from indecent exposure from online pornography. Among others, the IFFOR, the International Foundation for Online Responsibility, a Canadian organization had been pressing for a separate domain so as to combat child pornography. It hopes that this would regularize business and ensure that children and others who do not wish to access adult content can easily avoid it.
ICM Registry, which will operate the .xxx domain registry, was founded over 5 years ago specifically to seek approval of the .xxx TLD. It estimates that more than 10% of all online traffic and 25% of all global Internet searching is adult-content oriented. It claims that there are more than 100,000 adult webmasters and over a million adult domains. According to Reuters, online adult-oriented ecommerce is worth more than 3 billion dollars and is growing at a double-digit rate. The number of adult websites has grown 18-fold over the last six years alone.
oriented websites.
So many of the the million odd (yes, one million) adult websites would get new addresses. Though it does not mean that all adult sites with hosted at a .com or .net domain would automatically migrate to the new domain. But the new extension gives an immediate branding to all adult sites.
ICANN made a formal announcement early this week. A similar proposal was mooted almost five years ago, but was rejected by ICANN at that time. New domains are contentious issues and it takes long before such issues are finalised.
Net watchers hoped that such a move would help protect children from indecent exposure from online pornography. Among others, the IFFOR, the International Foundation for Online Responsibility, a Canadian organization had been pressing for a separate domain so as to combat child pornography. It hopes that this would regularize business and ensure that children and others who do not wish to access adult content can easily avoid it.
ICM Registry, which will operate the .xxx domain registry, was founded over 5 years ago specifically to seek approval of the .xxx TLD. It estimates that more than 10% of all online traffic and 25% of all global Internet searching is adult-content oriented. It claims that there are more than 100,000 adult webmasters and over a million adult domains. According to Reuters, online adult-oriented ecommerce is worth more than 3 billion dollars and is growing at a double-digit rate. The number of adult websites has grown 18-fold over the last six years alone.
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