Internationalized Domain Names Dr. Cary Karp MUSENIC Project Manager Second MUSENIC Project Workshop Stockholm, March 2004 MUSENIC – The Museum Network Information Centre – Europe (IST ) Added European Values Inherent in.museum: Museum, Political and Public Perspectives MUSENIC

The Internet Domain Name System (DNS) permits the use of a limited number of characters in domain names: the 26 letters in the Latin alphabet: a – z the ten digits: 0-9 and a hyphen: - The ”LDH” characters MUSENIC – The Museum Network Information Centre – Europe (IST )

In June 2003, standardized means became available for encoding a large range of characters using nothing more than the initial LDH array. MUSENIC – The Museum Network Information Centre – Europe (IST )

The characters used in almost all of the written scripts in present-day use are listed in the UNICODE Code Charts. Internationalized Domain Names (IDN) can include all characters that are listed in the UNICODE charts. UNICODE MUSENIC – The Museum Network Information Centre – Europe (IST )

A domain name that includes UNICODE characters is converted into ”Punycode”, which only uses the Domain Name System’s basic LDH representations, before it is actually entered into the DNS. MUSENIC – The Museum Network Information Centre – Europe (IST )

The IDN blåbärsbröd.museum is displayed here using UNICODE characters. MUSENIC – The Museum Network Information Centre – Europe (IST )

The Punycode equivalent of blåbärsbröd.museum is xn--blbrsbrd-2zai7q.museum MUSENIC – The Museum Network Information Centre – Europe (IST )

The original intention was that users would never actually see domain names in their Punycode representation. Initial experience with the actual use of IDN strongly suggests the need for familiarity with both the presentation (or display) form of a name, and its encoded representation. MUSENIC – The Museum Network Information Centre – Europe (IST )

The technical intricacies aren’t much of a problem at present, except when designing Web documents that provide hyperlinks to resources containing IDN characters in their addresses. MUSENIC – The Museum Network Information Centre – Europe (IST )

The reason for the restriction in the scope of this difficulty is that, except for the Web, the implementation of IDN is at such early stages that users are unlikely to encounter IDNs at all. MUSENIC – The Museum Network Information Centre – Europe (IST )

An illustration of a useful IDN application will be found at: MUSENIC – The Museum Network Information Centre – Europe (IST )

Detailed documentation will be found at: MUSENIC – The Museum Network Information Centre – Europe (IST )

The real issues surrounding IDN are not primarily technical. Policy concerns are substantially more complex. MUSENIC – The Museum Network Information Centre – Europe (IST )

Although the underlying notion is one of ”internationalization”, this may be a misnomer. From the USA perspective, the availability of Chinese characters for inclusion in domain names may, indeed, appear as a step toward internationalization. MUSENIC – The Museum Network Information Centre – Europe (IST )

From the Chinese point of view, the ability to use the native language in domain names is a matter of ”localization”. And there is no clear reason why IDN should not be available for this purpose on all levels. MUSENIC – The Museum Network Information Centre – Europe (IST )

Which of the these two domain names is the more reasonable to make available in a Greek language environment? αθλητισμου.museum or αθλητισμου.μουσειο MUSENIC – The Museum Network Information Centre – Europe (IST )

This quickly leads from the realm of DNS policy to that of national interest. MUSENIC – The Museum Network Information Centre – Europe (IST )

A generic top-level domain such as.museum serves the global community and the maintenance of its policy is not linked to any particular national government. This is precisely the sort of thing NGOs such as ICOM are there for. MUSENIC – The Museum Network Information Centre – Europe (IST )

A ”country code” top-level domain such as.gr serves a clearly defined national community and the maintenance of its policy can be seen as a concern of the national government. MUSENIC – The Museum Network Information Centre – Europe (IST )

Multiple IDN representations of a top-level label such as.museum can provide a useful vehicle for accomodating differing national perceptions of the essential attributes of museum activity. This is, however, far easier to describe than it is to implement. Disregarding issues directly relating to DNS management, the Grand Question is... MUSENIC – The Museum Network Information Centre – Europe (IST )

Can coherent policies and procedures be established and maintained for the operation of, for example, greece.museum museum.gr ελλάδα.museum μουσειο.gr ελλάδα.μουσειο μουσειο.ελλάδα ??? MUSENIC – The Museum Network Information Centre – Europe (IST )