insight 

Earlier this month isnic, the .is Icelandic registry, relaxed its rules for overseas registrants.

“Foreign registrants of .IS domains have until now been required to confirm their ownership of the corresponding trademark at the Icelandic Patent Agency (Einkaleyfastofa) before the domain can be registered. This requirement has now been lifted.

Foreigners can now, just as Icelanders, register any .IS domain they please. Foreign nationals, however, are still required to identify a domestic contact person. This is a practical arrangement established to facilitate ISNIC’s ability to contact the domain’s supervisors.”

It’s interesting to see this trend to liberalised registration continuing across many of the country code operators and is widely seen as improving the health of the domain name market.