PHILIPSBURG--Minister in charge of Telecommunications Franklin Meyers and Bureau Telecom St. Maarten BTP-SXM launched St. Maarten's new top-level Internet domain, .SX, on Tuesday.
They also launched 1-800 and 1-900 numbers to St. Maarten.
BTP-SXM Director Peggy Ann-Brandon explained that ".SM" had been the first option for St. Maarten's Internet domain, but the country could not acquire this domain because it already had been assigned to San Marino.
Meyers added that although ".SX" had been available, acquiring the domain still had required substantiation from team St. Maarten who fought an uphill battle that at times had seemed impossible to achieve.
St. Maarten had to justify to the International Organisation for Standardisation (ISO) its reasons for wanting .SX. The ISO assigns all codes globally and countries have to apply for new codes. The application process can take months, with no guarantees that a country will receive what it has requested.
Meyers explained that the people of St. Maarten, institutions and other entities always had promoted St. Maarten as "SXM," which is the three-digit identification code for Princess Juliana International Airport (PJIA). He said St. Maarten had been able to secure .SX after a lengthy process and had become only the second country in the world with basically the same two-digit country code and three-digit airport code. The other country is Mexico with country code ".MX" and airport code "MEX."
Meyers also disclosed that BTP-SXM and the company SX Registry
(http://registry.sx/) had entered into a 20-year agreement giving SX Registry the exclusive rights to market .SX. Ten per cent of revenues generated by SX Registry will go directly to assist University of St. Martin financially.
SX Registry will promote the usage and the registration of .SX domain names on a national and an international level via attractive registrar packages and a dedicated marketing programme. Truly global, the registry is based in St. Maarten with technical operations performed by OpenRegistry.com in Canada and Luxembourg.
.SX will be an open registry marketed on the open market where potential for revenue is greater compared to a closed registry. Meyers estimated that St. Maarten could have 150,000 to 200,000 registries on the open market compared to Curaçao, which currently has about 600 in its closed registry.
As for the 1-800 and 1-900 numbers, the issuance should begin some time next week. In the past 1-800 numbers for St. Maarten fell under an Antillean numbering plan. As St. Maarten is now part of the North American Numbering Plan (NANP), the country has to comply with a number of regulations by October 1, 2012. Within the NANP, issuance of these numbers is a regulation.
1-800 numbers are toll-free numbers for persons calling 1-800-Herald, for example. 1-900 numbers are used for services paid for by the minute. For example, TV shows such as American Idol uses a 1-900 number for people who want to vote. 1-900 numbers are also used for entertainment ventures and the like.
Brandon said she was very proud as Director of BTP-SXM, but would be remiss if she did not give credit where credit was due: to the team that had worked diligently to secure .SX. She also praised Meyers for his foresight, interest in industry and for allowing himself to be educated on telecom matters to guide the process.
Source: http://www.thedailyherald.com/islands/1-islands-news/26378-meyers-btp-launch-country-domain-sx-.html
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