The launch of Arabic dot-shabaka (شبكة.) extension has marked the beginning of a new era for internet registrations. The Arabic net address ending in شبكة. – pronounced dot shabaka, and meaning web in Arabic is the first to go live as part of the rollout of more than 1,000 new generic top-level domain (gTLD) name suffixes.
There were only 22 gTLDs, including .com and .org, in addition to country code endings, such as .uk until now.
Etisalat, telecoms provider in United Arab Emirates, has already announced that it had started using this new suffix.
Interested people and organisations will be able to start applying for their own Arabic extension addresses through registries including GoDaddy, 101Domain, and Lexsynergy starting Tuesday. The new domains will probably cost around £10 to £30, or $15 to $50, per year, but associated administration costs may add up.
President of Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN’s) Global Domain’s Division, Akram Atallah, said “For the first time, Internet users across the world will be able to use generic Top-Level Domain names entirely in their native languages.”
“This change will promote closer connections between people, brands and organizations and will in turn provide new routes for businesses to reach their customers.â€
General Manager of the DotShabaka Registry, Yasmin Omer, said “It’s monumental, in my opinion, because it means the internet finally speaks in Arabic.â€
“For a long time we’ve had Arabic-language content online but you needed to speak English to directly navigate to the sites. Now, if I’m an internet user that speaks only Arabic, I don’t need to rely on search engines or other pools to get to where I want.”
游æˆ, Mandarin for game; Ñайт, Russian for site; and онлайн, Russian for online are some of the other non-Latin script gTLDs expected to launch in the coming days.
New English language suffixes including .camera, .equipment, .estate, .gallery, .graphics, .lighting and photography will also be made available soon.
[Source: BBC]
