.wine

Status:	Delegated
country:	International
Type:	Generic
Category:	Food & Drink
More information:

.wine is a gTLD delegated to the Root Zone in ICANN's New gTLD Program on 5 August 2015. The registry is managed by Donuts.

Current Applicant

1. Donuts (June Station, LLC), one of 307 applied for by the company. This applicant submitted a Public Interest Commitment, which can be downloaded here.

Private Auction

A private auction resolved the contention set for this string in November 2014, with Donuts winning the rights for the gTLD.

Former Applicants

1. Famous Four Media (dot Wine Limited)
2. Afilias

dotVinum

gTLD professional, Jean Guillon, was involved as a partner in a .wine and .vin project, dotVinum, for a number of years. In February, 2012, he announced that the project would be coming to an end due to the fact that his partner had decided to pursue the extensions without him. It seems the unnamed partner was financing the project and was able to utilize Mr. Guillon's expertise without signing any type of binding contract, and thus was able to dump him from the project. It seems that neither Mr. Guillon nor his partner applied for the extension, as all three applicants are large, portfolio applicants.

Objections

Saudi Arabia's Communications and Information Technology Commission (CITC) filed an objection against the TLD, on the grounds that it could glamourise the consumption of alcohol.

Although the GAC was unable to come to consensus on advice for the .wine and .vin strings, the European Union appears to be strongly against the delegation of the strings without protection of "Geographic Indicator" rights holders (such as Champagne, a wine-growing region) and wine producers. A letter to ICANN by European Commission VP Neelie Kroes made their position clear and stated that they believe ICANN should hold to the GAC's advise on .wine and .vin given at ICANN 46 (Beijing), instead of the "no consensus" advise given in September 2013. The advise given at the Beijing meeting was to not move ahead with delegating the strings until GAC could come to a consensus.

Top-Level Domain

Governmental Advisory Committee. Considers and provides advice on the activities of ICANN as they relate to concerns of governments, particularly matters where there may be an interaction between ICANN's policies and various laws and international agreements or where they may affect public policy issues (ICANN Bylaws).