The story of how Colombia’s ccTLD .CO became a recent success is the focus of a report in The Huffington Post. The story outlines how entrepreneur Juan Diego Calle asked the Colombian government if he could commercialise the ccTLD, a government that had previously not been open to any form of commercialisation of the country code. His submission came to 1,165 pages and sought to explain why the team was right for the job, and then they crossed their fingers.

After only three weeks since its launch, nearly 410,000 .CO domain names have been registered in more than 180 countries worldwide. Among the more than 2,500 domains to be auctioned, the three with the most applicants are Slots.co, Insure.co and Denver.co.  Other notable .CO domain names up for auction include Mexi.co, America.co, Betting.co, Vitamins.co, UsedCars.co, Happy.co, Ebook.co and Jackpot.co. “As the .CO domain extension continues to generate global demand, I suspect we will see many exciting Landrush auctions for highly sought after domain names in the coming weeks,” said Lori Anne Wardi, Director of Marketing at .CO Internet S.A.S.

Recently, .CO domains became available to the general public for domain web hosting . They had been shopped to select major companies during “sunrise” and “landrush” phases for the months prior to opening to everyone, and a lot of the shorter, and most desirable names were quickly snapped up

Web Host News – REGENSBURG – The nifty .CO domain extension is about to enter the final phase of its launch. From July 20, 2010 onwards, .CO domain registration will be open to the general public. Domains can be registered via ten .CO accredited registrars located in North and South America – with the exception of InterNetX – the only .CO accredited registrar in Europe

Click here to RSVP to WHIR Events: Denver – Aug 26, 2010 Phoenix – Sept 23, 2010 Washington, DC – Oct 21 Five Most Recent Posts Blogs: The WHIR at HostingCon 2010 – What to Watch Out For News: Registrars Prepare for Wide Release of .CO Domain Blogs: Blueprints of Web Hosting’s Future News: Web Host VertexHost Colocates at VegasNAP (WEB HOST INDUSTRY REVIEW) — Due to extraordinary demand for the impending global .CO domain launch, .CO Internet S.A.S. ( www.cointernet.co ), the registry operator of the .CO domain, extended the high-priority .CO domain name deadline last week to midday Friday, Eastern Time. During the “Landrush” phase, those wishing to secure early access to a .CO domain name were able to do so for a premium price ranging from around $250 to $300.

Click here to RSVP to WHIR Events: Denver – Aug 26, 2010 Phoenix – Sept 23, 2010 Washington, DC – Oct 21 Five Most Recent Posts Blogs: The WHIR at HostingCon 2010 – What to Watch Out For News: Registrars Prepare for Wide Release of .CO Domain Blogs: Blueprints of Web Hosting’s Future News: Web Host VertexHost Colocates at VegasNAP (WEB HOST INDUSTRY REVIEW) — Due to extraordinary demand for the impending global .CO domain launch, .CO Internet S.A.S. ( www.cointernet.co ), the registry operator of the .CO domain, extended the high-priority .CO domain name deadline last week to midday Friday, Eastern Time

The recent ICANN meeting held in Brussels was judged a success by Minds + Machines’ Antony Van Couvering, whose company is likely to be behind applications for several new generic Top Level Domains when ICANN eventually begins taking applications. Van Couvering writes that the recent meeting “may become known as the meeting where the dust finally began to settle. Long-standing issues were settled, compromises were reached, no-one complained too much about the latest version of the Applicant Guidebook, and the Board stood by its project plan dates, even scheduling a Board retreat to solve remaining issues

Click here to RSVP to WHIR Events: Denver – Aug 26, 2010 Phoenix – Sept 23, 2010 Washington, DC – Oct 21 Five Most Recent Posts News: Web Host SoftLayer Provides Mobile Management Application for Android Devices News: Infinitely Virtual Expands into AIS San Diego Data Center News: Public IT Cloud Services Expected to Grow to More Than $55B by 2014: IDC Report News: WHIR Sponsoring Mississauga Independent Film Fest News: TrustDefender Names VP of Advanced Threat Research (WEB HOST INDUSTRY REVIEW) — Business technology solutions and services provider CSC ( www.csc.com ) announced on Tuesday it has appointed Tom Kenyon as managing director of CSC’s Latin American operations, in support of the company’s strategic goal to grow business in the region. CSC currently conducts operations in Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Peru and Mexico.

Web Hosting News – INDIA – Mi.com.co, the first local registrar for the .CO ccTLD formally announced that they will be partnering with LogicBoxes and utilizing its Registrar software. Mi.com.co has been closely involved in the .CO TLD re-delegation process that was finalized in August 2009, for over 2 years

NameAction visited Colombia recently to examine the registration process for the relaunched .CO recently. Juan Diego Calle (General Manager), Eduardo Santoyo (Vice-president of Corporate affairs) and Nicolai Bezsonoff (Vice-president of Operations) of NIC Colombia showed NameAction staff around and answered their questions. Below is a transcription of the interview, originally in Spanish, conducted on February 25, 2010.