.Za Alternative Dispute Resolution Regulations: The First Few SAIIPL Decisions: Lex Informatica Conference, 21St-23rd May 2008 Pretoria, South Africa

1 South African Domain Name Administration & Zadna (1) South Africa's domain name system has grown very informally since the Internet made its first appearance in the country in 1980s when the .za domain-name space was administered by UNINET (Vecciatto, 2007). The idea that an independent Domain Name Authority be established for South Africa was first raised in a discussion paper in 1999. The next year this was formally raised as a governmental policy in the Green Paper (2000) of the Department of Communications http://www.ecomm-debate.co.za . The proposal was met with disbelief and it was vehemently opposed by the Namespace ZA (2002), the industry stakeholder. The South African government remained convinced that its involvement in the .za DNS was crucial for the emerging information economy. The government believed that the policy-formulation process in the ICT arena should be inclusive of all stakeholders. The view was also expressed that the new economy, like all other free-market economies, is not perfect and therefore requires the government's intervention, particularly in the formulation of policy, to extend services to both public institutions and citizens who wish to access such services (Green Paper, 2000).