In a letter sent from the BRAZILIAN EMBASSY in Washington today to ICANN, the Committee on Foreign Affairs and National Defense of the Brazilian Senate formally opposed the application of Amazon to the new gTLD .Amazon
I would love to know the number of domain holders, brand holders and Internet based company that are located in the Amazon forest in Brazil.
I can’t image that the Amazon region is a hot bed of active internet businesses, but it appears Brazil is going to hold Amazon’s feet to the fire.
I’m not from Brazil and have never been to the Amazon, but as a guy from Brooklyn it looks pretty clear that if Amazon really wants the .Amazon gTLD they need to go make friends down there, spread the wealth, and pay the powers that be, to get those in charge to sign off.
in the meantime here is the official resolution translated into English:
FEDERAL SENATE OF BRAZIL
RESOLUTION (REQUEST) NO. 73 OF 2013
Pursuant to internal regulations, I hereby request that the Federal Senate’s Committee on Foreign Relations and National Defense forward to ICANN a formal statement in opposition to Amazon Inc.’s plan to register the top-level domain name “.amazon“ without the proper consent of Amazon countries.
JUSTIFICATION
Amazon Inc., founded in 1994 and headquartered in Seattle, WA, requested ICANN (company responsible for IP address allocation, protocol assignment and domain name for the Internet) 76 gTLDs, which means a generic top-level domain that requires not only prior authorization from ICANN but also, in some cases, consent from the countries to which it refers.
The aforementioned company intends to formally obtain the AMAZON domain, which would only be used by the company and its subsidiaries for the purpose of achieving its strategic corporate goals. This is to say that the company wishes to maintain exclusive domain over generic and subjective words that directly affect commerce elsewhere on the Internet.
In view of the foregoing, on November 15, 2012, Brazil and Peru filed an early warning with GAC/ICANN regarding the gTLD “.amazon”, with support from Bolivia, Ecuador, Guyana, and Argentina. This was done because the registration of such an Internet domain that refers to the natural resources and the public heritage of Amazon countries would also impose a permanent restriction on domains that refer to the Amazon and the customs of peoples in that region.
The statement also included a warning at the Fourth Ministerial Conference on the Information Society in Latin America and the Caribbean, which was held in Montevideo, May 3-5, 2013.
In view of the actions that have been carried out by member countries of the Amazon Cooperation Treaty Organization (ACTO) in support of the Amazon region, I request that this Committee formally forward to ICANN a statement in opposition to Amazon Inc.’s intention, for the purpose of assisting the representatives of Brazil and the other Amazon countries in the discussions on this topic.
I agree, yes as a Company Amazon.com I understand and many other country codes,
but .amazon is wrong on many fronts.
it would be the same for if a company applied for .anzacs
due to the history of NZ and Australia.
Derek
How do you compare one of the top 5 internet retailers in the world to something no one has ever heard of
I Have no stake in the game I don’t own a share of Amazon.com but clearly the government is trying to extort money out of the company for its agreement to allow the new gTLD.
How many internet users are there in the territory known as the Amazon?
How many Internet business are based in the Amazon
none is close
Agree that objections to .Amazon are BS.
The only ‘Amazon’ anyone in Brazil knows is the internet retailer.
The region is known as ‘Amazonas’
Both are originated from Greek.
Maybe Greece can object to Brazil naming the river after their mythology
I don’t read it as being an attempt to extort money from Amazon Inc at all.
There are some whose view of our world can be described as being very insular, at best.
Mike, I love your blog but this time I don’t agree at all. Amazon, hundreds or thousands of years before the Internet was invented, was (and still is) the world’s largest forest, also referred to as the “World’s Lungs” which alone produces more than 20% of the Earth’s oxygen. The least we can do to preserve this essential resource to life on our planet and spread awareness about the fact it’s in danger with all possible means (including the most powerful one called the Internet) is considering to dedicate a gTLD to it.
As you said, the company is among the Internet’s 5 largest retailers, plus it already owns the .com and most of the ccTLDs of the countries it operates in: it really doesn’t need the new gTLD in order to be successful.
surely the brazilian Amazon is born before Amazon.com 🙂
Brazil isn’t alone in this. Peru, Bolivia, Ecuador, Guyana, and Argentina also support that objection and if you know how to read the original document, you’ll find out that all countries were invited to send the same kind of letter to icann, which i believe they will anytime soon.
6 different countries make it pretty damn international to me.
But in the real world why does the Amazon Rain Forest Need protection in the domain name space
I think ICANN will yield …
There’s still rationale to reject the advice, but the heat is certainly rising.
Different spelling, different pronunciation. Different Meaning.
I like it. Global companies that use generic words can’t always get things their own way.
