June 29, 2010 | The Biz

.XXX approved

During its conference in Brussels, ICANN (the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers) gave initial approval of .xxx to be used as an Internet domain. Website addresses ending in .xxx will be exclusively for porn and will make it easier for companies and governments to filter material deemed inappropriate.

ICM Registry, behind the push for the new domain, claimed the decision was "great news for those that wish to consume, or avoid, adult content."

ICANN will now determine if the move has reasonable backing from the adult industry (which it does not).

Back in 2005, ICANN had approved the .xxx domain, but then rescinded the decision. Then early in 2010, ICANN was told by a panel of US judges it  had to re-open the request and give ICM a fair hearing.

ICM is a for-profit company which stands to reap millions upon millions from the deal because adult sites will feel obliged to pay the $60 annual registration fee in order to keep others from hijacking their site name.  And since sites will still want to keep their .com domains, the whole idea of using .xxx to somehow corral porn into an easily censored area simply will not work.

Sex domain gets official approval [BBC News]