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Towards the opening of a registration process for .FR domain names with one and two characters
Article | 30/01/14 | 2 min. |
Much awaited, domain names containing one and two characters will soon be available for registration with AFNIC (French Association for Internet Naming and Cooperation).
Up until now, the AFNIC naming charter has forbidden the registration of a domain name containing a single alphabetic or numeric character as well as domain names containing two alphabetic characters. For example, the possibility of reserving
However, such exclusion should not last much longer as the opening of domain names with one and two characters has been launched by AFNIC and should be complete by the second half of 2014. AFNIC is currently finalizing its project in order to submit it to the validation authorities.
The registration of short domain names, which was refused for a long period of time due to a risk of confusion with extensions referring to national domain names published by the ISO, will enable AFNIC to fall in line with its German and English counterparts who already implemented such a measure in 2009 and 2010 respectively.
In March 2013, the French body launched a public consultation which enabled it to gather remarks and comments from a great number of actors on the different processes envisaged for the opening of the registration of domain names with one or two characters.
To summarize the various contributions, AFNIC noted that the opening for registration of .FR domain names with one or two characters was mostly recommended with:
- • A sunrise phase to protect the rights holders, avoid disputes and prevent cybersquatting (such a phase will enable rights holders, and trademark holders in particular, to benefit from a reservation priority);
- • Special and dissuasive pricing in order to avoid any speculation and protect the rights holder;
- • Limited naming restrictions.
It is likely that certain restrictions will be imposed in order to avoid any confusion with extensions which have already been registered with AFNIC, such as for example
Therefore, if AFNIC follows these recommendations, the registration process would be seen as turning towards a system with several levels of offers rather than towards a system based on a “first come, first served” basis.
In any case, given the marketing interest of short domain names that are easy to remember, such new registrations will constitute a true added value for companies wishing to develop their image online.
What’s more, the most famous trademarks did not hesitate to invest in such domain names upon the opening of their registration in other European countries. In Germany, all the “new” combinations with one or two characters were registered within minutes after they were put up for auction on October 23, 2009. In the UK, 220 companies acquired a domain name corresponding to their trademark within fifteen days of the “sunrise” period, for example British Airways with
Véronique Dahan, Counsel