U.S. Gives '.edu' Domain Control to Nonprofit Group
October 29, 2001 11:48 AM ET
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. government said on Monday it has finalized plans to hand over the education-focused ".edu" Internet domain next month to Educause, a nonprofit group representing college technology departments.
Educause will expand the domain to allow the nation's 1,600 community colleges to register for .edu addresses, the group said in a release. The domain has been reserved until now for four-year colleges and universities.
Community colleges will be able to sign up for .edu names starting Nov. 12, the day of the handover, the U.S. Department of Commerce said in a release.
The Commerce department said last April that it intended to hand over control of the domain to Educause. The domain is currently managed by VeriSign Inc.VRSN.O., which also controls the popular ".com" domain.
VeriSign will continue to provide technical support for the domain, which contains about 5,000 names. Educause will not charge a registration fee for its services, the Commerce Department said.
To avoid conflicts between schools that have chosen the same Internet address, the nonprofit group has set up a preregistration period lasting until Jan. 7. Groups that apply for the same name during the preregistration period will be encouraged to work out a compromise on their own, Educause said.
Disputes over preregistration procedures have marred the rollouts of two new commercial domains, ".info" and ".biz."
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