Most commercial real estate companies and even many hard-core web surfers have never heard of the LA-based Internet Corp. for Assigned Names and Numbers. But ICANN wields vast power over the Internet, in part because it's responsible for approving or rejecting changes to the worldwide web's addressing system.

At a meeting that wrapped up here over the weekend, the group approved the use of web addresses that end with .biz, .name, .info and .pro. Also approved were .museum, .aero and .coop.

The decision took three years to make. It is designed to relieve overcrowding on the web, where seemingly every conceivable address--more than 25 million in all--that could possibly end with .com, .net or .org has been taken.