Groups representing US authors and publishers on Monday called on the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) to deny online retailer Amazon.com Inc’s exclusive rights to Web sites ending with .book, .author or .read.
ICANN is considering nearly 2,000 requests for new Web address endings, ranging from the general (.shop) to the highly specialized (.motorcycles).
Many of the requests are from large companies such as Apple Inc, Mitsubishi Group and IBM Corp — with Internet giant Google Inc alone applying for more than 100, including .google, .YouTube and .lol — Internet slang for “laugh out loud.”
Seattle-based Amazon, maker of Kindle tablets, has applied for generic top-level domains such as .book, .author and .read.
“We strongly object to ICANN’s plans to sell the exclusive top-level domain rights for generic book industry terms,” Authors Guild president Scott Turow said in a filed objection.
“Placing such generic domains in private hands is plainly anticompetitive, allowing already dominant, well capitalized companies to expand and entrench their market power,” Turow said. “The potential for abuse seems limitless.”
The guild represents more than 8,000 published authors in the US.
In its stated opposition to Amazon getting control of .book, the Association of American Publishers said the Internet retailer has expressed its intent to tightly control the domain in pursuit of its business goals.
“Granting exclusive control of a closed registry to any one entity, especially a private company interested in exploiting the domain solely for business purposes, does a disservice to ICANN’s broader intents,” the association’s general counsel Allan Adler said on the group’s Web site.
The objections came as Google sent word to ICANN that it is revising its applications for .app, .blog, .cloud and .search to domains to indicate Google would make those addresses available for others.
“We understand that there is particular sensitivity within the Internet community about certain broad terms that serve as industry descriptors,” Google chief information officer Ben Fried said in comments e-mailed to ICANN and posted in a forum on ICANN.org. “The best user experience for these broad industry terms likely include the opportunity for users to access a variety of service providers.”
Google said it still endorsed the plan for “close generic” domain names and called for the ICANN approval process to proceed “unfettered.”
California-based ICANN says the huge expansion of the Internet, which has 2 billion users around the world, half of which are in Asia, means new names are essential.
There are currently just 22 generic top-level domains in use, including .com and .org.
To many, Tatu City on the outskirts of Nairobi looks like a success. The first city entirely built by a private company to be operational in east Africa, with about 25,000 people living and working there, it accounts for about two-thirds of all foreign investment in Kenya. Its low-tax status has attracted more than 100 businesses including Heineken, coffee brand Dormans, and the biggest call-center and cold-chain transport firms in the region. However, to some local politicians, Tatu City has looked more like a target for extortion. A parade of governors have demanded land worth millions of dollars in exchange
Hong Kong authorities ramped up sales of the local dollar as the greenback’s slide threatened the foreign-exchange peg. The Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA) sold a record HK$60.5 billion (US$7.8 billion) of the city’s currency, according to an alert sent on its Bloomberg page yesterday in Asia, after it tested the upper end of its trading band. That added to the HK$56.1 billion of sales versus the greenback since Friday. The rapid intervention signals efforts from the city’s authorities to limit the local currency’s moves within its HK$7.75 to HK$7.85 per US dollar trading band. Heavy sales of the local dollar by
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co’s (TSMC, 台積電) revenue jumped 48 percent last month, underscoring how electronics firms scrambled to acquire essential components before global tariffs took effect. The main chipmaker for Apple Inc and Nvidia Corp reported monthly sales of NT$349.6 billion (US$11.6 billion). That compares with the average analysts’ estimate for a 38 percent rise in second-quarter revenue. US President Donald Trump’s trade war is prompting economists to retool GDP forecasts worldwide, casting doubt over the outlook for everything from iPhone demand to computing and datacenter construction. However, TSMC — a barometer for global tech spending given its central role in the
An Indonesian animated movie is smashing regional box office records and could be set for wider success as it prepares to open beyond the Southeast Asian archipelago’s silver screens. Jumbo — a film based on the adventures of main character, Don, a large orphaned Indonesian boy facing bullying at school — last month became the highest-grossing Southeast Asian animated film, raking in more than US$8 million. Released at the end of March to coincide with the Eid holidays after the Islamic fasting month of Ramadan, the movie has hit 8 million ticket sales, the third-highest in Indonesian cinema history, Film
RSS