The Race Is on for .Gay Web Space

The CEO of DotGay LLC is one of many businesspeople from around the world who will converge in San Francisco this week to determine the future of the Internet.

DotGay LLC, headed by CEO Scott Seitz, is a company looking to build a network of 300,000 websites with addresses like PeopleOfColor.gay and Intersex.gay, according to its own website. The DotGay initiative would require sites to be run for social good, saying they "cannot be operated as just a 'marketing platform' or a piece of real estate to be subdivided based solely on economic imperatives."

The nonprofit Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, or ICANN, regulates the sale and classification of top-level domains like .com and .net. Others up for grabs at the .nxt conference in San Francisco February 8-10 include .eco, .sport, and .god.

According toThe Washington Post, organizations such as the Human Rights Campaign and the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation are backing his cause. Seitz says he already sees the possibility for antigay organizations or individuals to fight the growth of the .gay network of sites.

"I've already told people to get steel doors and window bars for security to protect against anti-gay organizations that wouldn't want dot-gay to happen," he told the Post.