Booking.com Seems the Sole Candidate to become a .hotels Registrar
A twitter friend pointed me to a French site Tendance Hotellerie that found out Booking.com is the sole candidate to distribute the dot.hotels top level domain when ICANN signs off on Booking.com’s application.
If that will be the case, it is clear to me that other hotels or hotel chains will not be able to obtain any .hotels extension anymore, because I simply doubt that when Booking.com B.V. gets the registrant status It will grant any hotel chain a .hotels extension.
This seems not in line with the aims of ICANN with the new TLD’s to offer the users more choice, more competition and to make the internet more transparent.
Here is the application of Booking.com B.V.
Even from the application it is clear that Booking.com wants to control this whole TLD:
Given the fact that the Applicant is a hotel reservation agent, it has a vested interest in giving its visitors and clients a clear and predictable naming scheme in the .hotels gTLD. Since visitors and clients are mainly looking for hotel
reservations on the basis of their geographic destination, the Applicant may
indeed develop plans in order to register domain names that exclusively contain
geographic names (country names, city names, names of regions, etc.).
However, if such domain names will be registered, the Applicant will do so
considering the following confines:
(i) these domain names will be exclusively registered in the name of the
Applicant ⁄ Registry Operator, and not in the name of a third party that is not controlled by the Applicant ⁄ Registry Operator, unless agreed upon otherwise with the authority competent for giving its consent in accordance with
Specification 5 of the Registry Agreement;
(ii) where consents are required prior to the registration and use of a domain
name referred to and in accordance with Specification 5 of the Registry
Agreement, the Applicant will obtain such consents before actually registering,
delegating and using these domain names…..
It is clear for instance hilton.hotels will be registered by booking.com B.V. and not be available for Hilton to register….
Objections?
Yes! As an independent hotel owner I object and I will file an objection.
By coincidence ICAN’s Twitter account @ICANN mentioned a link to file objections today.
Objections can be filed on several grounds. Here is a Icann Brochure that makes it a bit more clear.
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