.book

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Status:	Delegated
Type:	Generic
Category:	Media
Priority #:	Top Level Domain Holdings Google (Charleston Road Registry Inc.) Amazon R.R. Bowker LLC Donuts (Double Bloom, LLC) DotBook, LLC Famous Four Media (Bronze Registry Limited)

.book is a gTLD in ICANN's New gTLD Program. After a private auction in November 2014, Amazon became the sole applicant for the TLD. The company's application succeeded and the extension was delegated to the Root Zone 05 December 2015. .BOOK Delegation. Retrieved 10 Dec 2015.

Applicants

Based on ICANN's List of New gTLD Applied-For Strings, the applicants for .book include:

Current Applicants

1. Amazon - The company applied for 76 new gTLDs including .book through its office in Luxembourg with the help of Valideus, a domain name and IP specialist focused in providing consultancy services for corporations. Rakuten, Inc. filed a community objection against this application.

Private Auction

A private auction conducted in November 2014 left Amazon as the only applicant for the string.

Former Applicants

1. Donuts (Double Bloom, LLC) - Daniel Schindler, EVP of Sales & Marketing and serves as the contact person in the application. Donuts filed for 307 new gTLDs, and each application was made under different LLC. This applicant submitted a Public Interest Commitment, which can be downloaded here.
2. R.R. Bowker LLC- is a US based company and Sharon Lubrano is the contact person.
3. Top Level Domain Holdings Ltd.- It is one of 68 applications that the company has filed on its own behalf. This applicant submitted a Public Interest Commitment, which can be downloaded here.
4. Famous Four Media (Bronze Registry Limited) a registry provider based in Gibraltar. The .book string was one of the 61 new gTLDs filed by the company. This applicant submitted a Public Interest Commitment, which can be downloaded here.
5. DotBook, LLC- a US based company. Annie Callanan is the contact person.
6. Google (Charleston Road Registry Inc.)- the company applied for 101. Sarah Falvey, Google's Senior Policy Analyst, is the main contact person in the application.
7. Global Domain Registry Pty Ltd, listed ARI Registry Services' Executives as its contact people. The application was withdrawn in May 2013, prior to the release of its initial evaluation results and thus eligible for a 70% refund.
8. STRAAT Investments- the parent company of .co Internet. The application was WITHDRAWN due to an undisclosed APPLICANT PARTNERSHIP.

Amazon

Amazon's application was issued a GAC Early Warning from the representative of Australia and GAC Chair, Heather Dryden. The warning system is noted as a strong recommendation on behalf of national governments to the ICANN Board that a given TLD application should be denied as it stands. Applicants are encouraged to work with objecting GAC members. The warning states that the applicant is "seeking exclusive access to a common generic string .. that relates to a broad market sector," which Ms. Dryden notes could have unintended consequences and a negative impact on competition. Amazon was subject to a large amount of identical warnings.

Amazon continued to come under scrutiny for its many applications for "closed generics", that is, generic terms that it plans to use in a closed system, thereby making it the only registrant for an important online market. The application for .book .author, .read, came under specific protest from Barnes and Noble, and other booksellers, which sent letters to ICANN.

TLDH & $15mm Auction Funding

On February 26 2013, Top Level Domain Holdings Ltd. announced that it had entered into a funding agreement worth $15 million to be used in the case of auction for a specific unnamed TLD. The investor will not receive ownership of the TLD but a share of future revenues. TLDH did not name the TLD that the funds are directed for, and it is in 11 head to head contentions and 12 featuring more than one contender.