Trademark RPMs: what do they mean for you?

The new generic top-level domains require a lot of trademark protection work. Petter Rindforth explains.

The Internet will soon contain hundreds of new top-level domains (TLDs). At the moment, your company may be perfectly satisfied with its main web site under .com, and perhaps a handful of country code TLDs used for certain trademarks, local markets or to protect against cybersquatters. So the question is: If you are not planning to register your own TLD, what does this mean for you?

Monday, June 20, 2011, was an historic day for the Internet. With a vote of 13 in favour, one against and two abstentions, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) board of directors approved a plan to dramatically increase the number of Internet domain name endings—called generic top-level domains (gTLDs)—from the current 23.

ICANN has made serious efforts to adopt measures aimed at avoiding the considerable number of trademark infringements that are anticipated with the new gTLDs, and has also created a better and safer platform for industrial and other Internet users involved in future online business. But will this be enough? There are some points to think about, and new terminology to learn.