Please create an account to participate in the Slashdot moderation system

 



Forgot your password?
typodupeerror
×
The Internet Technology

The Nations of the Amazon Want the Name Back (bbc.com) 85

Online retail giant Amazon and the governments of eight South American countries have been given a final deadline to reach an agreement over how to use the ".amazon" web address extension after a seven-year dispute. From a report: What will happen next? It's a name that evokes epic proportions: the world's largest rainforest; a global tech company; and now a diplomatic saga nearing its end. This is the battle of the Amazon and it starts back in 2012. The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), the body that polices the world wide web's address system, decided to expand its list of generic top-level domains (gTLD) - the bit that comes after the dot in a web address. The new rules allowed companies to apply for brand new extensions, offering internet users and businesses more ways to personalise their website name and addresses. But eight countries containing the Amazon rainforest objected to the retail giant's plans concerning the new .amazon domain name.
This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.

The Nations of the Amazon Want the Name Back

Comments Filter:
  • Jeff Bezos had this problem all worked out until his wife got the money he was going to use to buy those countries outright.
  • Still dumb (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday April 05, 2019 @12:38PM (#58390726)
    I still think all these new TLDs are a stupid idea.
    • I still think all these new TLDs are a stupid idea.

      I agree completely. Now that *.tld and *.*.tld are no longer enough, we have *.*.*

      Might as well just get rid of the dots entirely.

    • Chuck out the gTLDs. Yes, all of them. Go to using ccTLDs only. This very clearly defines jurisdictions in which to settle disputes. Countries can manage their TLDs any way they like. Tuvalu wants to make a buck selling *.tv to all comers? Let 'em. North Korea wants to limit *.kp to only government-approved outlets? More power to them. Some huge megacorp wants to flaunt a global online presence? They can jolly well negotiate for a name with each individual country's TLD.

      Works out for everyone. Well, ex

    • Of course it is, it's revenue farming.

      Cocacola.com will of COURSE not let cocacola.amazon fall into anyone's hands, so essentially opening a new TLD means all the big name domains are nearly guaranteed to simply cough up the $ to grab their same moniker on all the new TLDs. It's like free money.

  • by Rick Schumann ( 4662797 ) on Friday April 05, 2019 @12:45PM (#58390792) Journal
    Or something similar. Problem solved.
  • by Experiment 626 ( 698257 ) on Friday April 05, 2019 @12:49PM (#58390814)
    The near eastern warrior women were Amazons a couple millennia before some web site was founded or rivers in the New World started getting European names.
  • by RLBrown ( 889443 ) on Friday April 05, 2019 @12:50PM (#58390820) Homepage
    Traditionally, TLDs have been used to either designate a general usage category, e.g. commercial, education, military, government, and so forth, or designate a geographic area of origin, e.g. us, ch, de, and so forth. The geographical designator has been abused, for example, the use of the "tv" designation. However, if we keep with this tradition, then obviously the "amazon" domain can only refer to the geographical region of Themyscira, which by a very long period predates the usage in southern new world continent.
  • Peers (Score:5, Insightful)

    by jythie ( 914043 ) on Friday April 05, 2019 @12:56PM (#58390850)
    It is always kinda scary to see individual companies acting as peers or even superiors to entire nations like this. The idea of a single private entity getting an entire gTLD for its own private use instead of it going to a general usage or geographic region should have been laughed out of the suggestion box. While I am not surprised that ICANN seriously entertained the idea, I am annoyed.
    • Depends. Did they attempt to register it? Or are they just upset that someone else did and registered in protest. Frankly a rainforest does not deserve a donation name over an internet giant. And conversely the same applies to Amazon if they wanted to build a distribution centre in the actual Amazon.

    • see here [wikipedia.org]. It's been like this since trade became a thing.
  • Do any of those Amazonian countries offer 2-day prime shipping? I think not.

  • Longest river in the world, #1!

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]

  • so there's a bunch of Spanish and Portuguese speaking countries that want to have the English spelling in their TLD? why don't they fight over .amazonas or .amazona?
  • Anyone can have a gTLD.

    You could apply for, and receive, *.jythie if you want.

    Why? Because its a money making scheme, that's why. gTLDs force companies down this path where they either try to protect their trademark or have it trampled over. In return registrars generate millions of dollars registering gTLDs that aren't even used

Truly simple systems... require infinite testing. -- Norman Augustine

Working...