Soviet top-level domain refuses to die

ICANN -- who run the Internet's top-level domain system -- have been trying to retire .su, the old domain used by the Soviet Union. They ordered the .su registrar to stop selling .su domains, but the registrar continues to sell thousands of domains every year -- and they've just declared fire-sale pricing for new signups.

. One address that hasn't been retired is ".su" - assigned to the Soviet Union in 1990. It is still operating despite the country no longer existing, and despite the ".ru" TLD assigned to Russia in 1994.

There are currently 9648 sites under the domain. And apparently it is getting more popular - this time last year there were only 7206. Add to this the fact that the body operating ".su" has cut prices in response to an ICANN request to freeze new registrations, and the number of ex-Soviet sites that will have to be reassigned, and you have one almighty mess.

Link (via /.)

[#1 posted by Anonymous , September 21, 2007 4:46 AM]

That somehow doesn't surprise me. Russians can be very conservative.

Also, some ground laing site like MSU.su (Moscow State University) are living under .su, which were responsible for introducing Internet in ex-USSR. Many people who have lobbied hard for Internet in the troubled times feel somehow connected to .su. (And if you would look into current political situation, you would also find that many people in Russia are very nostalgic about USSR times.)

Though most interesting thing here would be, that among the .su (as well as .ru) sites you would find number of Japanese(!) site. Connection and explanation is very simple: romanization of many Japanese verbs end with 'su' and 'ru' syllables.

[#2 posted by Larrs , September 21, 2007 8:56 AM]

Check out lenin.su. I wonder what Vlad would think.

[#3 posted by brundlefly , September 21, 2007 10:55 AM]

I'm gonna have to register shit.su before they discontinue it.

(I know it's not spelled like that, but still...)

[#4 posted by Anonymous , September 21, 2007 12:52 PM]

The cost goes from $100 + $100/year today to $20 + $10/year in November (probably November 7, of course). The .su domain will also be the only domain with Cyrillic lettering. From 10 January 2001 to 31 October 2001, the cost of a .su domain was FIFTEEN THOUSAND US Dollars! http://www.fid.ru/projects/PRICE.php --John

[#5 posted by Teresa Nielsen Hayden/Moderator , September 21, 2007 1:10 PM]

Shi tsu? It's got all the letters in the right order.

[#6 posted by zzt711 , September 21, 2007 1:12 PM]

ICANN should just switch .su off and let the illegal .su registar deal with it (removing their ability to sell any more along with it). The majority of new registar's should also be aware that this can happen, there's a reason why it's cheap.

[#7 posted by Deus Ex Machinima , September 22, 2007 1:55 PM]

It seems like the .su domain is like Thomas the Tank Engine, chugging valiantly against the tide of calls for shutdown, repeating to itself under its breath like a mantra, "I think ICANN. I think ICANN."