A panel discussion on the poor uptake of some of the new generic top-level domains during the 3rd Aficta Summit, hosted recently in Johannesburg, saw criticism of Africa's attitude to technology at international level.

Under the auspices of ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers), the New generic Top-Level Domain Program's aim is to increase competition and choice in domain names by facilitating global domain name applications.

CEO of Mobile Software Solution Chris Uwaje led the offensive when he told delegates that listening, understanding and involvement at global level by Africans remains unsatisfactory, as evidenced by the low number of applications from the continent.

"Africa was not aware, initially, when all these top level domain issues were being defined and even when they went to the United Nations they had not really consulted and engaged in the process that translated into TLD, so it was late coming which turned into an opportunity loss."

Uwaje also remarked that Africa now has the largest domain estate in the world, which has not been exhausted and lessons should be drawn from the challenges encountered so far.

A global lethargy

It became clear that the inability to capitalise on global opportunities provided by the internet is not unique to Africa.

AMGlobal CEO Andrew Mack told the Summit - via video link from the US, that the world community was late in responding to applications from the southern hemisphere, and limited funding culminated in a mere seventeen applications from the new gTLD from the African continent.

This view is one supported by the Internet Society's Belgian board member and NPOC (Non-for-profit Operational Concerns Constituency) chair Rudi Vansnick.

"You are not alone, it's not just Africa being late comers, many were late comers because nobody was seeing the benefit of the new domain names."

Vansnick emphasised the importance of trust when deciding on ccTLDs and gTLDs..

"One word that I'm missing that can help a lot in moving forward is trust. If you trust the domain you will go to that domain and if you don't trust it you will leave it. That's one of the opportunities you have in Africa, it's - I would say - fresh soil that can be used. It's still clean...If I would like to buy something or do business with a company in South Africa, I would not trust the dot com and I would only trust the dot co za and that is something that we are forgetting...trust for me living in a developed region where we have all these issues with dot be is very important."