Tim W (admin (and human)) on Nostr: feld npub1p4gre…w8pte Tucows didn't become an ICANN-accredited domain registrar ...

feld (npub1yck…ujmw) npub1p4grecmvu25lzglljlq3dcqu0vxchmet9ua432fqt8cn9e9smhrqww8pte (npub1p4g…8pte) Tucows didn't become an ICANN-accredited domain registrar until 1999. Before that they were all about software distribution (and still were afterward, for a while).

Technically competition was allowed as of October 1998, but functionally 1999 is when ICANN actually started accrediting registrars.