Nominet, the .UK registry has just released their latest Communiqué, which relates to a meeting of their board of directors on 12th June 2013.
There are a number of pieces of news that will impact our resellers.
Firstly, .uk domains once again slightly increased their market share in the UK. If any of our Domain Resellers have customers in the UK, now is the time to ensure that they have already registered their .CO.UK domains! They also represent extremely good value for money. Make sure your clients know that!
Direct.uk
The ability to register .UK domain names at the second level has always been impossible. However, Nominet are now keen to open up the second level to the public. There have been a number of consultations regarding second level .UK registrations in the past. These all culminated in the publication of a consultation that explained how .UK registration would be implemented.
After a consultation in February:
‘The board approved a revised proposal to allow registrations directly at the second level within .uk, which will form part of a second consultation that will be launched on July 1.’
‘… the basis for the revised proposal would be improved registrant validation and verification, and improving security across the whole namespace.’
‘Subject to consultation feedback, existing registrants would have a six month right of first refusal for the corresponding second level’
‘… second level domains would be priced competitively, at approximately £5 per annum’
Lots of details have been provided about the revised .UK proposal which we will learn more about in July.
The Board has also agreed to a consultation regarding the registrar agreement that Nominet has with registrars.
In April 2013 there were 168,360 new .uk registrations. A sign of the popularity of .uk domain names for people operating in, or hoping to reach, the UK market.
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