Afilias Limited, a leading Internet registry services provider, today announced a rapid-fire contest to generate ideas for new top-level domains (new TLDs). As organizations consider whether or not to invest in new TLDs under the forthcoming ICANN New TLD program, they may not consider all the possibilities for new TLDs. The “Afilias Global Innovation Contest for New TLD Ideas” is designed to address that issue.

With this contest, Afilias is looking for unique new TLD ideas, whether that domain is a “dot Brand” (for a company) or a “dot Niche” (for a concept or community) or a “dot City” domain. The goal is to discover ideas for “right of the dot” domains that cannot be done today with any of the existing domains, like .com or .net.

To help participants generate ideas, Afilias has created a special downloadable e-book—The Afilias New TLD Innovation e-book: Ideas to Stimulate Your Imagination—available on the contest website at http://www.afilias.info/newtldcontest.

“Technology visionary Alan Kay once remarked, ‘The best way to predict the future is to invent it,’ and that is what our contest is helping to do: invent the future,” said Roland LaPlante, CMO and Senior Vice President of Afilias. “We’re excited to see what powerful ideas people have for new TLDs. The right TLD can change the Internet—and the world—as we know it.”

To ensure the largest number of voices are heard through this contest, the only requirements are that ideas must be submitted by participants of 18 years or older, and are submitted in English via the official contest website at http://www.afilias.info/newtldcontest. But potential winners need to act quickly: the contest opened on October 3, 2011, and closes on Monday, October 17, 2011, at 11:59 p.m. UTC / 7:59 p.m. Eastern.

Participants will be eligible to win a $5,000 first prize, a $3,000 second prize or a $1,500 third prize.

Winners will be selected by a panel of expert judges. The judging panel will include Paul Twomey (Managing Director, Argo P@cific, former ICANN CEO), Matthew Quint (Associate Director, Center on Global Brand Leadership, Columbia Business School), David Rogers (Executive Director, BRITE, Columbia Business School) and Kevin Murphy (Editor, domainincite.com), along with senior executives from Afilias.

Several of these judges will also participate in a special global webinar on new dot Brand TLDs called, “Who Should Invest in a dot Brand? Evaluating the Business Case for a Top-Level Domain Name.” This free webinar, hosted by the Columbia Business School’s Center on Global Brand Leadership and sponsored by Afilias (Diamond Sponsor) and Glowpoint (Silver Sponsor), will be held at 2 p.m. UTC / 10:00 a.m. Eastern on Wednesday, Oct. 19, 2011.

Afilias’ Global Registry and DNS services power 20 million domain registrations across 16 TLDs, including six TLDs operating under ICANN contracts. Afilias’ new TLD services include a state-of-the-art EPP registry, a globally diverse and redundant Anycast DNS network, 24x7 call-center and technical support, and links to the global distribution channel. In addition, Afilias provides other premium solutions to augment its registry offerings, including technology to enable mobile phone compatibility for websites and a unique IDN-capable email solution. All Afilias services are DNSSEC and IPv6 ready, and reflect more than 10 years of experience in supporting gTLDs operating under ICANN contracts.