SGNIC Offers Chinese & Tamil Domain Names to All
Always wanted a Chinese or Tamil '.sg' domain name for your organisation or yourself? Now you can register for one if you participate in a six-month trial launched today conducted by the Singapore Network Information Centre (SGNIC) for multilingual domain names.
In line with the aim of becoming a regional infocomm hub and given that Singapore is a multi-racial, multi-lingual society, the trial offers users an additional option to make their Internet presence felt. With multilingual domain names or Internationalised Domain Names (IDN), both organisations and individuals will be able to better reach their Chinese-speaking and Tamil-speaking audiences.
General Manager for SGNIC, Mr Lim Choon Sai, highlights the potential benefits of IDNs for various users, 'SGNIC notes that 92% of the world's population are non-native speakers of the English language. As such, IDNs offer users a more direct means of reaching their Chinese-speaking and Tamil-speaking constituents both here and abroad. With the opening up of China and India in recent years, IDNs can help businesses pave electronic inroads into these markets. SGNIC is pleased to be the first national domain name registry in the world to offer Tamil IDNs for trial.'
The six-month trial will run from 4 July 2005 and end on 3 January 2006. The trial is open to individuals and organisations both here and overseas. Overseas applicants will need to have a Singapore-based contact to participate in the IDN trial.
After the trial period, all registered IDNs will be purged from the system. SGNIC will then assess if there is sufficient market demand to justify a commercial rollout of .sg IDNs. Should SGNIC subsequently decide to rollout IDNs commercially, it will look into formulating the necessary registration policies and procedures based on feedback received during the trial period.
IDNs will be reflected with an '.idn.sg' extension so as not to affect the current '.sg' domain names zone. For instance, SGNIC's IDN will be represented as '中文.idn.sg' in the Chinese language1 or 'தமிழ்.idn.sg' in the Tamil language. To use IDNs, Microsoft Internet Explorer users need only to install a plugin software such as iClient2. Users who are using IDN-enabled browsers such as Mozilla Firefox do not need to install a plugin software.
Interested applicants can register now for the IDN trial with either of the two SGNIC-accredited domain name registrars participating in the trial i.e. IP Mirror Pte Ltd or Vooju Pte Ltd. Administrative charges will be determined by the respective registrars. In conjunction with SGNIC, SingNet Pte Ltd is also conducting in a closed version of the IDN trial for a few of its selected existing customers. For more details of the IDN trial and how to participate in it, please refer to the SGNIC website http://www.idn.sg.
ISSUED BY THE SINGAPORE NETWORK INFORMATION CENTRE PTE LTD
Notes to Editors:
1For Chinese IDNs, by default, only 3 variants of the name will be registered i.e. orginal string provided by applicants, prefered simplified string and the preferred traditional string of characters.
2The iClient software is developed by i-DNS.net, a spin-off from the National University of Singapore. SGNIC is pleased to acknowledge that i-DNS.net has modified the iClient plugin to support Singapore's IDN trial.
About Singapore Network Information Centre (SGNIC)
The Singapore Network Information Centre (SGNIC) is a fully owned subsidiary of the Infocomm Development Authority of Singapore. SGNIC was set up in October 1995 with the main purpose of administering the Internet domain name space in Singapore. It is the central registry delegated by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) to administer domain name registration under the '.sg' domain name. SGNIC collaborates with the international, regional and local Internet communities to ensure a stabilised and efficient operation of the '.sg' domain name space in support of applications provided over the Internet.
For media clarifications, please contact:
Ms Noraizah Zainal Abidin
Manager, Corporate & Marketing Communication
Infocomm Development Authority of Singapore
Tel: +65 6211-0273
Fax: +65 6211-2227
Email: noraizah@ida.gov.sg