gTLD	Full Legal Name	E-mail suffix	Detail
.信息	Beijing Tele-info Network Technology Co., Ltd.	tele-info.cn	View

18a.1 Background

In view of the 1.37 billion people in China mainland and approximately 50 million people in other part of the world, which account for 1⁄5 of the total population, the current space of Chinese Top Level Domains (TLDs) are relatively few in number compared with traditional American Standard Code for Information Interchange (ASCII) TLDs. Furthermore, the Chinese domain names have not been introduced to Chinese consumers and information technology vendors well enough, which make the current Domain Name System (DNS) structure inconvenient for Chinese Internet users to transmit information. Specifically, on one hand, traditional ASCII TLDs are inconvenient for Chinese language users to identify, memorize and read, on the other hand, most of the existing high value ASCII domain names which are short and easy to memorize have already been registered. Many organizations that provide Chinese information content often find it very hard to find domain names that match their brands and products. In most cases, they have to turn to some misleading ASCII domain names such as combination of numbers, phonetic representations or abbreviations which often results in confusion of users. To sum up, the current DNS system fails to give a full play to the functions of the domain name system to meet the needs of information services providers for rapid and accurate transmission of information to Chinese language users.

With the rapid development of the information industry, various information service have been on the rise continuously around the world, and there is an increasingly high demand for Chinese language information among Chinese language end-users, especially in those regions where informatization is being carried forward rapidly and the network bytes flow increases speedily and evidently. Take China, the country with the largest number of consumers in the world and where the Chinese language is most commonly used for example, referring to the data in the China Internet Development Statistical Report (http:⁄⁄cnnic.cn⁄dtygg⁄dtgg⁄201201⁄W020120116337628870651.pdf) in January 2012, by the end of 2011, there were 513 million Internet users in China, with an annual increase of 55.8 million, and the Internet penetration rate reached 38.3%, representing an increase of 4 percent from the end of the previous year. The number of web-pages in China showed an increase of 44.3% from that in 2010, reaching at 86.6 billion, of which Chinese web-pages account for 98.8% (simplified Chinese web-pages: 97.2%; traditional Chinese web-pages: 1.6%). In addition, many Chinese versions websites begin to spring up, and the types of Chinese language information services increase rapidly.

Under the full support of China Academy of Telecommunication Research of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology of the People’s Republic of China (“CATR”), Beijing Tele-info Network Technology Co., Ltd. (“Tele-info Ltd.”) applies for a registry of the Chinese gTLD “.信息” on the basis of CATR’s years of knowledge and understanding of the information industry and its mission of serving the information industry and Chinese Internet Community.

After a carefully selection process, Tele-info Ltd. has signed a binding term sheet with China Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC) pursuant to which CNNIC will provide back-end registry services for “.信息”. Tele-info Ltd. aims to leverage the technological expertise and proven channel management experience of CNNIC to provide “.信息” Chinese IDN domain name services and makes it the worldʹs most advanced Chinese domain name registry services.

CNNIC is a trusted third party provider of registry of domain name services which has operated “.CN” ccTLD for over 15 years. In addition, CNNIC is also a trusted partner for IDN services as it has successfully operated ʺ.中国” Chinese Internationalized country-code top-level domains (IDN ccTLD) since 2010 and developed standards of Chinese IDN like RFC 3743, RFC 4713, which has been recognized by the industry. Similarities in experience and principles were identified and discussed in depth between CNNIC and Tele-info Ltd.. Neutrality is a major focus of both Tele-info Ltd. and CNNIC, and they are committed to impartiality and fairness. Through the course of these discussions it became apparent to both Tele-info Ltd. and CNNIC that together they could combine their respective talents and resources transparently to serve the Chinese Internet communityʹs need for a stable, experienced registry. It was this mutual recognition of overlapping core competencies and complementary skills, combined with a desire to make a significant contribution to the Internet. Tele-info Ltd. will also assign specific personnel to supervise the conduct of CNNIC and guarantee the performance of the registry operation as well as the service levels.

In conclusion, the introduction of the Chinese gTLD “.信息” will make it more convenient for Chinese language users to access Chinese information via the internet, which accords with the ICANN’s original intention of satisfying the needs of the Chinese language users that have not yet been met by the introduction of new generic TLDs.


18a.2 The mission of “.信息”

The new gTLD “.信息” that meets the habit of Chinese language users in information exchange will be introduced by Tele-info Ltd. in strict compliance with ICANN’s original intention by making efforts to provide Chinese language users with more options and encourage competition and innovation of Chinese domain name market through the introduction of the new gTLD.

Tele-info Ltd. will be dedicated to the provision of Chinese gTLDs for global Chinese language users that meet their language habits in close cooperation with ICANN and the global Internet community on behalf of the Chinese information service industry, so as to make it convenient for global Chinese language users to access authentic, accurate, reliable and up-to-date information and enjoy online services, and concurrently make it convenient for domain name holders to set up various platforms for information release, aggregation and sharing, and facilitate the healthy development of Chinese information services and internet application innovation by virtue of the provision of secure and reliable services.

