CNMI gets payment for .mp use

The CNMI government has received some $4,000 payment from Saipan DataCom for its use of the dotMP (.mp) domain.

Gov. Juan N. Babauta, in a Feb. 23, 2005 memorandum to Finance Secretary Fermin Atalig, said the money is the initial payment from the company in accordance with the terms and conditions of the contract, which it signed earlier with the CNMI government.

He said the remittance represents the CNMI’s portion of the domain registration fees paid during the fourth quarter of Fiscal Year 2004.

“This is a positive indication that the contract will be very beneficial to the people of the CNMI,” Babauta said.

Likewise, he said the quarterly payments by Saipan Datacom to the CNMI treasury “are in addition to the many indirect benefits that will result in the utilization of the .mp domain registration by private businesses and other entities who access .mp website and register at http://get.mp.”

In a separate statement, the governor acknowledged that the government is “part-owner” of Saipan DataCom.

Saipan DataCom launched in October 2004 the dotMP, a complete Mobile Internet Content Platform that combines the newly available “.mp” Internet top-level domain with a suite of mobile content publishing tools that provides .mp domain name owners with both their own unique mobile Internet address and their own hosted mobile Internet site.

The .mp extension is the only existing TLD dedicated solely as the premiere address for mobile Internet sites. All .mp second-level domains display properly on mobile phones. dotMP solves the two fundamental problems that have plagued the mobile Internet by providing a readily recognizable mobile address and by automatically delivering properly formatted content for display on mobile phones. Users will easily equate .mp with the mobile Internet since “mp” is synonymous with “mobile phone.”

Each unique dotMP CS mobile site is hosted by Saipan DataCom, Inc. in alliance with SystemMetrics and Equinix. dotMP mobile sites are instantly generated at the conclusion of the domain name registration process and are immediately available for configuration and content input. dotMP employs a proprietary device detection system ensuring “Universal Mobile Content” or proper formatting and display of content on mobile phones and wireless devices around the world. The device detection system automatically recognizes the device requesting a dotMP mobile site and delivers content properly formatted for that particular device.

Saipan DataCom, Inc. is a Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands corporation. The CNMI is a US commonwealth and .mp is the CNMI’s country-code TLD. The company has been the administrator and registry for the .mp TLD since 1996. The .mp TLD was purposely held off the market while the Internet and mobile phone market sectors merged.