.cat (pronounced in Catalan: ''punt cat'' ) is a

sponsored top-level domain A sponsored top-level domain (sTLD) is one of the categories of top-level domain A top-level domain (TLD) is one of the domains at the highest level in the hierarchical Domain Name System The Domain Name System (DNS) is a hierarchical a ...

intended to be used to highlight the

Catalan language Catalan (; autonym: , ), known in the Valencian Community The Valencian Community ( ca-valencia, Comunitat Valenciana, es, Comunidad Valenciana) is an autonomous community of Spain. It is the fourth most populous Spanish autonomous ...

. Its policy has been developed by

ICANN The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN ) is an American multistakeholder group and nonprofit organization responsible for coordinating the maintenance and procedures of several databases related to the namespac ...

an
Fundació puntCAT
It was approved in September 2005.

History

Before .cat was available, and given the reluctance of certain Catalan institutions, companies, and people, to use .es, .ad, .fr, .it domains (depending on the state respectively) for their domains, alternatives emerged. An example of this was the website for the city of Girona in

Catalonia Catalonia (; ca, Catalunya ; Aranese, Aranese Occitan: ''Catalonha'' ; es, Cataluña ) is an Autonomous communities of Spain, autonomous community of Spain, designated as a ''nationalities and regions of Spain, nationality'' by its Statute o ...

, which preferred to use a .gi domain ("ajuntament.gi", the word "ajuntament" meaning both "city council" and "town hall"), even though .gi is the

country code Country codes are short alphabetic or numeric geographical Geography (from Greek: , ''geographia''. Combination of Greek words ‘Geo’ (The Earth) and ‘Graphien’ (to describe), literally "earth description") is a field of science ...

for

Gibraltar ) , anthem = " God Save the King" , song = " Gibraltar Anthem" , image_map = Gibraltar location in Europe.svg , map_alt = Location of Gibraltar in Europe , map_caption = United Kingdom shown in pale green , mapsize = , image_map2 = Gib ...

, instead of the corresponding .es as a Spanish local authority. To solve this matter, in September 2005 the .cat TLD was approved, designed to meet the wishes and needs of the Catalan linguistic and cultural community on the Internet. This community is made up of those who use Catalan for their online communications, and/or promote the different aspects of Catalan culture online and prefer it to any other domain. The initial registration period went from February 13, 2006, to April 21, 2006. The registry was open to everybody starting April 23, 2006. In September 2017 a Spanish court ordered that all .cat domain names that were being used to promote the Catalan independence referendum shall be taken down. On September 20 the Spanish police raided the offices of puntCAT and arrested CTO Pep Masoliver for sedition. Following this, puntCAT released several tweets and a press statement on their website that condemned this action, calling it "shameful and degrading, unworthy of a civilized country ndimmensely disproportionate". On October 31, 2017 several Catalan Government websites including ''president.cat'', ''govern.cat'' and ''catalangovernment.eu'' were taken down due to the political crisis in Catalonia and due to the take over of authority by the Government of Spain.

Restrictions

The .cat domain is not territorial, but applies to the whole Catalan-speaking community, whether or not a site is based in

. In order to be granted a .cat domain, one needs to belong to the Catalan linguistic and cultural community on the Internet. A person, organization or company is considered to belong if they either: *already have content in Catalan published online. *have access to a special code (sometimes called ENS), issued during special promotions or by agreements with certain institutions. *develop activities (in any language) to promote the Catalan culture and language. *are endorsed by 3 people or 1 institution already using a .cat domain name. Despite the restrictions, the domain has been exploited for feline-related

domain hack A domain hack is a domain name A domain name is a string that identifies a realm of administrative autonomy, authority or control within the Internet The Internet (or internet) is the global system of interconnected computer netwo ...

s, such as nyan.cat. In September 2017, with the domain's filters weakened after the raid by Spanish police, American neo-Nazi website '' The Daily Stormer'' was briefly hosted on a .cat address.

Impact

Following the success of the .cat domain, other language and culture-based domain names have emerged, such as .eus and .gal for the Basque language and

culture Culture () is an umbrella term which encompasses the social behavior, institutions, and norms found in human Humans (''Homo sapiens'') are the most abundant and widespread species of primate, characterized by bipedalism and exce ...

(

Basque Country (greater region) The Basque Country ( eu, Euskal Herria; es, País Vasco; french: Pays basque) is the name given to the home of the Basque people. Trask, R.L. ''The History of Basque'' Routledge: 1997 The Basque country is located in the western Pyrenees Th ...

) and the Galician language and

( Galicia), respectively, as well as the

.bzh .bzh is an approved Internet The Internet (or internet) is the global system of interconnected computer networks that uses the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) to communicate between networks and devices. It is a '' network of network ...

domain-name dedicated to the

Breton language Breton (, ; or in Morbihan) is a Southwestern Brittonic language of the Celtic language family spoken in Brittany, part of modern-day France. It is the only Celtic language still widely in use on the European mainland, albeit as a member ...

and

Brittany Brittany (; french: link=no, Bretagne ; br, Breizh, or ; Gallo: ''Bertaèyn'' ) is a peninsula A peninsula (; ) is a landform that extends from a mainland and is surrounded by water on most, but not all of its borders. A peninsula is ...

.PointBZH.com
, Association bzh, Quimper. (Site in Breton, French and English)

References

External links

Information and register process

Peter Gerrand, 2006: 'Cultural diversity in cyberspace: The Catalan campaign to win the new .cat top level domain'
(Issue 11:1)
The European Cultural and Linguistic Domains Network
. {{DEFAULTSORT:Cat Catalan language Mass media in Catalonia Sponsored top-level domains Computer-related introductions in 2005 sv:Toppdomän#Generiska toppdomäner