Turkish company offers Ottoman domain names

ISTANBUL – Anadolu Agency

Turkey’s recent plans to revive the Ottoman language have found a surprising new outlet, as an Istanbul-based company is now offering Ottoman-related domain names and hosting services.

“Catch the Ottoman trend,” reads one advertisement, featuring a Turkish sultan sitting on a sofa telling the viewer to “Register in no time.”

The company, isimtescil.net, offers various options to register "Ottoman domain names." The IT company was founded in 1998 and is one of the 500 biggest companies in Turkey, claiming to have registered more than 1 million names so far.

Turkey’s National Education Council decided over the weekend that Ottoman-language classes would be compulsory for religious high schools and elective for other high schools.

The decision sparked a national debate, with President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu standing behind the council’s decision after opposition leaders criticized the move.

The modern-day Turkish language is a revised and standardized version of the tongue used during the Ottoman period, which had used the Arabic script when written down. The Latin script was adopted in 1928 as a part of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk’s modernization efforts.