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India to be back-end for new .org sites
By agencies
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Tuesday, 04 October 2005, 19:30 IST
NEW DELHI: IndiaÂ’s global image is rapidly growing beyond call centers and software programmers. Top Internet decision makers have decided to make India a hub for the technical backend of all new not-for-profit websites, a newspaper reported.
The plan is to support the ‘.org’ name for all new websites from New Delhi, India. Total registrations could end in mega-millions, considering India alone has more than two million registered non-profit bodies, the New Indian Express newspaper said.
According to the Public Interest Registry (PIR), a not-for-profit body set up by the Geneva-based Internet Society (ISOC), .org websites will work much faster in India once their servers are located here. Afilias, which will run the dot org registry, estimates that a website that takes 5-7 seconds to be located by a computer today, could then take 1-5 milliseconds.
“PIR has housed its domain name resolution servers for dot org in India. This is for the world’s dot org servers, not just for India. Apart from quicker resolution of web sites, this will also create additional jobs and technological advantages for India and besides lower infrastructure costs,’’ says Edward Viltz, President and CEO, PIR.
Since non-profit bodies are among the biggest fundraisers, the billions of dollars donated online makes it even more important to give them a home on the Internet.
The .org tag on a websiteÂ’s name generally implies an NGO, research organization or private think-tank, though individuals, large corporations and even a local country club can use the name.
Considering the high stakes, PIR is also working with the Better Business Bureau on a “Seal of Approval’’ for well-run .org websites. “The devil is in the details, but we are discussing such a plan to recognize .orgs doing a good job themselves and helping the dot org community worldwide preserve the integrity and value of this name,’’ says Viltz.
Impetus for PIRÂ’s effort follows from recent successes with the government-launched .in (dot in) domain name. Since February, 1.4 million Indian companies have adopted .in on their websites, convincing .org supporters that the Indian end of the Internet is well-oiled enough to carry the worldÂ’s NGOs on its wheels, the paper said.
“India is getting a phenomenally good reputation in the world for not just call centre activity but also for its technology and infrastructure,’’ says Viltz.
The government is at present flooded by requests to register using .in name, and is now planning registrations in regional languages as well. Even .org registrations have leapfrogged. PIR says that since January, nearly 8,000 .org websites were registered from India, a 31 percent growth over last year. There are now 33,000 .org websites in India, compared to 9,000 in Brazil and 47,000 each in China and Taiwan, which, however, are not growing as fast.
“Today, India accounts for nearly 1 percent of .org websites worldwide, but the fact that .in was launched successfully will help spread Internet infrastructure tremendously faster in India,’’ says Viltz. At present, the U.S. hosts 65 percent of all .org websites, Europe 25 percent and India, 0.9 percent, the paper added.