1.1.  Information on all the top level domain names (tlds), Registration info.

Scroll or jump to country codes, 
.com, .net, and .org,
.edu,  .gov,  .int,  .mil,  .aero,  .coop, 
.museum,  .name,  .info,  .biz,  and .pro

February 1, 2002, NeuStar announces launch of .US

Accredited Registrars for .us

.us opens to non-government companies and individuals.

Who can register a .us
Individuals or organizations that have a substantive connection to the United States are permitted to register for .US domain names.  Details on requirements.

Some are Unrestricted and some are Restricted:

Find the country you are interested in, click it, and it will take you to the Registrar for that country code.

See one registrar's prices for country codes for an idea.  Registrars charge different prices.  Read the terms to see if there are restrictions.

Many country codes are not available to register if you live outside that country.  Some countries have opened theirs up for sale, some with restrictions, some not. 

For example, although a U.S. citizen can register a .de tld (Germany), they have to have a contact in Germany to also list on the registration.  

Only those living in Norway, with a Norway address, may register .no.

Tuvalu, a small Pacific island nation, sold their .tv tld with no restrictions, and planned to use the money on infrastructure to improve the quality of life on Tuvalu.  Anyone can register .tv.

Micronesia's .fm is open to everyone, and many radio stations are buying it.  It goes for a premium of US$100/year with an initial term of 2 years.  Read dotFM's faqs.

Update:   .us - America's Official Internet Address - is now available for registration.  

Save 40% off standard pricing when you register long-term

.US  2 years - $63 (10% discount)  5 years - $139 (20% discount) 10 years - $209 (40% discount)

Unrestricted - anyone can register. 

.com is for commercial businesses such as sony.com  and webstreetstudios.com.  Most business sites should register a .com address, but you don't have to be a business.

.net is for telecom, network, and Internet-related business such as RMI.net and Qwest.net.

.org is for non-profit organizations such as UN.org, and youthservice.org 

I've seen some personal and family sites with the .org extension.  I thought this was pretty clever as most families are definitely non-profit.

Beginning January 1, 2003, Public Interest Registry (PIR) - a subsidiary of the Internet Society (ISOC) took over operation of the .org registry from VeriSign.)  Here is the Oct. 14, 2002 announcement of the decision, and here is a Dec. 4, 2002, news article that the deal is finalized.

See the list of registrars certified to sell .com, .net tlds, and .org tlds.   And the list by country location.  Do not lose those links, because on Verisign's and Verisign GRS's sites you will only easily find links back to themselves to register a domain name with them.   It is such a conflict that they run the registry and sell tlds, but you have a choice now. 

register.com (United States) 

register.com prices as of Jan., 2002 are: $35/year, $70/2years, $150/5 years, and $299/10 years for .com, .net., .org.  Check the site for pricing on other tlds.

Some other choices:

I've used register.com for years, but it's getting hard to stay with them because their pricing is just not competitive.  When the monopoly ended, and other registrars joined in, prices lowered, but register.com and network solutions (VeriSign), kept their price at $35/year.

Just be sure who you use is an ICANN accredited registrar.  They have not updated their .org info, but you can find it here instead.  These less expensive companies are reputable:

Dotster.com
1 year  $14.95, 2 years $27.95, 5 years $64.95, 10 years $94.95 

NetWizards - $50 for 2 years, as of Jan. 2002.

NEW GoDaddy.com - see their page for their low prices.  I recently registered 2 names here for $8.95 each.  I want to check the admin interface, see how things are, and I'll let you know soon.  (Nov. 2002).  Jan, 2003 - Now, in addition to the 2 new names, I've transferred 2 domains from other registrars to godaddy.  So far, so good.

The original Registrar, Network Solutions, is not recommended at this time due to poor customer service, and a generally bad reputation earned when they were a monopoly and we had no choice but to use them.  $35/year.

Beginning in April, 2003 postsecondary institutions will be eligible for the .edu domain.  The list includes dance schools, acupuncture, and massage therapy.

Read more about it.

February 11, 2003 EDUCAUSE, the association for information technology in higher education, which manages the .edu Internet domain, and the U.S. Department of Commerce have announced that, effective mid-April 2003, eligibility for .edu names will be extended to postsecondary institutions that are institutionally accredited by agencies on the U.S. Department of Education's list of Nationally Recognized Accrediting Agencies.

Currently Restricted.  May be registered by higher education institutions only such as MIT.edu and Harvard.edu - until April.

Where to register a .edu domain name:

A college would use EduCause to register their school.  EduCause replaced VeriSign as the official registrar for .edu names.  More info on the switch from Wired

There are no fees for a .edu tld. 

Where to register a .gov domain name

U.S. federal government reps would register a domain name at http://www.nic.gov/ 

International treaty organizations can apply for a domain name through the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA).

Policy info:
www.itu.int/net/int/
int-policy-09.htm 

Where to register a .mil domain name:

U.S. Military representatives would register a .mil domain at www.nic.mil/ 

scroll or click to jump to .aero, .coop, .museum, .name, .info, .biz, and .pro 

Only .name and .info, are available to the general public without any special requirements.   See details for each tld below:

Restricted  for air transport/airline industry only 

Management of .aero was given to www.sita.int/ 

More Info - www.nic.aero/

Where to register a .aero domain name:
The list of registrars for authorized aviation community personnel 

Learn more from one of the registrars:
Overview and FAQ from Domain Bank.

