The dotMobi team arrived home from the ICANN Cairo meeting with a real jewel in their crown: after more than 5 months of sitting "in process," our application to ICANN for the release of single character domains on the second level has finally been approved by the ICANN Board. This paves the way for release of these domains (e.g., x.mobi, a.mobi, 1.mobi) via a Request for Proposals (RFP) process whereby content applications are sought from the market and evaluated by dotMobi on the basis of certain pre-defined criteria.
Single character domains are highly sought after in the domain world and work particularly well with the .mobi TLD since domain addresses requiring shorter keystrokes on handsets are extremely desirable. dotMobi is one of the first Registries to be allowed to release single character domains, and brand owners should be able to build and market their associated mobile presence in ways previously unimagined.dotMobi has also just received the green light from ICANN to allocate its two character names on the second level (e.g., ab.mobi, g3.mobi, 44.mobi). As with the single character release, these domains will not be auctioned, rather issued via RFP to qualified applicants.Both sets of domain releases -- each one due to commence shortly -- demonstrate dotMobi's continued commitment to secure quality, innovative content that best serves the needs of the mobile community.