In response to a push given by registrars, South African domain name registry ZADNA (.ZA Domain Name Authority) have announced that they are open to discussing possibilities of allowing second level domain name registrations under .ZA ccTLD. With this move, ZADNA seeks to stay relevant to registrants in order to compete against ICANN backed nTLDs.
According to ZADNA, the last few years have witnessed myriad requests for second level registrations under the .ZA domain from business owners as well as members from South Africa’s internet communities. They further added that in order to pave way for these registrations, ZADNA will expand beyond their current set of offerings that includes- AC.ZA, CO.ZE, GOV.ZA, ORG.ZA and NET.ZA.
ZADNA say that they have conducted research on the growing trend of ccTLDs of countries such as Columbia, Venezuela, U.K, New Zealand and Australia. Witnessing the success of registrations at the second level, ZADNA say that following suit will benefit them in the long run.
As per ZADNA, second level registrations will facilitate growth for the .ZA ccTLD because of its short URL. They also say that this is a much better option as compared to its current third level registration model.
In closing, ZADNA said that the discussion is currently underway with a 35-page document distributed among various stakeholders and the possibility of foreign registrants registering under the second level is also being evaluated.