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By Sally Watson, 6 October 2000 18:15

NEWS The European Community Panel of Participants (EC-POP) steering group advises that the organisation be clearly linked to the EU territorially and institutionally. "It is also of particular importance that the registry should respect the laws and policies of the European Union," the report states. Explicitly, the EU cannot be seen to create a commercial monopoly. The proposal aims to guide the EC in the development of a brand new registry for the domain. Suggested names include EU-NIC, Euro-names and EU-DRI (Domain Registration Institute). Last week, Icann, the domain name governing body, gave the dot-eu domain its blessing in principle - but the EC still has to win its bid to manage the domain. Christopher Wilkinson, advisor to the director general of the EU's Information Society Directorate and member of the steering group, said users will probably have to be registered within the EU to qualify for a domain. "The support is based on an increasing European identity," he said. One of the most pressing problems for the EC is the creation of a registry which won't be exhausted. "The EU is a big area with a large economy and potentially a large number of companies requiring dot-eu domains," said Wilkinson. "We can't afford to set something up which would suffer from the same restrictions dot-com has." The report suggests a number of solutions, including creating a range of second tier domains like culture-dot-eu and sports-dot-eu, or restricting domains only to trademark holders. According to Cormac Callanan, chairman of the Internet Service Provider's Association of Ireland and member of the advisory group, the proposals are now open for public debate. "The next two major steps are the appointment of a policy board and the setting up of the operational registry," he said. "We are trying to move as quickly as possible to have it in place by the end of the year," he added. However, according to both Callanan and Wilkinson, the first dot-eu registrations will probably be spring 2001. Details of the proposals can be found at http://www.ec-pop.org . The group will be holding an open meeting in Brussels on 19 October.