.furry

Mission "Furry" is a common English adjective meaning "covered with, or resembling fur", and is also widely used as a noun to identify members of the furry fandom, a creative community centered around anthropomorphic animal art and characters. Furries have been part of the fabric of the online world since before the World Wide Web, between many generations of technology. A Furry TLD cements our place in the foundations of the internet and provides a domain where our community can congregate. The mission of the .furry TLD is to establish an easily recognized and accessible namespace for this dynamic group, and for anyone who identifies with the term. Purpose The .furry TLD will be operated with open-registration by Pawprint Prototyping, a California 501(c)(3) Nonprofit. Any individual, artist, convention, hackerspace, small business, community group, or other lawful entity will be able to register a second-level domain in .furry on a first-come, first-served basis, subject to ICANN Consensus Policies and the registry's published code of conduct. There will be no eligibility criteria that limit registrations exclusively to Pawprint Prototyping or its Affiliates, consistent with Section 3(d) of Specification 11 of the Base Registry Agreement. Intended registrants and users The .furry TLD is intended for use by anyone who wishes to identify with the term “furry”, including but not limited to: Individual furry creators (artists, writers, musicians, fursuit makers, streamers, developers, etc.) who wish to publish under a furry namespace. Conventions, meets, and regional groups that need durable namespaces for events, registration systems, and community services. Volunteer-run community infrastructure: Mastodon instances, Matrix homeservers, Git forges, wikis, fediverse relays, MUCKs and MUDs, etc. Small businesses and artist collectives. Charitable and mutual-aid initiatives: fundraisers, emergency assistance, animal and civic welfare partnerships, harm-reduction coalitions, etc. Any other lawful registrant that finds value in a .furry domain. Activities to achieve the mission Before delegation, Pawprint Prototyping has: Been accepted into ICANN's Applicant Support Program (ASP), securing the fee reduction that makes a community-led application viable. Publicly documented the project at dotfurry.org and conducted a crowdfunding campaign whose more than 800 backers demonstrate the demand for a furry-community namespace. Committed to working with a pre-evaluated Registry Service Provider (RSP) to plan and deliver back-end registry services under an appropriately scoped agreement. After delegation, Pawprint Prototyping will: Operate .furry through an ICANN-approved back-end RSP with full DNSSEC support and Registration Data Access Protocol (RDAP) compliance. Publish and enforce an Acceptable Use Policy and an abuse-handling policy consistent with the Base RA, the applicable DNS Abuse provisions, and Consensus Policies. Reinvest surplus registration revenue into (i) supporting furry and LGBTQIA+ organizations and spaces, (ii) the ongoing educational mission of Pawprint Prototyping, and (iii) further work toward digital sovereignty within the community. Sustainability over time The mission is designed to be sustainable in three ways. First, Pawprint Prototyping's non-profit structure removes the pressure to maximise short-term registrant extraction: surplus is reinvested rather than distributed to shareholders. Second, the registry is built on a pre-evaluated RSP and industry-standard fee model, so operating costs scale predictably with registrations. Third, governance is vested in a Board of Directors accountable as a 501(c)(3) non-profit and to the organization's members, not in any individual stakeholders, ensuring institutional continuity.