.xxx is in the root

I blogged a couple of weeks back that after 6+ years of consideration and delays, that ICANN had finally approved on the 18th of March, the .xxx top level domain.

The two remaining steps for .xxx were to sign a contract with ICANN and then actually get the .xxx TLD into what is known as the root zone.

The contract was signed on 31 March. The final step involves ICANN asking Verisign to enter it into the root zone, and Verisign are required to first check with the US Government before doing so.

This is normally routine, but there was some concern that the USG might refuse – because it was one of those Governments that had oppossed .xxx as a TLD. It would be improper for them to use their historical authority over the root zone, to overturn the decision of ICANN, but it was not inconceivable.

However they didn’t, as got added to the root earlier today, and the website icm.xxx is now active. In it’s own way, a sort of historical day.

It will be interesting to see how many adult sites move to .xxx, and also to see if any Governments try to force all adult sites to .xxx. Also of interest will be if any countries automatically block the entire .xxx domain.