.cn = .中国 ... .com = .公司 ... .net = .网络

News that China was creating its own domain names that use Chinese characters has created quite a hubbub among techie types recently. Some of the controversy was a misunderstanding, apparently, but some are still worried that China is somehow circumventing "the system." Shanghaiist is not a techie, so we defer to those who know more about this. (But we always found it a little odd that those who don't speak or read English had to write URLs in "English" to surf the web.) Here are some links that will either clear up some confusion regarding this topic, or cause more confusion:

China's New Domain Names: Lost in Translation (Rebecca MacKinnon)
New Chinese TLDs (Steven J. Murdoch)
Did China Create Its Own Domain Names? (PC World)
China's Ministry of Information Industry revamps Internet domain names system (Interfax)
China gives itself its own top-level domains (arstechnica.com)
China creates own Net domains: Bypass of US control stirs fear of censorship (Boston Globe)