Technology Updates - .RADIO TOP LEVEL DOMAIN NAME READY FOR LAUNCH

2017 is a big year for radio. The EBU is launching a new Top Level Domain (TLD) name - .radio – for the radio community which will progressively change the way people are reaching internet resources linked to radio..radio can be used for web and email addresses and will be managed by the EBU with the support of the other world broadcasting unions.

For four years the EBU and its partners have been preparing the launch of .radio. The project was endorsed by all the leading radio organizations in the world (including ABU, AER, AIB, AMARC, ASBU, AUB, CBU, EGTA, IAB, NABA, OTI, and URTI). Exceptionally for the internet world, this project is a Community TLD, run for the benefit of the whole radio industry and amateur enthusiast and reserved for people and companies with active interest in the radio sector. "We are proposing that the radio community may like to consider securing the integrity of their web presence by requesting appropriate .radio domains for defensive reasons initially,” says the EBU’s .radio TLD Manager Alain Artero. “The TLD will be focused on content and matters specific to radio and we want to prevent speculators and cybersquatting in this TLD; this extension will therefore rapidly become a high-value internet space for websites, mail systems and other internet applications.”

Managers of radio stations should request a .radio domain(s) during the pre-launch. The EBU believes radio stations should be the focus of this new space on the internet, and consider them as our highest priority. We are therefore working with ICANN* to provide radio station operators with a pre-launch specific phase, starting 3 May 2017 and strictly ending on 5 July, because this will grant priority over all other categories (even trademarks) for a period of 60 days. If, for instance, a radio station and a web radio request the same domain, the radio station will be allowed to purchase it (providing it resembles the station name). During this pre-launch phase, the process is not ‘first come, first served’. The .radio team will seek to optimize domain name allocation to solve contentious issues and prioritize existing radio services. The pre-launch is exclusively reserved for radio stations. All other categories of applications from the sector will be managed during the launch period within a similar period of 60 days.

To request a .radio domain, interested parties should contact a registrar (company selling internet domains) providing it has signed an agreement to sell .radio domains or the EBU directly which will act as a reseller. At any time, an owner of a domain can transfer it from a registrar to another.

The price for registering a .radio domain name will be different for companies and individuals. It will depend on the registrar offering the product, since registrars themselves define their price and their marketing policy. It also depends whether some additional services are included in the yearly fee (like hosting, mailing). For companies, we expect typical prices between 200€ and 250€ per domain each year. For individuals, the price will be much lower.

*ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers) is the private (non-government) non-profit corporation with responsibility for IP address space allocation and domain name system management. ICANN’s role is to oversee the huge and complex interconnected network of unique identifiers that allow computers on the Internet to find one another.