Foes Line Up Against Amazon’s Domain Desires [Report]

Two publishing industry groups and rival bookseller Barnes & Noble have filed objections over Amazon.com’s request to own several new, generic, top-level domains (gTLDs), according to a Wall Street Journal report.

The paper says the Authors Guild, the Association of American Publishers and Barnes & Noble have all told the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) that Amazon shouldn’t be allowed to own domain spaces like .book, .read and .author.

“Placing such generic domains in private hands is plainly anticompetitive,” wrote Scott Turow, Authors Guild president, to the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, or ICANN, the nonprofit that oversees the world’s Internet domain names. “The potential for abuse seems limitless.”

Rival book retailer Barnes & Noble Inc. BKS +0.79% also opposes Amazon’s request, arguing in an objection filed with ICANN that the Seattle-based company could use control of the new Internet names “to stifle competition in the bookselling and publishing industries, which are critical to the future of copyrighted expression in the U.S.”

ICANN is in the process of expanding the domain space with what could be hundreds of new gTLDs. During the now-complete request process, ICANN received 1,930 requests for new domains — including some from Google, Microsoft, Apple and Yahoo. A company called Donuts Inc. applied for 307 new gTLDs.

Amazon was the third largest bidder with 75 applications.

Neither Amazon nor ICANN commented to the Wall Street Journal on the objections filed over some of Amazon’s applications.