14 DAY TRIAL // ICANN has published the list of domains that hundreds of companies are battling over. ICANN has controversially agreed to open up registrations on custom generic top-level domains.
These cost a pretty penny, but can be anything from .love to .map. The registration period ended recently and ICANN has now published the full list of top-level domains companies want.
There are 1,930 applications and, while plenty are unique, i.e. there's only one company trying to buy it, for example .google or .amazon, some are highly disputed such as .love or .app. Over 500 companies and organizations are fighting for the domains.
The public and other companies now have 60 days to review the applications and object if they find the terms offensive or for trademark violations.
After that, ICANN will review the companies and organizations applying for a gTLD to make sure they can manage the process, both financially and logistically.
The companies that make the cut will be awarded the domains, for which they'll have to pay a significant yearly fee.
There are plenty of cases of more than one company wanting the same domain. In fact 731 applications overlap and there is more than one application for 231 domains.
ICANN will leave it to those wanting the same domain to figure it out. But if they can't settle, ICANN will hold a bid and award the domain to the one that pays the most.
ICANN will process the applications about 500 at a time, so it's going to be a while before it goes through them all. Still, if things go well, the first domains should be going live within a year.
Things haven't always gone well, the registration period had to be extended for several weeks after a flaw in the registration software was found.
The new generic TLDs themselves are rather controversial as critics say they're nothing but a cash-grab and several companies have complained that it would be too expensive to prevent competitors or other parties from grabbing domains that could be linked to them.