London to get own web address, .london
London is joining a host of cities applying for their own Web domain, so you'll instantly know where the address is registered.
Cor blimey, love a duck. Laahndahn taahn is applying for its own Web domain. This means pretty soon you could see .london instead of .com or .co.uk at the end of a url, so you'll know instantly the site you're visiting is based in the capital.
London & Partners, the city's official promotional agency, announced it will apply for the .london domain, the Telegraph reports. Applications to licence such a top-level Web domain, as they're called, have to be in by April 2012, or those from London & Partners (who we're guessing will be dressed as Pearly Kings and Queens) will be sent skulking back down the apples and pears.
But don't expect to be seeing .london too soon. Consultations will take up to 20 months from the deadline, so it could be pushing 2014 before we see any cockerney websites. Other cities have also expressed an interest in applying for their domains, including New York, Paris, Sydney, Rome and Berlin.
Boris Johnson, the bumbling Beano character who moonlights as Mayor of London, is working with London & Partners to identify benefits, as well as consulting London boroughs to see how they could use the domain. They're also working on a business model.
BoJo is keen to see "a greater use of the digital world to deliver more effective public services for the city". The .london domain would be a "potential opportunity to build on London's position as a global centre for digital innovation," according to the mop-topped one.
Johnson recently said the Olympics would place "maximum strain" on the capital's phone networks, with 80 million people expected to be using their phones at 100 different sporting events next summer.
The .xxx domain recently went live, prompting companies to snap up their name followed by .xxx to prevent anyone besmirching their reputation. Or so they said.
Do you want to see a .london domain? And what's the most obscure cockney rhyming slang you've ever heard? Let us know in the comments section below on our Facebook wall.