The French government is challenging the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers’ decision to allow new internet suffixes .wine and .vin, according to Dr. Vino. This is in order to prevent cybersquatters from cherry picking prime web addresses like “champagne.wine” or “bordeaux.vin.” Since the naming rights of its regional wines are protected under international trade laws, France might have a point.
However, ICANN’s president Fadi Chehade seems a little dismissive of the French government’s concern. “We all get frustrated sometimes when we don’t get the conclusion that we want.” [Dr. Vino] [Photo: Flickr/James Cridland]