10 things to know about .berlin

Berliners are asking for an own identifier

The community of Berliners requests its own label on the Internet. This label will identify themselves and their organisations, content and interests appropriately in today’s networked world. The .berlin TLD has a clear meaning not only to Berliners but also worldwide.

Berliners are a multifaceted community

Berliners are a natural community. They are the people with a relation to the name Berlin. The community consists of people and organisations located in places named Berlin. They also include people born or having a root in Berlin, people who speak Berlinerisch, or people having a personal, business, or cultural relation with a place named Berlin. The Berlin community includes inhabitants of about 40 Berlins worldwide, many of them located in the USA or South America.

Berlin stands for freedom

The Berliners have a history which is known worldwide. Since JFK’s famous speech in Berlin 1963 (“Ich bin ein Berliner”), Berlin stands as a synonym for free people worldwide.

The community will be sponsor of .berlin

.berlin will be entrusted to the community of Berliners and is organised in a limited partnership company (dotBERLIN GmbH & Co. KG). Entities able and welcome to join dotBERLIN are individuals, companies, institutions, associations and other organisations from economy, culture, science, welfare, sports and other parts of the community. Several hundred members should present the broad spectrum of the community of Berliners at the end of the day. The one-time admission fee is EUR 100.00 per entity.

.berlin-Domains can be registered by Berliners

All Berliners and their organisations as defined above shall be able to register their individual .berlin domain for a reasonable price at their common provider.

.berlin has a considerable potential

Berliners hold over 660,000 domains today. There are over 110,000 domains having the string ‘berlin’ in a 2nd or 3rd level domain. At least these could have .berlin right of the dot. Qualitative market research show a big demand for the TLD within the community: Entities which potentially would benefit from .berlin domains are over 5 mio people and over 400,000 organisations, most of them located in Berlin, DE.

berlin.de is identifier of the city government - .berlin for the community

berlin.de is the home of the government and institutions of the city of Berlin, DE. Companies, organisations or individuals are not allowed to participate in this portal. In contrast .berlin is home for the community: .berlin will be identity for everyone in the community and opens up a myriad of opportunities for participation.

Intuitive usage is core added value

.berlin will be a TLD intuitively usable by Berliners and visitors. Community-relevant terms like school.berlin, lawyer.berlin or hotel.berlin will be pre-allocated to the appropriate institutions and start to run from the day .berlin is in the root. These reference domains will be highly visible and create the basis for a semantically and intuitively to use TLD. .berlin domains will help people to find what they search for, as type-in or by search engines.

Focus as success factor

.berlin will be one of the first TLDs which can leverage the advantages of a focused, clearly defined and existing regional market. This will allow very targeted and effective marketing. Aim is to reach each individual and organisation in places with the name Berlin and make .berlin as aware as the respective ccTLD.

Policies will incorporate various interests

Registration policies driven by community interests will avoid the pitfalls of previous TLD launches. The registrations phases planned are pre-allocation (e.g. government, city, community, reserved ICANN, WIPO II), sunrise (IP owners), auction and landrush. An advisory board with reputable representatives from the community of Berliners and the German internet community will act as a capable and credible policy-making body. The consistent representation of stakeholders ensures a transparent and fair allocation process.

March 2006