are you ready for the “biggest technological change on the internet”?
DESCRIPTION
A Prognostication on Key Trends & A Discussion on Implications and Opportunities as “The first Internet addresses containing non-Latin characters from start to finish will soon be online thanks to today(October 30, 2009)'s approval of the new Internationalized Domain Name Fast Track Process by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers board.”TRANSCRIPT
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November 21, 2009NON LATIN DOMAIN NAMES
Examples of Country Names in their Native Languages
Босна и Херцеговина Bosnia & Herzegovina
Druk Yul/Bhutan Brunei
Κύπρος Kypros/Cyprus Ελλάς Elias/Greece
한국 Hanguk/South Korea
Россия Rossiya/Russia 臺灣 Taiwan Mueang
Thai/Thailand
中国 Zhong Guo/China Masr/Egypt
“A Different Language is a Different Vision of
Life”Federico Fellini
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November 21, 2009NON LATIN DOMAIN NAMES
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Are you ready for the “biggest technological change
on the Internet”?
A Prognostication on Key Trends &
A Discussion on Implications and Opportunities
Kien M Lee
Managing Director | SENATUS.net
October 30, 2009 “The first Internet addresses containing non-
Latin characters from start to finish will soon be online thanks to
today's approval of the new Internationalized Domain Name Fast
Track Process by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names
and Numbers board.”
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November 21, 2009NON LATIN DOMAIN NAMES
Overview
Examples
4 Key Trends
Discussion: What Does It Mean For You?
Conclusion
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" This is only the first step, but it is an incredibly big one and an
historic move toward the internationalization of the Internet ," said
Rod Beckstrom, ICANN's President and CEO. "The first countries
that participate will not only be providing valuable information of
the operation of IDNs in the domain name system, they are also
going to help to bring the first of billions more people online –
people who never use Roman characters in their daily lives."
TABLE OF CONTENTS
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“ICANN Bringing the Languages of the Worldto the Global Internet”
ICANN chairman Peter Dengate Thrush
"The coming introduction of non-Latin characters represents the biggest technical
change to the Internet since it was created four decades ago,"
"Right now Internet address endings are limited to Latin characters – A to Z. But the
Fast Track Process is the first step in bringing the 100,000 characters of the
languages of the world online for domain names.”
ICANN's Fast Track Process launches on 16 November 2009
It will allow nations and territories to apply for Internet extensions reflecting their
name – and made up of characters from their national language. If the applications
meet criteria that includes government and community support and a stability
evaluation, the applicants will be approved to start accepting registrations.
OVERVIEW
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China Internet Network Information
Center (CNNIC) will apply for the top-
level Chinese domain name “Zhong
Guo” (written in hanyu pinyin)
“China has a huge number of netizens
– 388 million as of the end of June
[2009]. Their surfing on the Net will be
facilitated under the Chinese domains
but they can continue to use English
domains as well,” said Qilin, assistant
director of CNNIC.
Egypt will apply for the first Internet
domain written in Arabic, its information
technology minister said at a
conference where Yahoo's co-founder
Jerry Yang and others met to discuss
boosting online access in emerging
nations
Pronounced ".masr" but written in the
Arabic alphabet, meaning “.egypt”
“While there are over 300 million Arabic
speakers in the world, less than 1
percent of the content online is in
Arabic” Jerry Yang
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中国
EXAMPLES
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November 21, 2009NON LATIN DOMAIN NAMES
Branding of Domains
Corporations and individuals will look to have “vanity” domains that are
in specific languages for branding purposes in local markets, e.g.
http://baidu.com will likely be mapped to
http://百度.中国
Land grab, cyber-squatting will likely occur but intellectual property rights
will be more easily enforced by local registrars
The “localization of domain names” by native languages represents,
+ A liberalization and opening up of the domain business *trend #2
- A protectionist measure allowing local web businesses to thrive
unharassed by the “world wide web” *trend #3
Local Domain Name Registrars Will Hit Paydirt
High value domain names will be up for grabs, some registrars will employ pricing schemes
and sales mechanisms (e.g. auctions) to maximize profits.
5TREND #1
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November 21, 2009NON LATIN DOMAIN NAMES
Growth in Overall Online Traffic to Non-Latin Domain Names
Typing in non-Latin characters is not intuitive or simplistic for English
speakers
Non-Latin languages vary from being Phonetic-based to Pictograms
But for native speakers who are using their native languages on their
desktop/laptop and mobile operating systems, access is easy, direct
and convenient
Convenience wasn’t and isn’t the issue: It’s not Latin characters that
these consumers have a problem with. It’s just that they don’t think,
remember, write in Latin characters!
Remember, “A Different Language is a Different Vision of Life”
Growth potential is significant in developing countries’ online markets
Internet Penetration Across Countries Will Rise
Marketing campaigns that have domain names branded in local languages will be more
effective.
6TREND #2
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November 21, 2009NON LATIN DOMAIN NAMES
“Search” will go local; web businesses will go local
Some new businesses/websites will be built only to cater to specific
language market
The Internet will truly have “gated” communities
Note: Google Translate can ONLY do so much
“Search” will change
As more content is poured into these specific language domains & as
URL paths contain more non-Latin characters, weight ranking principles
will have to be adjusted
Semantic implications? Does searching for “China” the same as
searching for “中国”? Should it be similar?
Local territories will be drawn up
There will be URLs that you will have seen before that you won’t even know how to get to
again because you can’t read/write/type in the particular language.
The World Becomes… Bigger
7TREND #3
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Need to implement multiple language-named domain strategies
As search goes “local” (English search for English domains, Chinese
search for Chinese domains, etc)
Your Latin-named domain will be increasingly be accessed mostly
by English speakers/readers
You are forced to consider which non-Latin named domains to have, to
better market and position your web product globally, and strategically in
certain local markets
Glocal: Be Global and Local
e.g. Where once http://google.com or http://google.com.cn was enough for Google, it will
probably have a presence at http://谷歌.中国 as well.
8TREND #4
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Act, Don’t React. Forecast, Don’t Follow.
What adjustments and positioning re-alignments do you have to make?
Corporation/Brand
Blogger/Social Media Journalist
Brand/Media Consultancy
Web Developer
Web Entrepreneur
Examples for discussion
“天气” vs. “Weather”
“电话簿” vs. “YellowPages”
You’ll either be paid more, paying more or just working more…
9DISCUSSION
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If you would like to brainstorm more on this topic, I’m happy to coordinate future
discussions, email me at [email protected]
10CONCLUSION