Australian cities set to apply for new TLDs
As of February 14, ICANN has received at least a hundred registrations in its application website, with the first step being a $5,000 deposit before an application is acknowledged. ICANN

The Internet Corporation For Assigned Names and Numbers made a historic vote this week allowing for the creation of customized domain names.

Until this ruling, there were 22 generic top-level domain (gTLD)name endings including the .com, .org and .net. In a vote this week, ICANN ruled at the price of about $185,000, organizations can apply to create their own customized gTLDs. This means a company, such as Apple Inc., could ultimately create the domain name .Apple.

ICANN has opened the Internet's naming system to unleash the global human imagination. Today's decision respects the rights of groups to create new Top Level Domains in any language or script. We hope this allows the domain name system to better serve all of mankind, Rod Beckstrom, president and chief executive officer of ICANN, said in a statement.

On the vote, 13 board members approved the change, one opposed and two abstained from voting altogether. ICANN is certain the change, which will begin early next year, will usher in great change for the internet whereby a domain name will be able to end in any word in any language.

Today's decision will usher in a new Internet age, Peter Dengate Thrush, Chairman of ICANN's Board of Directors said in a statement. We have provided a platform for the next generation of creativity and inspiration.

However, not everyone is as positive about the change. In a blog post, Laura Weinstein of the4 People For Internet Responsibility and founder of The Privacy Forum, said this ICANN approved change will lead to a lot of domain abuse.

I believe we may see billions of dollars being wasted in ICANN's new gigantic gTLD 'domain name space'--mostly from firms falsely hoodwinked into thinking that new domain names will be their paths to Internet riches, and from firms trying to protect their names in this vastly expanded space, ripe for abuses, Weinstein said.

The Coalition Against Domain Name Abuse (CADNA) said it has worked with ICANN to ensure such abuse does not happen. However, the group says there is a lot of work. CADNA has said ICANN suffers from poor internal governance and a dense policy development process. This results in decisions that are not in the best interest of the Internet community CADNA says.

Follow Gabriel Perna on Twitter at @GabrielSPerna

Apple inc. Twitter Apple inc. Twitter