Two new top level domains

November 2004

Internet authority ICANN has announced that it has entered into commercial and technical negotiations with the potential registrars of two new top level domains - .post and .travel.

If approved, the new domains may be made available for registration as soon as early 2005. Firstly, however, the new TLDs will be subject to a review process consisting of three panels of experts to measure the applications against criteria set by ICANN in terms of technical competence; business and financial sufficiency, etc.

.post is being proposed by the Universal Postal Union (UPU) - a UN agency - and is intended as an "innovative standard identifier of the postal community in cyberspace." Like some other of the newer top level domains like .aero and .museum, .post is intended to be a restricted space available only to members of the specific industry it's aimed at rather than general Internet users.