Digital Archery
Digital Archery is a mechanism developed by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers to determine the processing time or batch slots of every gTLD application using the "target time variance." The digital archery was approved by ICANN during a special meeting of the ICANN Board on March 28. 2012. [1]
Applicants must follow the four steps in the digital archery batching process: [2]
Step 1- Applicants will enter their batching preference (target date and time) in an online batching system. For example: Target Date: 11 June 2012 and Target Time: 08:00:00 EST Step 2- Applicants must re-enter the online batching system to generate the message sent by the system indicating their target time and date. The online batching system will then record when the message was received. For example: Message Received Date: 11 June 2012 and Message Received Time: 08:00:03) Step 3- The secondary time stamp will be calculated by the system using the time variance between step one (when the applicant entered his/her target time) and step two (when the message received date/time was generated/recorded). The example shows that the secondary time stamp between step one and step two is 3 secs. An application will be included in an earlier batch to be processed if the time stamp is closer to 0- if an applicant selected to participate in the earliest batch to be processed. Step 4- The batching selection process will combine the applicant's batching preferences, the secondary time stamp and the geographic region of a specific new gTLD application to determine its batch sequence.