In a move reminiscent of the early dot com years, NASA has secured two much-coveted TLDs – after a secret, 30-day-long negotiation with top ICANN executives.
The new TLDs, .moon and .mars, will be active in the coming weeks. Now that NASA’s mission to the Moon delivered the fantastic news of water existence in the polar region, NASA is entering the domain realm quite aggressively.
“We wanted to ensure that premium real estate such as the Moon and Mars are secured in the form of an independent TLD”, said Bobby Twotone, executive director of the “Earth to the Moon & Beyond” initiative – adding: “There will be other acquisitions in the future, potentially .mercury and .venus; we are working closely with ICANN to provide them the necessary documents that prove such missions are actually in place.”
Meanwhile, NASA is receiving an increased amount of grants from the federal government, thanks to President Obama’s reach to domainers worldwide.
On Tuesday, a group of protesters gathered around the Washington monument, holding banners that read “Moon No! Won’t go!“
