Webnames.ca Co-founder Honoured for Preserving Canadian Identity on the Internet
VANCOUVER, British Columbia - June 4, 2008 - John Demco, Co-Founder and Director of Webnames.ca and Ex-officio on the CIRA Board of Directors, was honoured recently by the University of British Columbia for creating the .ca country code top-level domain for Canada and managing it on a volunteer basis for more than 10 years.
In recognition of John's efforts, the Dept. of Computer Science at UBC has named its undergraduate computing learning facility "The Demco Student Learning Centre". The name is a tribute to John's tremendous achievements, his foresight in preserving a uniquely Canadian identity on the World Wide Web and his positive impact on the reputation of UBC in this field.
"It has been a pleasure to work with John over the past nine years. He is a genuine visionary – John anticipated how people would use the Internet and created the .ca domain years before the widespread adoption of the Net" said Webnames.ca Inc. President Stephen Smith. "Not only is John the innovator of .ca, he continues to play an important role in the governance of the Canadian Internet."
Demco first conceived the ".ca" domain name in 1987, managing requests and approving applications by hand. By 2000, almost 100,000 dot-ca domain names were registered by John and a team of UBC volunteers. In December 1998, the non-profit Canadian Internet Registration Authority (CIRA) was created to manage the growing .ca registry. Today, with more than a million .ca domains registered and 76% of Canadians preferring to shop on a .ca website, it has become one of the most successful ccTLD's worldwide.
"Hundreds of thousands of Canadians have benefited from John's ingenuity and efforts in protecting and fostering Canadian Internet presence." said Byron Holland, President and CEO of CIRA, "Since 2000, CIRA has been able to continue on the founding principles of John's dedication and integrity to protect, promote and develop the Canadian Internet identity."
CIRA requires potential registrants to establish presence requirements or demonstrate strong Canadian connection before they granted a .ca domain. Each day approximately 300 million requests are processed by CIRA to connect Internet users to more than one million .ca Internet addresses.
John Demco resides in Vancouver, BC where he is active in corporate planning for Webnames.ca, publishes a weekly domain name newsletter and continues to champion the adoption and use of the .ca domain.
About Webnames.ca Inc.
Webnames.ca Inc. is Canada`s original and most experienced domain registrar. A spin-off from the Internet pioneers who founded the .CA domain in 1987, Webnames.ca is 100 per cent Canadian owned and operated. In addition to domain registration and corporate domain name management, Webnames.ca offers a growing list of Internet services. Webnames.ca`s reliability is complemented by state-of-the-art systems and online tools which help customers get the most from their Internet presence. For more information, visit www.webnames.ca.
About CIRA
The Canadian Internet Registration Authority (CIRA) is the not-for-profit, member-driven organization that manages Canada's dot-ca (.ca) domain name registry, develops and implements policies that support Canada's Internet community, and represents the dot-ca registry internationally. CIRA processes over 300 million requests per day to connect Internet users with over one million dot-ca Internet addresses. For more information, visit: www.cira.ca.
Contact:
Julianna Horvat
Marketing and Communications Coordinator
Webnames.ca Inc.
604-633-3097 ext. 148
julie@webnames.ca
Melisa Durak-Buljubasic
Public Relations and Communications Specialist
Canadian Internet Registration Authority (CIRA)
Phone: 613-237-5335 ext: 294
Cell: 613-219-5328
melisa.db@cira.ca