Phase 1 opened in March, 2002.  Phases 2 and 3 to be complete by Sept. 2002.

DotCooperation LLC is a subsidiary of National Cooperative  Business Association (NCBA) and is the actual sponsor of the .coop TLD that is licensed by ICANN.

Where to register a .coop domain name:

Jan. 30, 2002 - Worldwide Live Registration Opens!
See if your coop name is available. and register it.

Article from Newsbytes on the opening of this domain for live  registrations.

.coop went live on January 10, 2001 to only certain registrants.
Real time registration will open worldwide on Jan. 30, 2001
Some Cooperative organizations pre-qualified their coop.

Cooperative  information reports

Where to register a .museum domain name:

Museum Domain Management Association (MuseDoma) is the  .museum registry.

Info and name request form from MuseDoma.

From the MuseDoma site:

"Although a few formal actions remain to be finalized, museums are welcome and encouraged to submit applications for names in .museum. All new names are immediately visible to Internet users on a public index and may be used for both website and e-mail addresses."

All .museums will have at least 3 levels.  The top level is, of course, .museum.  The second level is to designate location, subject or other identifying word.  Then the 3rd level will be the name, company, whatever.

Some examples that went live in the test:

stockholm.music.museum/ 

american.windmill.museum/ 

nc.naturalsciences.museum/  

northwest.railway.museum/ 

computerhistory.virtual.museum/ 

This one is a little weird with 4 dots.  Can't believe they did that.
united.states.cold.war.museum/ 
 

Where to register a .name domain name:

Find an accredited registrar at The Global Name Registry 

Format for .name:

firstname.lastname.name or lastname.firstname.name.

If your name is Jennifer Jackson you can register jennifer.jackson.name, j.jackson.name or even jackson.jennifer.name. There are many possibilities - as long as you have two dots in the domain.

The domain must have the following number of characters:  
 1-63      first part before first dot
 3-63      second part after first dot
 .name   last part

Valid:   a.johnson.name, or anna.johnson.name. 
Not valid:   a.j.name

Email addresses are offered with the domain name for a fee.

Some registrars offer the domain name and email only as a package, and some offer them separately.

An email forwarding service will accept incoming email to your .name address and will forward that mail to an address specified by you. 

register.com  
Includes domain name, email address in .name format and email forwarding to email address you already have.
Package:
1 year = $24.95 
2 years = $38.95 
10 years = $159.95 

"These .info names were reserved before the general public was allowed to register .info names. But registration problems prompted the .info registry to cancel those registrations and release the names this summer. 
There is NO CHARGE to request these names and NO LIMIT on the number you may request. But because the registration process will be randomized for fairness, we cannot guarantee that names you request will be registered to you. "

See their FAQS page for more info.

.Info is Unrestricted.  Anyone can have a .info tld.  .Info is fully operational and is accepting live registrations (meaning not pre-registrations, or reservation lists).

"INFO was created for general use around the world.  Use your .INFO name for business, personal use, your organization — whatever you like." - Afilias.

Info on .info from Afilias.com

Where to register a .info:

Register with anyone on this list:

Accredited Afilias member registrars who can register .info

Some on the list I like:
register.com  - USA
Melbourne IT - Australia
Net Wizards - USA

trademark issues with .info from InternetNews.com



Press Release from ICANN 
May 15, 2001

You may not have NSISucks.biz 

Where to register .biz:

Find an accredited registrar though Neulevel.biz

Some on the list I like:

register.com - USA
Melbourne IT - Australia
Net Wizards - USA

Restricted.  For professionals - accountants, doctors, and lawyers

You will have to provide evidence of professional qualifications.

Where to register a .pro domain name:

Update 5/7/2002 - RegistryPro's contract to register .pro addresses has been approved.  The U.S. Dept. of Commerce needs to sign off, but no one expects any problems.

They have not listed authorized registrars yet.

.pro is not yet available for registering, but plans are now for 2003.

"RegistryPro, founded in September 2000, is headquartered in New York. Register.com (Nasdaq:RCOM) a leading provider of global domain name registration and Internet services, is the sole shareholder. "

The RegistryPro site says:  "Please continue to check www.registrypro.com for updated information regarding the latest news on registering for a .pro domain name. Until registrations begin, consistent with ICANN policy, we do not plan to pre-register domain names. Moreover, we would caution ICANN accredited registrars not to pre-register a .pro domain name. The registry will not recognize a pre-emptive right by such pre-registrations to a .pro domain name."

RegistryPro is a joint venture between Virtual Internet and Register.com established to apply for the .pro domain registry. 

Read their press release.

Cost
From the Washington Post:  "Although RegistryPro has not yet set a wholesale price for .pro addresses, Gaon said that one-year .pro registrations will retail for $250 to $300, roughly 10 times the cost of a one-year .com registration."   Read the full article.  Holy Cow.  I guess doctors, lawyers, and accountants can afford it.

. Pro Update February 5, 2002. - "Internet addressing authorities hope to finalize a contract authorizing the creation of the "dot-pro" Internet domain before the end of February" - from Newsbytes.  

Read the faqs from register.com

The names will follow this form:

JoeESmith.law.pro for an attorney
JoeESmith.med.pro for a doctor
JoeESmith.cpa.pro for an accountant

More professions are planned but not in the works yet.