Last month, I reported that the United Arab Emirates would likely capture the first ever Arabic IDN extension with it’s proposed .emarat. Surprisingly, Egypt was the first to submit its application for their Arabic IDN. The extension will be called .masr (aka .egypt) of course the letters will be all in Arabic characters.
As there is very little actual Arabic content that exists online, I expect the .masr and .emarat and other forthcoming IDN extensions to dramatically increase the amount of Arabic content on the Internet. I haven’t yet heard if Saudi Arabia, Iran or other highly populated Arabic speaking nations plan on applying thru the fast track process.
