In Germany, numerous people have surnames written with letters with so-called umlauts. They include the Müllers, Jägers and Schröders, and as of 1 March next year they will no longer have to make do with transcribing their surnames as mueller.de, jaeger.de or schroeder.de if they want to use them for Internet domains. DENIC, SWITCH and nic.at, the registries for domains in Germany, Switzerland/Liechtenstein and Austria, will then be offering a significant and practical enhancement for the choice of possible domains. The introduction of the new IDN (Internationalized Domain Name) standard does much more than permit umlauts. A total of 92 additional characters, from the French é to the Danish ø, will then adorn domains.

The three registries are planning to act in unison in multiplying the orthographic possibilities for domains. This switchover is going to cater for the wishes expressed by numerous users, given that the rule applicable today does not go beyond the character set needed for English and hence imposes restrictions on other languages. Eliminating these has grown into an important priority for the Internet.

Names just like in real life

Anyone wishing to register a domain today is still restricted to the 26 letters of the Latin alphabet, the digits 0-9 and hyphens. In numerous cases (such in the examples of Schröder, Müller or Jäger), these characters are not enough for putting names into the Internet in their correct form. In order to improve this situation, which many users have considered unsatisfactory, the number of possible characters is being increased by 92 for .de and .at and by 31 for .ch and .li. There only remains one character that German-speaking Internet users will have to do without in future: ß. According to international rules, this is equivalent to its transcription as ss. It would thus simply not be possible to distinguish between the domains straße.de and strasse.de. On its website, DENIC provides a list of all the characters that are going to be permitted in domains in future.

Cultural identity and consistent branding

Given that a domain, like a person’s name, is often surrounded in emotion, the enhancement that is now going ahead will be of crucial importance. The introduction of IDNs is going to make it possible in future to register names precisely as desired. The domain will then no longer stand out as a cultural discontinuity. It will also benefit from greater acceptance, since it will be possible to use the familiar characters of the particular national language. It is also going to be possible for any new mark to be written precisely the same way online and offline, which will also boost its recurrent recognition and, in the final analysis, add to its value too. Despite all their enthusiasm for the new potential for domains, applicants should not forget that the same ground rules apply for IDNs as for all other .de domains. It is, for instance, the sole responsibility of domain applicants to make sure that their domains do not infringe any rights of others.

Launch on 1 March

Starting on 1 March 2004, all the characters newly introduced with the IDNs will be available for registration. DENIC is not, however, accepting any form of prior reservation for IDNs. Prospective domain holders are advised to contact their provider for advice on how best to secure their desired domain. It is, nonetheless, possible that there could still be difficulties in using IDNs, at least during the initial period, since not all Internet applications (such as browsers and mail and chat programs) have an IDN capability. Some manufacturers are already offering plug-ins, which have to be installed by the users themselves. The domain registries will offer assistance as far as their resources allow, but they cannot assume any sort of guarantee for the full and correct functioning of the programs, since all they can do is to ensure that the technical prerequisites for their use are in place.

Further information can be found in the IDN section and the IDN-FAQ.