Some time ago we had a post about the possibility countries of Great Britain could have their own top level domain. For Scotland this option looks like a certainty now after the First Minister of Scotland, Alex Salmond MSP expressed his support to the campaign.

He mentioned that the .SCO (or .SCOT) domain names would be a good choice not only for the people of Scotland but also for the Scots living abroad. Especially it would matter if ICANN approved the new TLD in 2009 – it is going to be the official Come Home Year for Scots.

The campaign for Scots own domain name was launched back in 2005. Initially it was proposed to use .SCO extension for the new TLD but as time passed many people felt that .SCOT would be more appropriate. If you consider the pronunciation of .SCO, it could really be confused for .CO; the recent proposition makes more sense. There is nothing wrong with 4-letter domain name extensions. The internet already has .INFO, .MOBI, .NAME and others. A public poll that was carried out as part of a research shown that 59% of respondents supported .SCOT while only 14% would prefer .SCO.

Now the Scottish domain name concept looks more and more real than before. The Scottish Government has already created a dedicated working group that deals with technical and administrative questions. dotSCO campaign is helping to prepare the necessary documentation to submit an application at the nearest ICANN meeting, possibly as early as March 01, 2009.