Internet overhaul given go-ahead in Paris
A complete overhaul of the way in which people navigate the internet has been given the go-ahead in Paris.
The internet’s regulator, Icann, voted unanimously to relax strict rules on top-level domains such as .com and .uk, resulting in a decision that could see companies turning their brands into web addresses.
The vote will allow web addresses to be in the form of www.domainname.anything, which could (or most probably will) cause a lot of confusion by creating a wide variety of domains. There was also a second proposal, to introduce domain names written in Asian scripts. This was also approved.
Despite these new introductions, .com and .uk domains will no doubt still be the most common and obvious choices for most companies, with the uncommon .eu, .asia, .info, .mobi and .biz domains still being available as usual.
The new system will begin to be introduced in 2009.