Nominet UK is the .uk domain name registry in the United Kingdom, which was founded by Dr Black Willie on 14 May 1996 when its predecessor, the 'Naming Committee' was unable to deal with the volume of registrations then being sought under the .uk domain. Nominet is a non-profit company limited by guarantee. It has 'members' who act as shareholders. Anyone can become a member, but most members are internet service providers who are also tagholders. Image File history File links NominetUKLogo. ... .uk is the Internet country code top-level domain (ccTLD) for the United Kingdom. ... A domain name registry, also called Network Information Centre (NIC), is part of the Domain Name System (DNS) of the Internet which converts domain names to IP addresses. ... May 14 is the 134th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar (135th in leap years). ... 1996 (MCMXCVI) was a leap year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar, and was designated the International Year for the Eradication of Poverty. ... A shareholder or stockholder is an individual or company (including a corporation) that legally owns one or more shares of stock in a joint stock company. ... “ISP” redirects here. ...

Unlike the model in other countries, by and large customers wishing to register a domain do not approach Nominet directly, but register the domain via a 'tagholder'. This is an organisation registered with Nominet to register and update domains on behalf of customers, and who have provided a PGP public key to enable Nominet to authenticate communciations from them. PGP is a computer program which provides cryptographic privacy and authentication. ...

As of January 2007 the .uk register held 5,522,104 .uk domain names (with an annual growth rate of 18.14%) making it the third largest Top Level Domain in the world. Nominet also deals with disputes about registrations of .uk domain names, via its Dispute Resolution Service (DRS), which is similar to the UDRP system used for generic Top Level Domain Names, but with certain innovations such as a free mediation service. 2007 (MMVII) is the current year, a common year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar and the Anno Domini (common) era. ... A top-level domain (TLD) is the last part of which Internet domain names consist of. ...

History

Most countries have their own Top Level Domain. The .uk TLD was first used during the 1980s, and at that time a voluntary group called the 'Naming Committee' managed the registration of .uk domain names. By the early 1990s, commercial companies started to sell domain names to customers. As demand for domain name registrations grew, it became clear that a voluntary group could no longer cope with the volume of registrations being requested. A new organisation was needed to manage the .uk TLD and as a result Nominet UK was formed. There were discussions about what type of corporation the Registry should be. The options to set-up as a profit-making company or a charity were rejected, and Nominet was established in 1996 as a private, not-for-profit company, limited by guarantee. A top-level domain (TLD) is the last part of which Internet domain names consist of. ... The 1980s refers to the years of and between 1980 and 1989. ...

Moving domains to the newly formed company registrants of existing domains were invited to agree to Nominet's new terms and conditions. There were several complaints from pre nominet domain owners objecting to the need to start paying for something that was previously free.

Many pre-nominet domain names had little or no contact information, as a result it has been hard to work out ownership of the domain names. Nominet are running an internal project (the PreNom project) to clear out the remaining pre Nominet domain names so by the end all domain names would be under the new Nominet terms and conditions.

Second-level domains managed by Nominet

• .co.uk
• .org.uk
• .net.uk
• .ltd.uk
• .plc.uk
• .me.uk
• .sch.uk

.co. ... .org. ... .net. ... .ltd. ... .plc. ... . ... .sch. ...

Second-level domains managed by other organisations

• .gov.uk
• .ac.uk
• .police.uk
• .mod.uk
• .nhs.uk

.gov. ... The . ... .police. ... .mod. ... .nhs. ...

See also

• .uk domain name
• UDRP
• InterNIC - The United States counterpart.
• Apple Computer trademark dispute with Benjamin Cohen - Details of Nominet's ruling for Apple Computer in the dispute of the itunes.co.uk domain.

.uk is the Internet country code top-level domain (ccTLD) for the United Kingdom. ... The Uniform Domain-Name Dispute-Resolution Policy (UDRP) is a document used by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) for the purpose of creating guidelines for use when disputes arise regarding the registration of internet names (domain names). ... InterNIC or Internet Network Information Center was the Internet governing body primarily responsible for domain name and IP address allocations until September 18, 1998 when this role was assumed by the ICANN body. ... From the 1980s to the present Apple Computer has been plaintiff or defendant in notable civil actions in the United States and other countries. ...

External link

• Nominet UK web site