.CO Domain Names Now Available for the General Public

Leesburg, WA, June 23, 2010 --(PR.com)-- The interest in the new domain extension .CO is high – the social network Twitter e.g. has just announced to implement t.co as official service for shortening links on Twitter. Furthermore, the .CO Landrush is a topic in the Twitter community. The Landrush phase of the .CO launch lasts until July 13, 2010. Everyone can order his .CO domains in this phase. The previous two Sunrise periods limited the registration to brand owners, who could secure their trademarks as .CO domain names. The .CO registry .CO Internet S.A.S now collects the Landrush applications. Single applications will be awarded at the end of the Landrush period, multiple applications will go through an auction by Pool.com.

The .CO registry emphasizes the chance to secure valuable .CO domains during the Landrush starting on June 21 before the general public gets access. “In fact, the Landrush offers the possibility to register memorable .CO domain names with a good chance for success, before the principle ‘first come, first served’ applies,” describes Key-Systems CEO Alexander Siffrin. “The extension .CO has a high potential to become popular,” he is convinced.

Key-Systems COO Thorsten Smeets adds: “Many recognizable domain names under .COM are already registered. .CO can be an interesting alternative. Similar remarks can be read on Twitter: The user with the nickname “LesPorter“ writes: “I'm betting my $ in landrush registrations that .CO #domains will be competitive. Twitter's use of t.co certainly helps.”

The top-level domain .CO can represent expressions like “Company”, “Corporation” and “Commerce”. Furthermore, the domain extension is associated with “Social Networking” buzzwords like “Communities,” “Content,” “Connect,” “Communicate,” or “Collaborate.” .CO domains can be registered for a period of one year. The domain extension enjoys liberal registration policies: anyone in the world can register and transfer .CO domains without domicile or documentation requirements. CO domain names will be available for all interested parties at a “first-come, first-served” basis from July 20 on. Pre-applications for this phase are already possible with Key-Systems.

Key-Systems currently administers more than 2,6 million internet addresses for more than 70,000 end customers and 1,700 resellers via its three domain portals RRPproxy.net, BrandShelter.com and domaindiscount24.com. According to domain information portals such as registrarstats.com it is one of the 15 largest ICANN registrars worldwide and number two in Europe. The company with 50 employees has direct access to the registries of more than 200 country-code domain extensions such as the German .DE and generic extensions such as .COM.

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