EnCirca has announced it is now taking orders in advance from all businesses that might qualify for the dot-pro domain. After a lot of deliberation, the dot-pro registry and ICANN have done away with many of the restrictions for dot-pro domain names. All professionals anywhere in the world can now register a dot-pro domain name that operates in the similar way as dot-com domain names.

 

With help of EnCirca's ProForwarding service, eligible businesses and professionals can book their business names, trademarks, and personal names on a first-come, first-served basis before the rule modified.

 

"This will lead to a huge expansion for the dot-pro domain name," says Thomas Barrett, President of EnCirca. "Previously, only doctors, lawyers, accountants, and engineers were eligible to register dot-pro domains; however, now business people representing over 1,100 professions can take advantage of dot-pro. In addition, there will no longer be any geographic restrictions for dot-pro - businesses and individuals from every country in the world will be eligible."

 

It has been decided that the dot-pro domain name and the dot-com domain name will work in a similar fashion. A user may register under any kind of name. Companies are free to register industry keywords, search engine terms, company names, trademarks or personal names. Plus, companies and users can register any number of dot-pro domain names.

 

Any person or company that has the recognition of any government agency or licensing body can register to dot-pro, as per the new rules. However, no consumer verification will take place prior to the usage of the dot-pro names. In place of verification, regular audits of registered companies will be conducted to ensure compliance.

 

The latest rules will become operational subsequent to a short comment period and an assessment by the ICANN Board of Directors. People can send their views and suggestions about these anticipated changes to ICANN by April 10.

 

EnCirca is the premier ICANN registrar for the dot-pro domain, run by RegistryPro, an ICANN registry only for professionals who want to market and promote themselves on the world wide web. It was created in 2001, and is credited by the Internet Corporation of Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN).