A Chinese IDN for "Public interest" (new gTLD)

The China Organizational Name Administration Center (CONAC) applies for the IDN gTLD string."公益”.

"公益" means “public interest”.

More here.

A Chinese IDN for "Government and government affairs"

The China Organizational Name Administration Center (CONAC) applies for the IDN gTLD string ".政务.

".政务" means “government and government affairs”. The language of the label in English is “Chinese” [Native Name:中文 (Zhōngwén), 汉语,漢語], as referenced by ISO-639-1, the language of the label is “zh”.

More here.

ICANN finally confirms target dates

Events:

• 30 May 2012: New gTLD application window closes;
• 8 June 2012: Batching process begins (what is batching?);
• 13 June 2012: Announcement of applied-for Top-level domains ("Reveal Day"):
• Application comment period begins (what are public comments?);
• Formal objection period begins.
• 24-29 June 2012: ICANN's 44th Public Meeting; Prague, Czech Republic (more here);
• 28 June 2012: Batching process ends;
• 11 July 2012: Batching results announced;
• 12 July 2012: Initial evaluations begin;
• 12 August 2012: Application comment period ends;
• 14-19 October 2012: ICANN's 45th Public Meeting; Toronto, Canada (more here);

More on the ICANN new gTLD web site.

.CREDITUNION Top-Level Domain

Thank to Bret Fausett (Internet.pro) for spotting this new generic Top-Level Domain.

"According to CUNA President/CEO Bill Cheney, CUNA’s move to reserve a credit union specific top-level domain, such as .creditunion, ensures this important identifier will stay in credit union hands and will allow the credit union movement to collectively take full advantage of the next stage of the Internet’s development and growth."

Announcement can be found here