New TLD Guidebook May Be Approved in March After All

New TLD supporters received good news today.

After what seemed like disappointing news last week, now things are looking up for potential new top level domain name applicants.

ICANN just released resolutions from its board meeting on January 25 and they indicate that ICANN plans to go forward with approving the applicant guidebook during the March meeting in San Francisco. The group plans to “trigger the Bylaws mandated consultation” with the Governmental Advisory Committee during the March meeting before the Friday board meeting.

That means we may see the application window for new TLDs open up in late summer and the first ones would likely to come online in 2012.

But this is a case where new TLD supporters surely won’t count their chickens before they hatch. They’ve already done a lot of counting to no avail.