What If There Were An Application For Dot Wikileaks?
What would happen if the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) received an application for a .wikileaks top level domain name (TLD) next year, under its new system of opening up the internet for domains? It could make an interesting example of how well the complex system to apply for new TLDs works and how much political intervention is possible in the system. At the 39th ICANN meeting in Cartagena, Colombia this week, the self-regulatory body is trying to finalise issues in the published Final Applicant Guidebook - and it is governments and trademark owners that are calling for more time and more procedures.
In the Caribbean, issues of traditional knowledge in intellectual property are hardly considered to be of special significance to the majority of policymakers and, except for a few pockets of interest groups such as a group of Rastafarians in Jamaica, the average citizen is uninformed on the subject. The protection of the cultural heritage of the region through a normative system of law is exceedingly necessary for the survival of our unique brand of cultural expression, writes Abiola Inniss.
This year marks the first time a website address may exist fully in Chinese, Russian, Arabic, or other non-Latin scripts. Ten years from now, the percentage of English content could easily drop below 25 percent. But there are still obstacles to this linguistically local revolution, writes John Yunker.