Internet Newsletter for Lawyers |
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First announced in November 2000 by ICANN – the body in charge of the Internet's domain name system – .pro was one of seven new top level domains. While some, such as .biz and .info, were intended for general use, others were designed to be restricted to specific groups and bodies, such as .aero for the aerospace industry and .pro for professionals. (See also the earlier article in the Oct/Nov 2002 issue - www.venables.co.uk/n0209dotpro.htm).
RegistryPro planned to allow only lawyers, accountants and medical practitioners to register the domains at first, with other professions gradually being introduced. To make sure that only qualified professionals were able to register .pro domains, RegistryPro proposed to work with professional bodies, such as the Law Society, to check registrants’ credentials. This would have the additional benefit of creating a global online database of professionals allowing Internet users to search for a lawyer or doctor by speciality or geographic location.
Taking into consideration RegistryPro's primary target markets of the USA, the UK and Japan, there are an estimated 2.4 million lawyers, 2 million doctors, and 2.7 million accountants out there. It is now clear that RegistryPro's plans were somewhat ambitious and the announcement of .pro's much delayed launch has shown that they have had to scale back these plans.
To start with .pro domains will only be available to US-based professionals who will merely self-certify they are eligible. For everyone else, RegistryPro has created a service called "ProReserve" - a defensive registration service that will allow registrants who are living outside the jurisdiction of the United States to register and reserve their name until live registrations are available in their jurisdiction. So UK subscribers will, in effect, pay for a domain which they cannot use until RegistryPro rolls out registrations to Europe.
Similarly, trade mark owners may register defensive registrations using the "ProBlock" service which blocks an exact trademark or service mark across all profession-specific domains (e.g. .med.pro, .law.pro, .cpa.pro). Again the practical use of such domains will be limited.
In addition, given that the domain will be restricted to the USA for the time being and that the checks on domain registrants will be limited and open to potential abuse, the much touted "global database of professionals" is unlikely to materialise.
So should British and Irish solicitors and barristers be rushing to buy a .pro? Well, not really. Given that it's taken 2½ years to launch the domain in the USA, it's unlikely to reach this side of the Atlantic any time soon and given the limited usefulness of the professional database, lawyers might be advised to ignore the hype and carry on with .com
Tim Brown is a consultant with Edinburgh-based Demys Limited (www.demys.com), who as well as working on Internet brand matters for their international clients, also produce a free domain news service for business (www.demys.net). Email t.brown@demys.com.
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