[Governance] Linguistic gTLDs

[Tapani Tarvainen]

This is an interesting topic. One related issue is that ICANN is
considering how to treat gTLDs in Latin script that differ only by
diacritics, like .quebec vs .québec.

Somewhat surprisingly at the moment it seems they're going to allow
such to coexist as long as the operating entity is the same (and so
able to avoid confusion), but not all languages will be treated
equally. For instance, they would allow .sjo, .sjö (Swedish) and .sjó
(Icelandic) in such situations, but not .sjø (Norwegian/Danish/Faroese).

Although at the moment it seems the policy won't be decided in time
for the next round next spring, and lots can happen before the next one.

Tapani

On Thu, Nov 13, 2025 at 08:41:43AM -0400, Daniel Pimienta via Governance (governance at lists.igcaucus.org) wrote:
> 
> Colleagues,
> 
> I see an item  on new gTLDs in the program of *Forum de la Gouvernance de
> l’Internet France 2025 <https://www.afnic.fr/en/observatory-and-resources/expert-papers/the-french-internet-governance-forum-fgi-france-2025/>.*
> It may be of interest of some of you to know that a study has been realized,
> on request from .cat (Catalan) organization, for the worldwide screening of
> the languages which could benefit from a linguistic gTLD : Following the
> Legacy of Pioneer .CAT: Identifying World Languages Best Suited for
> Linguistic gTLDs <https://domini.cat/documents/Estudi_Daniel_Pimienta.pdf>,
> D. Pimienta/domini.cat, 1/2025
> 
> Additionally, original data on European linguistic gTLDs can be consulted in
> https://www.obdilci.org/projects/other/gtld/
> 
> On 11/13/2025 5:13 AM, Joly MacFie via Governance wrote:
> > 
> > *LIVESTREAM <https://youtu.be/yT-boZilDhA>  | PERMALINK
> > <https://isoc.live/19851>*
> > 
> > Le *Jeudi 13 Novembre 2025 *le *Forum de la Gouvernance de l’Internet
> > France 2025 <https://www.afnic.fr/en/observatory-and-resources/expert-papers/the-french-internet-governance-forum-fgi-france-2025/>* (FGI
> > France) se tiendra à Paris et en ligne. Objectif : engager les
> > multiplesparties concernées dans un dialogue sur la gouvernance de
> > l’Internet. Une webdiffusion en direct sera assurée par l’*Internet
> > Society France Chapter <https://www.isoc.fr/>*.
> > 
> >