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mTLD to open .mobi domain for mobiles in May

By Bernard Cole
iApplianceWeb
(04/10/2006, 1:54 AM GMT)

Las Vegas, Nev. – At the Cellular Telecommunications & Internet Association ( CTIA ) meeting here,  mTLD, Ltd.. announced that its years long efforts to establish a top level domain address designed specifically for the requirements of Internet connected mobile devices is a success.

At the CTIA show, Neil Edwards, CEO, mTLD Ltd. said that “.mobi” will be going on line as of May 22 as the first and only Internet address created for mobile phones.

Backed by many of the world's leading mobile operators, handset manufacturers and software developers, mTLD has been designated the official worldwide registry for the dotMobi domain.

Leading mobile industry associations including the GSM Association (an mTLD founding investor), CTIA – The Wireless Association, and the Mobile Marketing Association have lined up to support an early dotMobi launch for their members May 22-29, 2006.

Referred to as the sunrise period, this launch offers the mobile industry a week-long advance period to register their trade and service marks.

Edwards said mTLD is working closely with the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), registrars, copyright bodies and site owners to ensure that trademarks are properly protected during the sunrise period.

"The dotMobi Internet address, brings the ease of accessing the Internet

from the PC to mobile phones everywhere, and clearly indicates Internet sites and applications that are designed for consumers on the go," said Edwards. "dotMobi is the Internet made mobile.

"More people have access to an Internet-ready phone than to a PC with Internet access. By 2008, researchers expect 1.3 billion people to be connected to the Internet through mobile devices.”

However, accessing the Internet on a mobile phone can be frustrating. Downloading content to mobile devices can be expensive, slow, exceed screen size, and difficult to navigate.

"Many existing Internet sites are grounded in desktop PC-oriented services and were not designed with a mobile phone in mind, which has led to less than ideal performance for consumers," said Edwards. "The dotMobi sites are tailor-made for browsing and navigating on the mobile phone, making a far better experience."

To make creating Web sites for mobile Internet functional and reliable, mTLD has developed rules and best practices, all based on open standards, for content developers and service providers. This ensures that their Web sites can be viewed and navigated by any mobile phone.

The consultative dotMobi Switch On! Web Browsing Guide may be found at mtld.mobi. A guide for mobile messaging will be launched later this year. Edwards said these guides are based on best practices specified by the World Wide Web Consortium's Mobile Web Initiative (MWI).

mTLD has already issued temporary domain names to Newbay, Nokia, TIM, Vodafone and Weather Channel, among others, to demonstrate the improved reliability of downloading dotMobi Web content on mobile devices.

Top Level Domain Ltd (mTLD), gained approval from ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers) for the '.mobi' Sponsored Top level Domain (TLD) in the second half of 2005.

mTLD is backed by leading mobile operators, network and device manufacturers, and Internet content providers. Investors in mTLD include Ericsson, GSM Association, Hutchison 3, Microsoft, Nokia, Orascom Telecom, Samsung Electronics, Syniverse, T-Mobile, Telefonica Moviles, TIM and Vodafone. mTLD is also a sponsor of W3C's Mobile Web Initiative.

For more information, go to http://mtld.mobi.  

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