fadi chehade

The Public Diplocast is back with a new episode featuring a talk by Fadi Chehadé, digital economy expert who spoke at CPD's "PD for the Digital Future" event in Washington, D.C.

Fadi Chehadé is selected by UN Secretary-General as one of 20 independent experts serving on the Panel.

Earlier this month, the US Commerce Department announced a plan to back away from its last direct involvement in running the Internet. The man who made that decision, Lawrence Strickling, sees the government's role today as merely "clerical," but letting go of even that sends an important symbolic message: The Internet is all grown up now.

Starting next week, the Internet is going to look very different -- and ICANN Chief Executive Fadi Chehade is the one who'll get both the credit and the blame. Today, Net addresses end with 22 familiar terms -- .com, .net, and .edu -- called generic top-level domains (GTLDs). But starting Feb. 4, the first of hundreds of new GTLDs will begin arriving -- .ninja, .farm, .shoes, .photography, .bike, .pink, and even .wtf.