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March 1, 2002 — (WEB HOST INDUSTRY REVIEW) — Tucows Inc. (tucows.com), a provider of Internet services to
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ISPs and Web hosting companies, announced that “Sunrise” pre-registrations
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began yesterday for .us, the country code top-level domain for the United
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States.
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Pre-registration for the Sunrise Period is exclusive to owners of existing
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or pending U.S. trademarks and service marks. Participation in the
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pre-registration process does not guarantee successful registration of a
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domain name, and pre-registrations will be subject to random selection as
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well as strict application rules.
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The launch of .us allows individuals, organizations and businesses to
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establish an American identity on the Internet. Short, simple Internet
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addresses such “johndoe.us,” “charity.us,” and “mycompany.us” were not as
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accessible under previous .us policies, the company said.
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Registration for the Sunrise Period officially begins on March 4, 2002,
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followed by “Registry Go Live” registration for the general public beginning
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April 24, 2002, according to Neustar, the registry selected by ICANN to
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operate the .us extension. Registration will be limited to U.S. citizens,
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legal residents and organizations with a “bona fide” presence in the United
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States.
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“Our resellers have expressed very strong customer demand for this new
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country code top-level domain,” said Elliot Noss, president and CEO, Tucows
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Inc. “The expansion of the .US namespace offers the opportunity to get a
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top-tier American identity on the Internet. Other country code TLDs like .ca
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and .uk have demonstrated value to regional businesses, and we anticipate
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.us will offer the same value to domain name registrants with American
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interests.”