Think in terms of Tourism (mainly of English speaking origin)…
The image results split down the middle.
https://www.google.com/search?q=amazon&psj=1&bav=on.2,or.r_cp.r_qf.&bvm=bv.53760139,d.eWU,pv.xjs.s.en_US.1iFepK0GFHA.O&biw=1280&bih=639&dpr=1&um=1&ie=UTF-8&hl=en&tbm=isch&source=og&sa=N&tab=wi&ei=UrdWUveGIsKKqwH-h4HIBg
Who do you favor 1 single (‘argueably ‘greedy’) company or a large community of countries…?
Who is looking bad?
Like Tom said “the heat is rising”
@ Joe said
Ditto.
@ MHB, I get what you’re doing. You’re pushing buttons to generate blog comments. You don’t seriously believe
Same reason as Gold Coast.
Mike, the brazilian government isn’t trying to extort Amazon Inc., they would rather see .amazon withdraw the application. You might not agree with the brazilians reasoning for it, but I assure you extortion is not the game here.
Rubens – As a Brazilian, when you hear or say ‘Amazon’ (NOT Amazonas), what do you think it means – internet retailer, or river/ jungle/ rainforest ?
What about the typical Brazilian, does any brazilian refer to the river/forest/rainforest as ‘Amazon’?
As written, ‘Amazon’ has more brand recognition for the retailer globally than the region does.
Amazon corp also fully supported any future applications for .amazonas and .amazonia.
Call things what they are – what they actually mean to to the parties involved, in their appropriate context.
‘Amazon’ is the English name for a region in Brazil. But ask any native English speaker what ‘amazon’ means – they will tell you it is a place to buy books and just about anything else online.
Not a place in South America
Educated people will give you 2 answers.
@Tom
If they don’t know what Amazon means and its vital importance to their own lives, it’s just their fault. As lawyers like to say, “ignorance is no excuse”.
@Domo
Not in Brazil they wouldn’t – in Brazil ‘Amazon’ is an internet company.
Not a rainforest or river.
https://www.google.com.br/#q=amazon
https://www.google.com.br/#q=amazonas
https://www.google.com.br/#q=amazonia
It would be similar to any city named ‘Libertad’ which means ‘Liberty’ in Spanish – objecting to a Liberty Mutual .liberty application.
Different meaning, different spelling, different language, different context.
There’s plenty of rationale to reject the advice, but with Brazil and the NSA, internet governance issues – ICANN will probably cave.
The NTIA is probably already consulting ICANN in this.
Tom, this is an international issue not a local issue.
Not sure if there is an specific set of rules on it but like you say the political pressure is huge,
most of these countries have very outspoken Presidentsand are not shy to defend what they might think is in the best interest of their country.
(Read the case: Argentina vs REPSOL from Spain )
Tom, as I’m a child of the early digital age and bought CDs from cdnow.com using telnet text interface in the 90s, my associations are not as representative of the population as one would like. I personally was somewhat neutral towards this issue until Amazon answered GAC Advice in a way I found obnoxious by comparing their application to one other brand that happens to also be a historical local river name. Your example in defense of .amazon (Libertad x .liberty) was much better, they should have hired you to defend them…
I don’t see the NSA/Snowden case influencing this issue; my guess is NGPC is waiting for ICC to judge the community objection against .amazon and hoping they don’t need to decide this issue. By having external experts pushing the kill button instead of them, they don’t need to either please or confront GAC.
Thanks Rubens
What do you think ICC will decide and, what if they dismiss the community objection?
You think ICANN follows the GAC advice?
Sorry if I was fresh to Mike! Sorry!
It’s how Brazil markets Amazon to the world. Amazon already has the dot com, which many consider the bottom line in domain marketing!
Amazon could have applied for .aws – Amazon Web Services, and it wouldn’t have been offensive. Enough people know it refers to Amazon.
The Brazilian government, of course, has direct control over their own ccTLD, but where do you suppose that amazon.com.br takes you?
Joe
By the way I think you are confused
“The least we can do to preserve this essential resource to life on our planet and spread awareness about the fact it’s in danger with all possible means (including the most powerful one called the Internet) is considering to dedicate a gTLD to it””
In the event Amazon doesn’t get .Amazon due to the objection of Brazil and other countries it doesn’t mean Brazil gets it.
So no one else applied for .Amazon so if Amazon the company doesn’t get it .Amazon will not exist
So its not a choice of letting the company have it or the region
John, the .br ccTLD is run without government interference. The .br registry answers to a multistakeholder body(Brazilian Internet Steering Committee) where the government is represented with 9 out of 22 directors. amazon.com.br was registered to a local company for decades; Amazon Inc. tried to get the domain in local courts with no success. All of a sudden the domain has been transferred by its owner to Amazon Inc. after Amazon received GAC Early Warning from Brazil. Coincidence ? I left the conclusion to the reader.
ICC, as all DRPs in the new gTLD process, is a surprise box. Do a coin-flip and get a better forecast than mine of the result… 😉