Saturday, October 31, 2009

Internet REALLY going global

by Karen Coppock
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ICANN voted to allow non-Latin-script web addresses this week, in a nod to the 800 or so million Internet users who read and write in Arabic, Chinese and other non-Latin-script languages.

This could fundamentally change the nature of the Internet. The billions of people that use non-Latin-script languages will soon be able to access sites without having to know the Latin-script suffix (e.g., .com)...but they will still have to type in the prefix, http://

Many people have voiced in on the pros and cons of this new policy. Regardless if you consider this a good or bad move, it is definitely a move toward the increased globalization of the Internet and has distinct ramifications for multi-national firms which were accustomed to managing their brands and customer-relations on a more uniform platform.

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