.bi
Encyclopedia
.bi is the Internet
country code
top-level domain
(ccTLD) for Burundi
. It is administered by the Burundi National Center of Information Technology.
The registry site states that ".BI Registry has a rather liberal policy about domain names as soon as the domain name is in relation with the business name or one of its marks. The general principle is that a domain must reflect the truth." Registrations are open to anybody worldwide, but are not supposed to be registered or used for misleading purposes, though apparently no pre-screening is done to ensure this. The site also states that "We strongly discourage the use of suffixes of our country for misleading people. We remind that .bi stands for Republic of Burundi and for nothing else." This is apparently intended to discourage the "repurposing" of .bi as has been done with other ccTLDs (such as .tv
for "television" and .la
for Los Angeles), or the use in "domain hack
s" where the TLD becomes part of a word or phrase (as in del.icio.us
). Use of "bi" in the sense of bisexuality
is likely the sort of thing they are aiming to prevent, though it is unclear whether there have been any actual uses of the ccTLD in this manner. It is used by the Israel
i company Vision.bi, which develops Business Intelligence
software.
There does not seem to be very much use at all, either within or outside Burundi, despite the liberal registration policy. The nation's political
and economic situation may at least in part account for the relatively low number of registered domains; Burundi is among the most impoverished nations on Earth.
.bi is one of the minority of ccTLDs which has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with ICANN
, something ICANN has attempted with limited success to get all ccTLD registries to do. The .bi registration agreement also subjects registrants to the UDRP dispute policy, but they do not appear to have contracted with WIPO to place disputes in this ccTLD under their panels' jurisdiction, and there is no indication in the registry site of any other adjudication body authorized to hear such disputes.
Internet
The Internet is a global system of interconnected computer networks that use the standard Internet protocol suite to serve billions of users worldwide...
country code
Country code
Country codes are short alphabetic or numeric geographical codes developed to represent countries and dependent areas, for use in data processing and communications. Several different systems have been developed to do this. The best known of these is ISO 3166-1...
top-level domain
Top-level domain
A top-level domain is one of the domains at the highest level in the hierarchical Domain Name System of the Internet. The top-level domain names are installed in the root zone of the name space. For all domains in lower levels, it is the last part of the domain name, that is, the last label of a...
(ccTLD) for Burundi
Burundi
Burundi , officially the Republic of Burundi , is a landlocked country in the Great Lakes region of Eastern Africa bordered by Rwanda to the north, Tanzania to the east and south, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo to the west. Its capital is Bujumbura...
. It is administered by the Burundi National Center of Information Technology.
The registry site states that ".BI Registry has a rather liberal policy about domain names as soon as the domain name is in relation with the business name or one of its marks. The general principle is that a domain must reflect the truth." Registrations are open to anybody worldwide, but are not supposed to be registered or used for misleading purposes, though apparently no pre-screening is done to ensure this. The site also states that "We strongly discourage the use of suffixes of our country for misleading people. We remind that .bi stands for Republic of Burundi and for nothing else." This is apparently intended to discourage the "repurposing" of .bi as has been done with other ccTLDs (such as .tv
.tv
The domain name .tv is the Internet country code top-level domain for the islands of Tuvalu.Except for reserved names like com.tv, net.tv, org.tv and others, any person may register second-level domains in tv...
for "television" and .la
.la
.la is the Internet country code top-level domain for Laos.- History :The LA Names Corporation, based in Guernsey, has gained the rights to market .la registrations, and they had used the registry services of Afilias and, formerly, the registrar services of DreamHost. However, DreamHost has...
for Los Angeles), or the use in "domain hack
Domain hack
A domain hack is an unconventional domain name that combines domain levels, especially the top-level domain , to spell out the full "name" or title of the domain. Examples include del.icio.us , goo.gl and fold.it...
s" where the TLD becomes part of a word or phrase (as in del.icio.us
Del.icio.us
Delicious is a social bookmarking web service for storing, sharing, and discovering web bookmarks. The site was founded by Joshua Schachter in 2003 and acquired by Yahoo! in 2005, and by the end of 2008, the service claimed more than 5.3 million users and 180 million unique bookmarked URLs...
). Use of "bi" in the sense of bisexuality
Bisexuality
Bisexuality is sexual behavior or an orientation involving physical or romantic attraction to both males and females, especially with regard to men and women. It is one of the three main classifications of sexual orientation, along with a heterosexual and a homosexual orientation, all a part of the...
is likely the sort of thing they are aiming to prevent, though it is unclear whether there have been any actual uses of the ccTLD in this manner. It is used by the Israel
Israel
The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...
i company Vision.bi, which develops Business Intelligence
Business intelligence
Business intelligence mainly refers to computer-based techniques used in identifying, extracting, and analyzing business data, such as sales revenue by products and/or departments, or by associated costs and incomes....
software.
There does not seem to be very much use at all, either within or outside Burundi, despite the liberal registration policy. The nation's political
Politics of Burundi
Politics of Burundi takes place in a framework of a transitional presidential representative democratic republic, whereby the President of Burundi is both head of state and head of government, and of a multi-party system. Executive power is exercised by the government...
and economic situation may at least in part account for the relatively low number of registered domains; Burundi is among the most impoverished nations on Earth.
.bi is one of the minority of ccTLDs which has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with ICANN
ICANN
The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers is a non-profit corporation headquartered in Marina del Rey, California, United States, that was created on September 18, 1998, and incorporated on September 30, 1998 to oversee a number of Internet-related tasks previously performed directly...
, something ICANN has attempted with limited success to get all ccTLD registries to do. The .bi registration agreement also subjects registrants to the UDRP dispute policy, but they do not appear to have contracted with WIPO to place disputes in this ccTLD under their panels' jurisdiction, and there is no indication in the registry site of any other adjudication body authorized to hear such disputes.