Chaos as .info registry grinds to a halt

NEWS The .info registry is still offline after huge volumes of traffic forced it to a halt yesterday as registration opened to the general public. The service slowed down after unanticipated numbers of applicants logged on to chase .info domain names on the first day of public registration. Five thousand people registered between 16:00(EDT) yesterday, when the registry went live, and the close of business. Heather Carle, spokeswoman for Afilias, the registry overseeing the allocation of .info domains, explained that the service was taken offline to ensure applicants on fast connections did not get an unfair advantage. "There are no technical hitches, it's just running slow and we want to optimise it to a level that we are comfortable with," she said. The service is expected to resume again by 17:00(PDT) today.