A small number of registries and registrars are responsible for three-quarters of child porn websites says the Internet Watch Foundation (IWF) in their annual report released this week.

The IWF found 74 per cent of child sexual abuse domains they traced are commercial operations selling indecent images of children with 76 per cent of these (some 850 unique domains) are registered with just ten unnamed domain name registries. Of these, five registries and registrars accounted for 55 per cent of all the commercial child sexual abuse domains known to IWF during 2008. … more

Telnic, the registry operator for .TEL, have launched a free Microsoft Outlook plug-in application that will enable anyone with Outlook to have their address book updated dynamically. … more

The global financial crisis has impacted on domain name registrations with global domain registrations rising 16 per cent in 2008 to a total of 177 million domain names compared to a 27 percent increase in 2007. Overall in 2008 there were approximately 300,000 less domain name registrations each quarter than there were in 2007, according to the fourth quarter 2008 Domain Name Industry Brief published by VeriSign. … more

Michael Collins, Executive Director of the Internet Commerce Association has announced his resignation from his post with the organisation in an email to members of the ICA. … more

In Netcraft’s January 2009 survey, they received responses from 185,497,213 sites, reflecting what Netcraft has described as “an uncharacteristic monthly loss of 1.23 million sites.” … more

Abstract: In this article, Moringiello analyse’s the opinion in Network Solutions, Inc. v. Umbro International, Inc., the case that sparked much discussion about whether an internet domain name can be considered “property” of the registrant. … more

Verisign’s latest Domain Name Industry Brief shows there are now 174 million domain names registered worldwide - a 19 per cent increase over the same time last year, but only a three per cent increase over the second quarter 2008. The slowdown in growth would appear to indicate the global financial crisis is having an impact on domain name registrations. … more

The comedian Sarah Silverman is interviewed by the wonderful Jonathan Ross. As part of the introduction, Ross plays a stand-up clip from Silverman in which she asks how to deal with the rage of 9/11. Well, Silverman’s answer was to put it into domain names. … more

The Wall Street Journal looks at the likely approval by ICANN of new gTLDs saying the difficulty in obtaining a .com name will lead many to look at alternatives when they become available. The article refers to domains “the endings on Web addresses, such as .com and .gov”. The article also notes there is disagreement on the outcomes of allocating more gTLDs, with some of the view it will only create confusion in the online marketplace. … more

There are reports such as one in The Huffington Post that with Sarah Palin’s hotness, among some, has led to the McCain campaign registering the domain name voteforthemilf.com. Currently this forwards to the Google home page. … more

Jon Postel died ten years ago and Vint Cerf has posted on the ICANN blog a piece remembering Postel and his legacy, and looks forward to the next decade of the internet.

Cerf looks at Postel’s background and interests and the lead up to the creation of ICANN, created in October 1998, two weeks before Postel’s death. … more

In a newsletter to members, the Internet Commerce Association has expressed its “opposition and frustration” to the Kentucky Governor’s seizure of over 140 gambling-related domain names through a court order. … more

Directi’s Divyank Turakhia earned his first million dollars at the age of 18 and went on to build a company valued at $300 million. Ron Jackson’s Domain Name Journal cover story for September looks into Turakhia and finds out what was it that made him. … more

Just 3,800 domain names have been registered in Vietnamese since they were first issued 18 months ago.

Cao Kim Trong, Director of the Kim Tín Jewelry Company, was one of the first in line to register kimtín.vn as a site, after state agencies allowed for Vietnamese domain names.

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Fresh from being awarded his most recent Peabody award, back in June Stephen Colbert interviewed Jonathan Zittrain who wants to save the good chaos of the Internet and separate it from the bad chaos that will stomp on everything. … more