The domain namegov is thegeneric top-level domain used by government websites used in theUnited States at the federal, state, and local levels. It was one of the first top-level domains, made in January 1985.[1]
The U.S. is the only country that has a government-specific top-level domain in addition to itsccTLD. Other countries typically use a second-level domain for this purpose, e.g., .gov.au forAustralia, .gov.uk for theUnited Kingdom, .gc.ca forCanada, and .gouv.fr forFrance. Since the United States controls the .govTop Level Domain, it would be impossible for another country to create a domain ending in .gov, for example, .jp.gov.
Some U.S. federal agencies use .fed.us rather than .gov. TheDepartment of Defense and its subsidiary organizations use.mil. Some U.S. governmental entities use other domains, such as the use of.com domains by theUnited States Postal Service (usps.com) and theUnited States Army (goarmy.com).Internet purists consider these usages to be improper, as these are governmental or military entities rather than commercial ones.[2]
All governments in the U.S. are allowed to use .gov, such asatlantaga.gov for thecity ofAtlanta, andgeorgia.gov for theU.S. state ofGeorgia. This was not always true; under an earlier policy, only federalagencies were allowed to use the domain, and agencies beneath cabinet level were needed to use subdomains of their parent agency.
The usage of .gov as a gTLD controlled only by the U.S. is controversial, as some people believe this to be an example ofarrogance by the U.S. – such views hold that usage of .fed.us or a new second-level domain of .gov.us would be more suitable. Others believe that U.S. control of .gov is a natural result of the fact that the U.S. federal government was responsible for the initial creation of the Internet and its first user.
