IAHC

The IAHC is the abbreviation for International Ad Hoc Committee. The IHAC was formed in the year 1996 by the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA) and Internet Society (ISOC) in an endeavor to add top level domain names. The issue was put forward by the head of the IANA. The Internet Architecture Board (IAB), the International Telecommunications Union (ITU), International Trademark Association (ITA) and World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) were all a part of the coalition of IAHC. In the year 1997, the IAHC suggested the use of generic Top Level Domain or the gTLD for domains of the level of .org or .com. For this, the IAHC had proposed seven new gTLDs. However, due to new recommendations of the report, the committee dissolved and many of the suggestions made by the IAHC were considered later.

How the IAHC worked

The International Ad Hoc Committee typically noted that three gTLDs, .org, .com and .net, were existent when the report was written in the year 1997. As per the IAHC’s recommendations .com was kept aside for firms or businesses, .org for Not-for-profit entities and .net for firms that deal with emphasizing data networking services especially in reference to the Internet. The report recommended a Generic Top Level Domain Memorandum of Understanding (gTLD-MoU), which would be set-up including the seven new gTLD, which were mainly:

• web - for entities giving more importance to activities related to the World Wide Web
• rec - for entities emphasizing entertainment/recreation activities
• info - for entities that provide information services
• firm - for firms or businesses
• store - for businesses offering their products to purchase
• nom - for those wishing personal or individual nomenclature
• arts - for entities emphasizing on entertainment and cultural activities

The report led to the establishment of a large group of the global registries under the governing of Council of Registrars (CORE), to look after the new registries for the gTLDs proposed by the IAHC.

The fall of IAHC

The IAHC somehow managed to garner support but its report was criticized on several grounds. The tech community viewed the report as too condensed and strict as it led the schedule for technological development and implementation with a timeline of only 100 days. The others thought that the report gave no importance to the business issues and was unable to solve the problems which it was destined to solve. These mostly include the introduction of the .store, .firm domains and already established .com. There was a lack of unity among the suggestions given by the IAHC. However, many of its recommendations were later successful proposals one of which is .info, which the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) introduced later after the dissolution of the committee.

IAHC and ICANN

The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), a not-for-profit private sector corporation took over the functioning of the IAHC. It was in the year 2000, that ICANN approved the seven new TLDs for use .info, .museum, .name, .aero, .biz, .coop, and .pro. It was only in the year 2008 that the ICANN went further and allowed all the private and public organizations to register with any length of letters as their gTLD.