'Historic' day as first non-Latin web addresses go live
Arab nations are leading a "historic" charge to make the world wide web live up to its name.Net regulator Icann has switched on a system that allows full web addresses that contain no Latin characters.
Egypt, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates are the first countries to have so-called "country codes" written in Arabic scripts.
The move is the first step to allow web addresses in many scripts including Chinese, Thai and Tamil.
More than 20 countries have requested approval for international domains from the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (Icann).
It said the new domains were "available for use now" although it admitted there was still some work to do before they worked correctly for everyone. However, it said these were "mostly formalities". More...
05-09-2010 16:04
FCC details plan to reassert authority over Internet
The Federal Communications Commission on Thursday detailed plans for its so-called "third way" to reclassify broadband service as a telecommunications service, which would help the agency reassert its authority for regulating the Internet, after it lost an important legal battle last month.The purpose of the statement is to put the agency on stronger legal footing after a federal appeals court ruled last month that the FCC had no legal authority to punish Comcast for slowing down BitTorrent traffic on its network. The FCC officially censured Comcast for violating its Net Neutrality principles.
The court decision has called into question the FCC's authority for any regulation of the Internet, especially new regulation the agency is forming to deal with Net neutrality--the broad question of whether rules are needed to prevent lopsided treatment for certain Web sites or types of Internet traffic. The chairman's statement, which asks for input from the public and the industry in determining how traffic should be reclassified, is a step toward making the FCC's legal status in regulating the Internet more certain. More...
05-06-2010 16:08
U.S. to roll out major broadband policy
(Reuters) - U.S. regulators will announce a major Internet policy this week to revolutionize how Americans communicate and play, proposing a dramatic increase in broadband speeds that could let people download a high-definition film in minutes instead of hours.Dramatically increasing Internet speeds to 25 times the current average is one of the myriad goals to be unveiled in the National Broadband Plan by the the Federal Communications Commission on Tuesday.
The highly anticipated plan will make a series of recommendations to Congress and is aimed at spurring the ever-changing communications industry to bring more and faster online services to Americans as they increasingly turn to the Internet to communicate, pay monthly bills, make travel plans and be entertained by movies and music.
"This is a fairly unique event," said Paul Gallant, an analyst with Concept Capital. "The FCC really has never been asked to design a broad regulatory shift like this. Broadband is important and difficult because it threatens every established communications sector." More...
03-14-2010 21:50
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