“What’s in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet.” – Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet (II, ii, 1-2)
With all the attention that Internationalized Domain Names (IDNs) have garnered over recent months, is a rose by any other name still a rose? And moreover, does it really matter to you as a brand-holder?
It should, because that’s how a sizable number of potential customers are going to find you. And you don’t have to do business in China, the Middle East, India, or Japan in order to take full advantage of what “basic” IDN’s can do for you.
As far as reach goes, there are almost three times as many Chinese-speakers as English-speakers around the globe. Support for IDN domains has been around in the .com, .net, and other top level extensions for a long time – since 1998 – yet until now domain names have been centered on Latin script, ASCII characters. Even browser technology had to catch up so that 玫瑰.com could be entered directly into a browser address bar rather than the cryptic looking (PUNY Code) of xn--ncy8p.com.
“Change is good. You go first.” – Dilbert
It was a natural progression that registries would want to take it to the next level and have natural characters in the extensions as well. So who was first? China was actually the first off the mark with IDN.IDN’s, however, their current IDN.IDN domains still only work within China. The new IDN.IDN domains will work globally, giving you even more reach to your potential customers.
As a brand-holder, where do you start? Each registry is allowed to make its own rules when it comes to launching IDN.IDN domains. To date there has always been a sunrise period containing a trademark component. So your Trademarks Database is the pivotal point to begin queuing up what you might want to protect on IDN.IDN launches.
Currently Saudi Arabia and Egypt are underway and at varying stages in their IDN.IDN launch schedules. In perusing your trademark data, be aware that the mark filed must be in natural characters for it to qualify under the sunrise period for Saudi Arabia and Egypt. If your brands are “known” locally in the language but not trademarked, you can still queue them up for any subsequent phases. This way you can at least make an attempt to secure your brand.
CSC can help you prepare for the pending launches by also checking your natural character brand strings in all the ASCII extensions that currently support IDN domains. We’ll let you know if you have any gaps even before the IDN.IDN launch comes about. For more assistance, reach out to our Brand Advisory team or your Client Service Specialist, or fill in an online request here.
Quinn Taggart
Global Brand Advisor
Corporation Service Company