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To those Firefox users wondering why the http://xn--4gbrim.xn----rmckbbajlc6dj7bxne2c.xn--wgbh1c/ar/default.aspx link in TFA didn't display non-ASCII characters in the address bar...

Yes, Firefox supports International Domain Names, but there's a bunch of Whitelist Preferences in about:config that control which TLD's will work. The .xn--wgbh1c isn't in there, so you need to make sure you have the following preferences:

1. Check existing preference" network.enableIDN : boolean = true
2. Check existing preference" network.IDN_show_punycode : boolean = false
3. Create new preference: network.IDN.whitelist.xn--wgbh1c : boolean = true

Extra hint: Changing the preference will not affect currently-open tabs and windows.

Here you go: http://xn--4gbrim.xn----rmckbbajlc6dj7bxne2c.xn--wgbh1c/ar/default.aspx

This is equivalent to http://mcit.gov.eg/ except it directs you to the English webpages instead of the Arabic webpages.
Notice teh directory structure after the last slash.
one thing to notice in the TLD above, which is in Arabic, is that the TLD happens to be 3 letters the arabic equivalent of MSR (which is egypt)

The other TLDs mentioned in the ICANN blog are much longer:
Egypt: (Egypt)
Saudi Arabia: (AlSaudiah)
United Arab Emirates: (Emarat)

I was wondering why they arrived at this decision and then I read this document: http://arabic-domains.org/docs/NIC-docs/SupportingArabicDomainNmaes.pdf which seems to explain the logic behind the choice.
It is still a lot to type though, so if i have the choice, I'll use latin domain names.

Interesting that a language that is read right-to-left has a scrolling ticker that goes left-to-right... http://xn--4gbrim.xn----rmckbbajlc6dj7bxne2c.xn--wgbh1c/ar/default.aspx

Not all of the link on the blog seems to be rendering correctly: http://xn--4gbrim.xn----rmckbbajlc6dj7bxne2c.xn--wgbh1c/ar/default.aspx. I can make out most of it, but what does that "aspx" code at the end mean?

It would be strange for (in that case) some Arabic TLD to 1) render correctly in a browser of a non-Arabic speaker, and 2) to have Latin characters in the domain name itself and 3) still manage to look correct in RTL scripts.

Think of how many programs you use that display clickable links. Imagine how many of them will get bug reports that non-Latin links "don't look right". Of those, a lot of authors will use heuristics to detect and handle non-Latin TLDs, like if (link.tld.contains('-')) { fancyRTLDisplayLink(link); } else { displayLink(link); }. One of the examples from the article (I just skimmed it! Don't cast me out!) was http://xn--4gbrim.xn----rmckbbajlc6dj7bxne2c.xn--wgbh1c/ar/default.aspx . Suppose that was http://moc.tfosorcim.xn--wgbh1c/ and that clickable link was detected as non-Latin and helpfully rendered prettily for our non-English-speaking friends.

So the big guys - Firefox, Chrome, (possibly) IE, Outlook - might get it right. What about your IM client?

Except there *IS* an escape sequence. And the actual representation is in standard latin alphabets.

Would you ever visit this website if you saw it in an e-mail?
http://xn--4gbrim.xn----rmckbbajlc6dj7bxne2c.xn--wgbh1c/ar/default.aspx

Because I sure as shit wouldn't.
It looks like a scammer's wet dream.

Support for Unicode URLs is already available in Google Chrome (5.0.375.29 beta). The Arabic URL is: http:///.-. Chrome will display it on my Ubuntu 10.04 machine as: http:///.-./ar/default.aspx However, in Mozilla Firefox 3.6.3, the URL will be shown as: http://xn--4gbrim.xn----rmckbbajlc6dj7bxne2c.xn--wgbh1c/ar/default.aspx I have a standard Ubuntu 10.04 installation (no extra language packs or whatever).

For those that don't feel like making that extra click, here is what my browser turned that link into: http://xn--4gbrim.xn----rmckbbajlc6dj7bxne2c.xn--wgbh1c/ar/default.aspx

Seems to work across FF, IE, and Chrome.

Yes you can slashdot them, but you cannot show a correct text-. Yet...

The linked ICANN blog suggests http://xn----rmckbbajlc6dj7bxne2c.xn--wgbh1c/ as an example.

Here you go: http://xn--4gbrim.xn----rmckbbajlc6dj7bxne2c.xn--wgbh1c/ar/default.aspx