On 1 November Aotearoa New Zealand’s ccTLD launched a brand new registry system for its 750,000 plus .nz domain names, using technology based on Canada’s CIRA Registry Platform, the infrastructure behind the .ca domain name. InternetNZ will continue to manage it and keep all the .nz-related data in Aotearoa New Zealand.
As economies around the world hit headwinds with rising prices, worker shortages and interest rate rises, it seems domain name registration growth has stagnated. During the second quarter of 2022, the total number of domain names registered across all top-level domains increased by 1.0 million, or 0.3%, in the second quarter of 2022 according to Verisign’s latest Domain Name Industry Brief released this week. In the 12 months to 30 June, domain name registrations increased by 10.4 million, or 3.0%. This took the total to 351.5 million domain name registrations.
The COVID-19 pandemic saw registrations for many top-level domains get a welcome boost after some years of limited or no growth. The two years of lockdowns and restrictions saw a sizeable number of businesses that did not have an online presence go online, and new business ideas were started. But now life has largely returned to normal, according to the latest CENTRstats Global TLD Report with European ccTLDs largely returning to registration rates that are consistent with long term averages.
The number of .eu, .ею and .ευ domain names grew by 0.9% in 2021 to 3,713,804 according to EURid’s 2021 Annual Report released this week. It’s the highest total number of .eu domains since 2017 when there were 3,815,055 domains. But this 2017 figure was before the impact of Brexit and included 317,286 .eu domains registered to British registrants, the vast majority of whom became ineligible once Britain left the European Union.
Continue reading EURid Beats Post-Brexit Blues To Record 0.9% Increase in 2021 Registrations
The number of .de domain names registered grew by 460,000, or 2.75%, to 17,160,504 in 2021 cementing .de’s position as the world’s largest ccTLD. This was an increase over 2020 when .de domain registrations grew 376,000 or 2.30%.
In a surprise announcement, auDA today announced Jordan Carter, until a few months ago InternetNZ’s Chief Executive, will be crossing the ditch to join auDA in the newly created role of Internet Governance and Policy Director, from 13 July.
Twelve months ago domain name registrations were on the decline, but at the end of the first quarter of 2022 it’s a different story. As of 31 March, there were 350.5 million domain name registrations across all top-level domains, an increase of 8.8 million, or 2.6%, compared to the fourth quarter of 2021 according to Verisign’s latest Domain Name Industry Brief. Over the 12 months to 31 March registrations increased by 13.2 million or 3.9%.
EURid, the .eu registry, signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with ICANN to strengthen collaboration between the two organisations supporting Internationalised Domain Names (IDNs) and promoting the Universal Acceptance (UA) of all domain names and email addresses.
ICANN’s meetings are starting to get back to normal with in-person attendances. In an announcement during the recent ICANN74 in The Hague, DENIC, eco and ICANN announced the ICANN78 annual general meeting will be held in Hamburg, Germany, in October 2023. And ICANN has scheduled the first Global Domains Division Summit since May 2020’s cancelled GDD Industry Summit in Paris for Los Angeles in November 2022.
Your favourite .eu (or .ею, or .ευ) website could win an online marketing budget worth €5,000 in the 2022 .eu Web Awards launched Tuesday.