But before an overseer can sell its name to a registrar, it has to determine who will be eligible to use the name and provide the technology that will enable the domain to function.

WSJ: The Race to Nab Web Addresses

From a technical standpoint, CloudFlare offers authoritative DNS, a function of the domain name system that Web sites use to identify themselves on the Internet, with a twist.

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With applications for nearly 2, 000 new domain names outstanding, each one of which will function as a miniature .com registry under the control of the winning bidder, the new territories will be exponentially harder to monitor than the existing world of .com, .edu, .gov and a handful of generics like .travel and .museum.

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