With so many new domain extensions now available in the online space, it is very hard to measure the success of an individual TLD (Top Level Domain). There have been various methods used, such as total domain registration count, hosted live sites in the Alexa top-million, premium domain sales, aftermarket value, etc. Many of these metrics do help in understanding a new extension's progress, however, top-line registrations alone do not tell a complete story. more
Global IP traffic for fixed and mobile connections is expected to reach an annual run rate of 1.6 zettabytes -- more than one and a half trillion gigabytes per year by 2018, according to the Cisco's Visual Networking Index. more
Fundamental & imperative story behind this enablement of a meaningful string as IDN ccTLD name script in local language is very interesting. Previously there was a limitation of two letters as abbreviation for the IDN ccTLD name script and it is I, who proposed and convinced ICANN to remove this limitations that enabled all countries and territories of the world (who use non-Latin base script of their official language) to apply for a meaningful abbreviation or full name of the country as IDN ccTLD. more
China has shut down or 'dealt with' thousands of websites for sharing 'harmful' erotic or obscene content since April, the state's office for combating pornography and illegal publications announced on Thursday. more
The longer I have been in the tech industry, the more I have come to appreciate the hidden complexity and subtlety of its past. A book that caught my attention is 'Open Standards and the Digital Age' by Prof Andrew Russell of Stevens Institute of Technology in New Jersey. This important work shines a fresh light on the process that resulted in today's Internet. For me, it places the standard 'triumphant' narrative of the rise of TCP/IP into a more nuanced context. more
The browser is now a full fledged platform for apps. The major benefits of using the browser as a platform includes ease of universal deployment and avoiding concepts such as having to install software. It's also a very flexible and powerful environment. Increasingly consumer electronics "devices" are software applications... Today's PWAs (Progressive Web Apps) go further. They take advantage of HTML5 and also capabilities of the JavaScript environment. more
The notorious social networking website 8chan was taken offline on Monday afternoon following discontinuation of support from various service providers to the platform over its links to the mass shooting in El Paso, Texas. more
When did the Internet begin? It all gets a bit hazy after so many years, but by the early 1970s, research work in packet-switched networks was well underway, and while it wasn't running TCP at the time (the flag day when the ARPANET switched over to use TCP was not until 1 January 1983) but there was the base datagram internet protocol running in the early research ARPA network in the US. Given that this is now around 50 years ago, and given that so much has happened in the last 50 years, what does the next 50 years have in store? more
Nobody doubts that some time in the near future there will be Internationalized Domain Names (IDNs) in Chinese, Russian or Arabic scripts. The Chinese, Russian and Arabic-character-using worlds are large -- encompassing hundreds of millions of current and potential users. They are politically influential blocs, with the ability to demand action in international meetings. And perhaps most importantly, they are -- at least when taken together -- rich. Everybody knows that access on the web in these languages is not a matter of if, but simply a question of when... more
Tim Berners-Lee has called on governments, companies and individuals to back a new "Contract for the Web" that aims to protect people's rights and freedoms on the internet. more
ICANN's new gTLD program was designed in part to boost innovation. The thinking was: give people the canvas and let them paint in new and fascinating ways, with no set direction... and paint they will. Now that the new gTLD dream has become reality, new uses and business models are already emerging to prove this theory correct. One of the industries in which new gTLD innovation is making itself felt is traditional advertising. This is a sector that has been turned upside down by the Internet revolution of the last decade. more
Lily Hay Newman reporting in Slate: "You may associate the sound of the Internet with the sound of a computer fan or the extinct song of dial-up. But the real sound of the information super highway is the whir of hard discs and fans spinning inside servers and creating a powerful white noise. It seems like it might be a soothing din, but workers report that it's a problem." more
A new IETF draft has been published that specifies a new HTTP status code for legally restricted resources. That is, if the government restricts your access to the web page, return this code (similar to how something not found is a 404). The error code: 451. From the Internet Draft, if the user tries to access a page, but access to the page is restricted by the government, display the following... more
Earlier this year Google made the announcement that it is reviewing its business operations in China and considering possible closure due to China's cyberattacks and limits on free speech. Google today stopped censoring its search services (Google Search, Google News, and Google Images) on its chinese website, Google.cn and users visiting Google.cn are now being redirected to Hong Kong's site, Google.com.hk. more
ICANN, the Internet Authority is up against the wall, and here are the top five reasons for which it may simply drop its greatest revolutionary idea of offering a brand new type of a designer domain name to fit the next generation of widely expanded Internet and cyber realities of tomorrow. This new proposed platform will surely revolutionize the marketing and branding for big and small businesses around the world, offering highly affordable tools for global reach than ever before but the strong opposition would like to kill this idea. more
A World-Renowned Source for Internet Developments. Serving Since 2002.