Generic TLDs are great for institutions with true international presence. Microsoft may be based in the US, but they have tons of employees and customers nearly everywhere so it makes sense to have a generic TLD. Same goes for non-profits like UNICEF, WWF, etc.
What about accredited four-year post-secondary institutions? Sure, plenty of universities have an overseas campus or two, but these institutions really belong under country code TLDs. Cambridge is in the UK, Harvard is in the US, Todai is in Japan.
So, what's the purpose of .edu? It's a legacy domain. US colleges and universities were a significant chunk of the internet in its early days; for years it was mostly college students and professors who had internet access. Since URLs shouldn't change, we're not going to ditch it, and for uniformity, we'll keep giving out .edu addresses according to the same old policies.
(Yes, a few grandfathered .edu domains don't fit the criteria. There are random institutions like museums and high schools in there.)
Comments
Generic TLDs are great for institutions with true international presence. Microsoft may be based in the US, but they have tons of employees and customers nearly everywhere so it makes sense to have a generic TLD. Same goes for non-profits like UNICEF, WWF, etc.
What about accredited four-year post-secondary institutions? Sure, plenty of universities have an overseas campus or two, but these institutions really belong under country code TLDs. Cambridge is in the UK, Harvard is in the US, Todai is in Japan.
So, what's the purpose of .edu? It's a legacy domain. US colleges and universities were a significant chunk of the internet in its early days; for years it was mostly college students and professors who had internet access. Since URLs shouldn't change, we're not going to ditch it, and for uniformity, we'll keep giving out .edu addresses according to the same old policies.
(Yes, a few grandfathered .edu domains don't fit the criteria. There are random institutions like museums and high schools in there.)