18(a) Describe the mission/purpose of your proposed gTLD

Prototypical answer:

The applied-for string will serve as the TLD for the City of Paris, Capital city of France. Paris is world famous as a center of arts, science, technology, culture, fashion, design and cuisine... The TLD is being applied for by the City of Paris, the public authority for Paris.

Through the TLD .PARIS, the City of Paris intends to provide specific content to Internet users from all over the world. The Internet today appears as a global medium where local parameters are not always clear or easy to identify. Estimates from major search engines place local search at around 30% of the total amount of search queries they handle. For the City of Paris, .PARIS is a way to help Internet users pinpoint Paris-specific content more easily, thereby improving their user experience.

The latest figures available (2010) show that 2.2 million people live in Paris and a total of 11.6 million inhabit the Greater Paris area. Paris is also home to 350,000 companies and 30,000 shops. Around 28 million people visit Paris every year (making Paris the number one tourist destination in the world), including some 17 million tourists from outside France. France remains the worldʹs leading tourism destination with 76.8 million visitors in 2010 according to the UNʹs World Tourism Organisation (UNWTO).In 2011, Roissy and Orly airports received 88.1 million passengers. In 2010 there were 13.6 million visitors to Notre Dame, 10.5 million at Sacré Coeur Montmartre, 8.4 million to the Louvre, 6.6 million to Eiffel Tower and 3.5 million at Centre Pompidou.
In the Greater Paris area (The bulk of Paris Area belongs to the French administrative Region “Île de France”, composed of 8 départements), there are 18 convention centers and exhibition grounds where 959 congresses and 384 exhibitions took place in 2010.

The Greater Paris area has more than 71,000 companies whose businesses rely primarily on tourism. These companies account for 500,000 salaried jobs, including 47% in Paris, with growth of 2 to 3% per year in job creation. Tourism consumption is estimated at 16.7 billion euros for the greater Paris area (Ile de France).

Paris is referenced in billions of web pages, as shown by a search on the string ʺparisʺ carried out using any of the leading search engines.

There are more than 100,000 domain names registered in the leading gTLDs (COM, NET, ORG, INFO and BIZ) containing the word Paris.

According to figures released by the City of Paris, 80% of the Paris population are regular users of the Internet (versus 71% for France as a whole) and 45% surf using mobile devices (35% for France).

The .PARIS TLD aims to service both this local, national and international user base by providing a clearly identified domain on the Internet for the city.

The .PARIS TLD is intended as an open TLD with registrations rules that guarantee widespread usage by all Internet users, be they from Paris, or elsewhere. This TLD is designed as a highly attractive TLD, with projections in the order of 35,000 registrations in the first years of operation.

.PARIS has several goals:
* To facilitate digital communications from, to and within the Paris Community.
* To provide a platform for the urban development of the Paris Community in the digital space, including local digital services
* To strengthen the image of Paris online.

The City of Paris intends to achieve these goals by:
* Actively designing and developing the .PARIS TLD name space with a focus on the needs of the Paris Community, by involving cultural, welfare, business and public stakeholders.
* Allowing registrations of second-level domains in the .PARIS TLD by individuals and organizations with a bona fide nexus to the Paris area.
* Operating the .PARIS TLD under the stewardship of the City of Paris in consultation with the local public authorities of the Greater Paris area and private sector stakeholders.

Similar gTLD applications: (0)