Dutch minister Maxime Verhagen officially opened the website www.de25jaarvan.nl. At a launch ceremony in The Hague, the minister’s blog entry was posted on the special jubilee website developed by SIDN to mark the twenty-fifth anniversary of .nl’s creation.
‘In the last quarter-century, the simple abbreviation ‘.nl’ has become a factor of considerable economic significance. The internet is now the source of innovation and one of the drivers of our economy,’ Mr Verhagen wrote. One of the jubilee website’s functions is as a repository for anecdotes from Dutch people, describing the impact that the internet has had on their lives, and on the life of their country, in the last twenty-five years.
For the first twenty-five hours of www.de25jaarvan.nl, every hour another prominent Dutch personality will make a contribution to the site. Each of them will add to the website’s timeline with words or images reflecting his or her personal experience of the internet. Among the celebrities and public figures who will be contributing are Hanna Verboom (actress and founder of Get It Done), Frank Heemskerk (former State Secretary for Economic Affairs and Chairman of ECP-EPN), Jacco Eltingh (former tennis professional) and Raymond Spanjar (founder of Hyves). The personal recollections and reflections include a piece by Frans Nauta, describing .nl as ‘The perfect Albert Cuyp market for a Dutch ideas stall. As it has been for twenty-five years!’ Boris van der Ham points out that ‘The internet has opened up political parties. They are now able to communicate with people more quickly and are more accessible.’ Ot van Daalen opens his blog entry with the words, ‘For the last twenty-five years, every time that a Dutch person has accessed the net for the first time, the world has got a little smaller and a little better.’
History
On 25 April 1986, the .nl domain became one of the world’s first country-code domains to be delegated to a body outside the USA. That body was the CWI (Centre for Mathematics and Informatics). Driving force behind the delegation was Piet Beertema, who then worked at the CWI. ‘In those days, if you’d suggested that before long there would be an internet connection in every living room, people would have thought you were mad. Apart from anything else, the connections were far too expensive and too slow to be suitable. Nowadays, even small children are able to surf the net or have their own homepages,’ Beertema observes.
Since its introduction, the domain has developed into the fourth biggest country-code domains in the world, with 4.2 million active domain names. In 2010 alone, the number of .nl domains rose by half a million. The very first .nl domain name was cwi.nl which remains active to this day. In 1996, Piet Beertema, Ted Lindgreen and Boudewijn Neederkoorn set up SIDN and control of the .nl domain was passed on to the new organisation. As well as being very successful in terms of size, the .nl domain is one of the most secure top-level domains in existence.
Internet Relay
During the Internet Relay, hourly contributions will be made by the following people: Hanna Verboom (actress and founder of Get It Done), Frank Heemskerk, (former State Secretary for Economic Affairs and Chairman of ECP-EPN), Boris van der Ham (MP for the D66 party), Jacco Eltingh (former tennis professional), Raymond Spanjar (founder of Hyves), Roger van Boxtel (Chairman of health insurer Menzis), Ernst Jan Pfauth (Internet Editor at NRC Handelsblad), Francisco van Jole (internet journalist), Alexander Klöpping (internet entrepreneur), Yoeri Albrecht (CEO of De Balie), Eddy Terstall (film director), Frans Nauta (lecturer in public sector innovation), Iens Boswijk (founder of www.iens.nl), Martijn van Griensven (SNS Bank, No-threshold Banking), Ot van Daalen (CEO of Bits of Freedom), Remco Pijpers (Mijn Kind online [My Child Online]) and Rudolph van der Kraan (Wehkamp.nl). The contributions can be viewed at www.de25jaarvan.nl.
Activities
In recent years, the internet, and the .nl domain in particular, has become an increasingly important feature of Dutch society. No part of modern living - from looking up information to making important purchases – would be complete without .nl. In 2011, the .nl domain celebrates its silver jubilee: a major milestone in the development of the Netherlands as a global knowledge and innovation centre. To celebrate the domain’s twenty-fifth anniversary, SIDN (the Foundation for Internet Domain Registration in the Netherlands) is organising various activities in 2011. Later in the year, some of the recollections posted on www.de25jaarvan.nl will be published in a special jubilee magazine. Throughout the jubilee year, there will be activities celebrating everyone who has contributed to the success of the .nl domain. Plans include a jubilee event and an exhibition in Nemo, Amsterdam, as part of ‘Scientific 2011’.
For more details check out www.sidn.nl
Follow these links for more information about .nl domain registration or to register .nl domains .
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