A domain suffix (gTLD) exlusively for Riga, the capital of Latvia; think:
live.riga (now: liveriga.com)
police.riga / pasvaldiba.riga (now: pasvaldiba.riga.lv)
airport.riga / lidosta.riga (now: riga-airport.com)
112.riga (the emergency services in Riga)
Depending on the ICANN Policy Development Process in 2026/2027 only for the 2nd time in history after 2012 entities will be able to apply for new domain suffixes at ICANN.
.riga will be a community based new gTLD application by SIA dotRIGA; a Latvian public-benefit, non-profit entity broadly owned by a large number of stakeholders representing Riga's community. The Riga city council and the Latvian Government will be eligible to use a wide array of .riga domain names for free.
A city name based gTLD like .riga needs to be closely managed and supervised by the targeted community: the stakeholder groups that are representing the economical, cultural and political aspects of the city. Example being the distribution of premium keyword based domain names:
shopping.riga, hotels.riga, tickets.riga or apartments.riga! These and thousands of other impacting domain names should be allocated in a way that leads to the creation of brand awareness for the new gTLD ".riga" - and not simply auctioned off to the highest bidder who might treat them as an "investment opportunity" rather then developing a thriving website that would serve as a brand ambassador for ".riga" - and with it for the city of Riga. Other examples are the 58 neighborhoods of the city; e.g. Vecriga, Centrs, Jugla, Imanta or Agenskalns. Domains like agenskalns.riga or jugla.riga should be carefully allocated to entities which will be using them in a way that will be benefiting the citizens and visitors of Riga.
Over the next several month interested parties will find together and form a working group that will periodically meet and discuss the future policies for .riga. The ownership of the project will be broadly distributed. A policy and advisory board will be formed over time. Sponsors are welcome - .riga will be a non-profit project and relies on contributions. Eventually funds will be raised in order to pay for necessary staff, management and finally the ICANN application.
SIA dotRIGA, Riga, Latvia
Web: www.dotRIGA.org TWITTER: twitter.com/dotRIGA Facebook: fb.com/dotRIGA
The website is maintained in English in order to dis-encourage portfolio city applicants from applying for .riga! Over time we will offer a Latvian version as well. The project has been initiated by city-gTLD veteran Alexander Schubert; a native of Berlin; co-founder of ".berlin" (see. www.schubert.berlin); based in Riga since May 2006. An advisory and policy board will be introduced soon and the leadership of the .riga project will be of course Latvian.
For more information please send an email to alexander.schubert@dotRIGA.org or call +371-26633466