Single-letter second-level domains
Domaining Guide
Single-letter second-level domains
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Single-letter second-level domains are
domain names in which the
second-level domain consists of only one letter, such as x.org.
Such domains are rare, as on
December 1, 1993, IANA explicitly reserved all single letter and single digit second-level
domain names in the TLDs .com,
.net, and .org. This was done in case the registries for these domains became
overloaded. Recently, ICANN has
considered auctioning off their domains.
However, the few such domains that were already assigned were not recalled;
They were grandfathered in and therefore were not affected by the restrictions
that have existed since.
| Domain |
1993 Owner |
Current Owner |
|
i.net |
INet Solutions Ltd |
Future Media Architects |
|
q.com |
JG |
Qwest Communications |
|
q.net |
Q Net |
"Q Networks" |
|
x.com |
Weinstein & DePaolis |
PayPal |
|
x.org |
The Open Group |
The Open Group |
|
z.com |
HomePage.com |
Nissan |
| |
|
Of the above addresses, as of December 2005 only one, x.org, actually
hosts a Web site directly in the single-letter domain in question. Three others
redirect to sites in different domains, and one, q.net does not appear to
be active for Web use.
Two-letter domain names
Two-letter domain names are also restricted to prevent confusion with
country-codes. However, this restriction was enacted long after domain names
became popular, so there are many existing registrations in the old top-level
domains, though they are prevented in most of the new ones such as .info.
Several notable examples are un.org, ba.com, ae.com, sf.net, and tv.com.[1]
In some new TLDs, special exceptions were made to permit two-letter domains
for particular purposes; for instance, in the .aero domain the domains are
reserved for airlines identified by their two-letter codes, such as aa.aero for
American Airlines.
Controversy
With the 2005 announcement that registration of the remaining single-letter
names might become available, some companies have begun jockeying into position
to claim them by claiming to own trademark rights over single letters used in
such a context.
U Magazine has gone so far as to re-brand its Web site as "U.com", with a ™
sign, in online logos and captions[1]
even though it is not actually at that address; and they have sent an
intimidating letter to ICANN attempting to jump the queue for registration
of this name.
External links
Whois links
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Domaining Guide, made by MultiMedia | Websites for sale
This guide is licensed under the GNU
Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia.
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