Several people here have suggested the creation of a new TLD,
probably .npo, for
non-profit organizations; this would be an
alternative to the proposed
restriction of .org to non-profit
organizations.I have no objection to the
idea, but there's one question I
don't think anyone has asked. Is a dedicated
TLD for non-profit
organizations even necessary? For example, just the first
page of
a Google search for "red cross" shows:
www.redcross.org
(American Red Cross)
www.ifrc.org (International Federation of Red
Cross
and Red Crescent
Societies)
www.icrc.org (International Committee of the Red Cross)
www.redcross.ca (Canadian Red Cross)
www.redcross.org.uk
(British Red Cross)
www.hck.hr (Croatian Red Cross)
www.redcross.org.au (Australian Red Cross)
www.redcross.be (Belgian
Red Cross)
The point is that many (most?) existing non-profit organizations
already
have perfectly good domains under existing TLDs.
If a group of non-profit organizations
requests
a new TLD, they should have one. But it's
interesting that nobody
even proposed such a TLD; see
http://www.icann.org/tlds/tld-applications-lodged-02oct00.htm.
(Perhaps
no NPO had a spare $50,000 for the application fee.)
Like the suggestion that existing
.orgs be grandfathered, the .npo
TLD is being suggested as an alternative to the
proposed restrictions
on .org.
The restrictions on .org are most likely being
proposed to
drive people into TLDs on which VeriSign can make a profit.
Don't
compromise. Leave .org alone.