Isle Of Man .im Domain Name Not Yet Officially Recognised

by Amanda Banks, Tax-news.com, London

07 June 2001

The International Standards Organisation (ISO) is refusing to officially recognise the Isle of Man's domain suffix of .im and insists that it remains on the ISO's reserve list of domain suffixes along with Jersey and Guernsey. Consequently, companies that sell goods over the Internet can not use .im in e-mail addresses and although residents on the Island can buy online they have to foresake the .im for the .uk domain suffix.

The .im is the National Top Level Domain for the Isle of Man and was established in five years ago as a joint project of the Manx Government and Advanced Systems Consultants. National Top Level Domains are vital to all jursidictions because they represent Internet addresses from a particular geographic region which in turn is important for branding and marketing operations.

The ISO appears to be a master of bureaucratic red tape in demanding that the Isle of Man be placed on two United Nation's domain lists before it places the Island on its own list. Currently the UN has only included the Isle of Man on one listed document.

The Island's E-envoy, Tim Craine, has stated: 'In practical terms it is not a big issue but in terms of principle it is. If you order over the internet you have to put the UK as your country of residence, which is geographically and politically incorrect. Ourselves, Jersey and Guernsey are the only countries in the world on the (ISO's) reserve list. We've been in discussions with the International Standards Organisation for a number of months and the last we heard from them is that they would only put us on the full list if we were on two UN lists.'

He continued: 'They are very protective of the list. More and more sub-divisions and islands are requesting inclusion. For example, originally you had Czechoslovakia. Then that split into the Czech and Slovak republics and those two as opposed to one wanted suffix letters. You've also got little islands in the Pacific, part of Oceania or Indonesia, saying rather than having the Indonesian suffix they all want individual suffixes. The ISO is being very rigid about who they will provide two-letter suffixes to.'

Referring to a recent meeting with the UN in New York, Mr Craine commented: 'We had very good discussions while I was there and I think we should be able to progress.' Before the UN meeting Mr Craine spoke to the Jersey and Guernsey authorities on the subject, he said: 'It was agreed that I would brief them upon my return so that we would be able to discuss tactics and where we go from here.'

According to Mr Craine, all three of the Channel Islands could apply for inclusion on the UN's second list but he postulated that they could 'press the ISO to scrap their reserve list and put us on their full list.' He added: 'we would argue let's scrap this anomaly with only three countries in the world on it — let's just upgrade us.'

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