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Tuesday, March 12, 2013

Books Publishers Don't Want Amazon to Own .book

Posted by Paul Constant on Tue, Mar 12, 2013 at 1:18 PM

The Authors Guild and the Association of American Publishers, worried that Amazon will use new internet names like “.book” and “.author” to gain more power in the publishing industry, are asking the agency that assigns control of those names to refrain from giving them to a private entity...Both Amazon and Google have paid to obtain the right to run hundreds of new names though it’s still unclear what the companies intend to do with them. Google has indicated it will keep suffixes related to its core business, such as “.goog” or “.search,” for its private use while making others like “.store” and “.dog” open to anyone. Amazon, which also wants to run names like “.kindle” and “.movie” declined to respond to the Wall Street Journal’s request for comment.

This will come as a shock to many of you, I know, but I side with the publishers on this one. Assuming that these custom suffixes take off in popularity, allowing one company to own something as simple as .book could be almost as bad as giving one publisher the trademark to the word "book," and punishing other publishers for using the term to describe their product.

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On behalf of Greece, I don't want them to own .amazon either.

Posted by Will in Seattle

on March 12, 2013 at 1:24 PM

That'd be like Microsoft patenting ones and zeros...

http://www.theonion.com/articles/microso…

Posted by Urgutha Forka on March 12, 2013 at 2:03 PM

Uh... the Greeks have no particular reason to feel protective of the "amazon" brand, Will.

Posted by rob!

on March 12, 2013 at 3:12 PM

I look forward to the day when fights over particular domains seem as relevant as adding multiple "A's" to the name of your business in an effort to appear first in the phone book.

Posted by yelahneb

on March 12, 2013 at 3:12 PM

Categorical domain names are stupid. Categorical TLDs are just as stupid. If this was a big issue, you'd think they'd already be fighting over "book.com". Oh, wait, that belongs to Barnes & Noble -- but nobody cares. Remember when that guy paid $3 million for "vodka.com", or that other idiot paid twice that for "business.com"? Again, nobody gives a flying fuck. "Sex.com" sold for $16 mil a few years ago; value? FUCK ALL.

The domain names that matter were built up from stupid-sounding non-generic names that someone made up and then built a business around, names like amazon.com, google.com, facebook.com. But you have to have a business to go with; remember the fiasco around "boo.com"?

This is just the new internet gold rush with no gold. Nobody gives a crap what your domain is. There is a bit of a premium for short ones, like bit.ly, youtu.be, and whatnot, because of Twitter's character limit, but the only people who give a shit about .book or .author or .whateverthefuck are marketdroids trying to drive up their consulting fees.

Want a good book domain? Build a good book business. Want a good author domain? WRITE BOOKS PEOPLE WANT TO READ. They will find your page, even if it ends in .totaldickheadwhenitcomestointernet.

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