On 10 December, the 39th ICANN International Meeting in Cartagena (Columbia) brought its work to a closure. It is safe to say that ccTLD .РФ and its more than impressive first results (about 700,000 registrations for just a month) were one of the core trends at the conference. “Almost at every session we attended I heard a phrase about “dot .РФ”, - says Marina Nikerova, deputy director general of the Technical Center of Internet. – “First it seemed like everyone is eager to ask something about it. But it turns out that our foreign colleagues were closely following the launch of ccTLD .РФ and kept abreast with all events.”
This considerable interest to ccTLD .РФ is understandable: in last years the New gTLD program, which streamlines the procedure for launching new generic TLDs, has been making the key item at every ICANN meeting. And practically each meeting postponed its approval (the Cartagena meeting did, too). Apart from a great deal of political, economic and technological reasons for such a procrastinated program implementation period, the experts are aware that the surge of the top-level domains number may spiral out of control which may ultimately backfire. Plausibility of such a scenario was evidenced by the launch of ccTLD .РФ: neither Russian, nor foreign experts could visualize such a feverish demand for domain names in a new national zone. While the technical aspect in this particular case has not stirred any criticism and can serve as a model example for other countries, such a boom worldwide may affect the global domain names system in a most unpredictable way.
Small wonder that all three presentations the Russian delegation gave at the ICANN meeting concerned the launch of ccTLD .РФ and its inception performance. Irina Danelia, the CC’s deputy director, delivered a presentation “ccTLD .РФ: Implementation Results” at the ccNSO technical session. She focused on organization of the technical infrastructure whose smooth performance ensured registration of so many domain names in the first hours of the open registration period. Her presentation provided detailed information on domain names registration process in ccTLD .РФin the first day of the open registration period and during the first month of its operation. The next day in the framework of сc NSO sessions Irina Danelia focused on lessons from the zone launch by touching upon a sensitive subject of domain names auctions and priority reservation principles with regard to certain groups of registrants. Russian experience can help all those who are at the onset of the open registration process in new domain zones. Moreover, it is important not only for IDN domains but for the future New gTLDs.
Specific challenges facing IDNs and affecting their development were debated at the session on IDN protocol introduction experience and function of applications in IDN domains. In her presentation, Marina Nikerova, deputy general director of the ITC, highlighted on urgent problems facing ccTLD .РФ: correct interaction between search engines with IDNs and the trendiest issue for national non-Latin domains –that is, the mail services’ performance. Creation of a full-fledged mail service for IDNs remains a critical task for the global Internet community. This issue is raised at many international meetings and experts are increasingly confident the problem might be resolved as early as in the coming year.