18a.3 The goal of “.信息”

The following specific goals are expected to be achieved through the operation of “.信息”:

(1) provide global Chinese language users with services in respect of “.信息” domain names that are more in line with their Chinese input, reading and memory habits, open up a new space in the field of domain names, and meet the needs of the Chinese language user community for diversity in language and culture;

(2) provide Chinese information industry with the first specialized domain name registration services without restriction of territory that meet the needs for release, aggregation and sharing of Chinese language information, therefore increase the difference between their services, and encourage market competition among registries of global Internet TLDs;

(3) make “.信息” top-level domain names become a generic brand of the platform for information release, aggregation and sharing among global Chinese language users, and conduct long-term introduction of “.信息” domain names to various entities that provide information services to support the business promotion of Chinese network information services among the Chinese language user community and boost innovation in the business model of Chinese network information services and global promotion of Chinese network information;

(4) maintain and enhance the security and availability of the global domain name system, further improve the quality of services through the implementation of overall policies on rights protection and reliable security management measures, and explore in depth spaces

gTLD	Full Legal Name	E-mail suffix	Detail
.网站	Global Website TLD Asia Limited	namesphere.asia	View

With close to 500 million users online, China is already the country with the most Internet users. However, with a population of over 1.3 billion people, that represents only a penetration rate of around 36%. Part of the challenge for the hundreds of millions of Chinese Internet users who have yet to be connected is the ability to navigate the Internet with domain names in their own language. The ability to have complete domain names in Chinese script is seen as providing significant opportunity to these people, as well as offering tremendous value and benefit to the current online users.

The meaning of the TLD string “网站” roughly translates to ‘website’ in English. The purpose of the TLD is therefore to support the development of Chinese websites around the world. Furthermore, the Registry aspires to become a breeding ground for innovation and development for the global Chinese Internet community as a generic Chinese IDN TLD.

The introduction of a fully generic Chinese IDN (Internationalized Domain Name) TLD also provides an opportunity for global businesses to open a window into the rapidly growing Chinese Internet marketplace. Businesses and initiatives around the world can better communicate and express themselves with a more friendly and memorable online identity to the audience in China.

The vision of the .网站 TLD is that through the development of an open generic namespace supporting full Chinese IDNs, it could become a nucleus for Internet activities from and for the Chinese community, and become a driver of economic and social value for Chinese users around the world.

The mission and purposes of the .网站 TLD are:

1. To develop a namespace that is meaningful to the Chinese language community and is globally recognized as a prime Chinese IDN gTLD;

2. To operate a secure, stable and trusted Chinese IDN gTLD with a reputation as a reliable online destination on the Internet;

3. To foster the sense of connection and ownership from the Chinese language community to the Internet, especially to engage participation in global Internet governance;

4. To promote the accessibility of the Internet to the majority of Chinese users whose primary spoken and written language is Chinese; and,

5. To serve the global Chinese language community with an open generic namespace supporting a full Chinese IDN experience.

Based on the broad generic nature of the .网站 TLD, Global Website TLD Asia Limited (the ‘Registry’) aspires to become the domain of choice for individuals and companies developing websites serving the Chinese language community.

In addition to its mission and vision as a new gTLD, the Registry believes in its responsibility as a responsible industry participant to advance competition, enhance consumer trust and promote consumer choice with the development of the TLD:

A. Advance Constructive Competition

The release of IDN TLDs in this new gTLD round is expected to add a significant level of overall competition to the market for domain registrations by introducing an option to register full Chinese domain names based on a Chinese IDN gTLD. The .网站 TLD seeks to especially target to capture the segment of the market that is not yet online, especially those that could find English alphanumeric TLDs to be difficult to manage.

This is important, as it is expected that a number of proposed new TLDs will enhance competition by targeting existing domain registrations and penetrating into the existing marketplace with aims to switch away from or add to their existing domains. As a broad generic IDN gTLD, .网站 aspires to attract a good portion of registrations from amongst new Internet users such as Chinese SMEs that are just about to get online, and be unique to the TLD, rather than primarily being alternative registrations across multiple TLDs.

B. Enhance Consumer Trust

Based on expert studies, Internet users have more trust for domain names that exactly match what they are looking for. Today, Chinese Internet users may still be using English alphanumeric domains because those already online may be more familiar with English. Even so, an absolute majority searches online in their native language: Chinese. A full Chinese IDN is therefore one of the best ways for companies from China or looking to enter the China market, to speak to and be found by the target audience.

The value of the TLD name in itself is therefore a core part of the value and of building consumer trust. Companies can establish their own dedicated domain for videos introducing their company or for online customer support via video instead of using other platforms.

Furthermore, appropriate Abuse Prevention & Mitigation (APM) as well as Rights Protection Mechanisms (RPM) are also important to ensuring a trusted domain space. Further details of APM and RPM beyond the basic ICANN requirements are discussed in response to Question 28 and Question 29.

C. Promote Consumer Choice

The Registry believes that a broadly generic full Chinese IDN TLD promotes choice for registrants to better express their offline identity online without being diluted by the “.ascii” restriction (or be boxed-in to a country code).

Based on recent studies, the majority of the Asian online population is under the age of 30. This young crowd is energetically engaged in social media, with a growing social networking population which surpassed 250 million (the entire Internet population in the US is estimated at 245M) in 2011. Already half of China’s online population is microblogging on Twitter-like services, and that percentage is expected to rise to two-thirds by 2014. The significance of this is that the user generated content is almost exclusively in Chinese language, and therefore it is only natural that the choice of web addresses used should be Chinese. Furthermore, the microblogging scene is not just about teenagers. Companies are scrambling to join this Chinese conversation to promote their brands on the major microblogging platforms as consumers continue flocking to them.

Riding the creative explosion of the Chinese Internet users, the .网站 TLD promotes consumer choice by providing an option for users, including individuals and companies, to utilize different microblogging platforms and integrate them onto their own website under their own domain, rather than to rely and depend on the platform. That also promotes user choice in helping users to regain control of their traffic and reduce the barrier for switching between providers.