HONG KONG, June 17 /PRNewswire/ --

- ".Asia" Hot-or-Not Contest First Weekly Prize Winning Domain: resorts.asia GMA2008.Asia Attracts Millions of Hits, Drives ".Asia" Adoption

DotAsia Organisation announced today total registration for ".Asia" domains are expected to exceed a quarter of a million by the end of the first quarter after its public launch. Proceeds from the ".Asia" Sunrise and Landrush auctions have already exceeded US$3M and rising, demonstrating strong demand and growth value for ".Asia" domains.

"Registrants competing for unique ".Asia" domain names in a fair and calm process is proof the auction mechanism is better for facilitating an orderly and stable introduction of the ".Asia" domain into the social and technical fabric of the Internet, than the chaotic first-come-first-serve model," says Edmon Chung, CEO of DotAsia. "We are equally excited that the ".Asia" auctions have already reached US$3M, with about two-thirds of Landrush auctions still to go." So far highest-priced auctions have reached beyond US$80,000, with top 100 averaging over US$10,000, including promotion.asia (US$26,000) and sushi.asia (US$22,500).

Earlier, DotAsia launched the Hot-or-Not Domain Appraisal Contest rewarding US$15,000 to anyone who identifies the domain fetching the highest auction price. Last week the first of 5 Weekly Prizes of US$1,000 found its winner. The winning contestant correctly identified the winning domain: "resorts.asia", and was most accurate in his appraisal for the winning price at US$20,000 (the actual price was US$22,501). While we congratulate the winner, the contest continues with 4 more Weekly Prizes of US$1,000 each and a Grand Prize of US$10,000. Enter to win, find expert opinions and check out the live auction ticker at: http://www.think.asia.

Adoption of the ".Asia" domain is showing signs of new vigour. Of the over 30,000 global brands registering their ".Asia" during Sunrise, many are beginning to setup Asia content on their site, e.g. sonyericsson.asia, levis.asia, oce.asia etc. Earlier Kenny G's Asia tour utilized http://www.KennyGLive.asia, while Stephen Chow's latest movie adopted the http://www.CJ7.asia web address. The latest to join this trend is GMA2008.asia, the official website for this year's Golden Melody Awards, the Grammies of Mandarin-pop music. The site houses an online poll for the hottest Chinese stars and is drawing millions of hits from fans across Asia. This means awareness of the ".Asia" domain for millions of users typing in http://www.GMA2008.asia to their browsers.

Media Contact: Pavan Budhrani Tel : +852-3741-0015 Web site: http://www.think.asia http://www.KennyGLive.asia http://www.CJ7.asia http://www.GMA2008.asia

Pavan Budhrani of DotAsia,+852-3741-0015