Amazon versus The Amazon in a Battle for Dot-Amazon

Watch out everyone, theres an epic battle between man and nature raging over the rights to a top-level domain name. Be careful, because this could get crazy.

It's this guy...

Apparently Amazon is trying to secure the domain title .Amazon for it's own as new top-level domain names go up for bidding. Makes sense from a marketing perspective right? Well not to Brazil aka the keeper of the Amazon Rain Forest. The country doesn't believe Jeff Bezos and his e-commerce empire should have the right to that address; that it doesn't serve the public interest. 

As a backgrounder for those of you who don't know, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers altered their rules for approved domain titles (i.e. .com, .net). ICANN made it so that all organizations public and private can bid over generic top-level domains, such as .coke or .facebook. Suffice it to say, without getting into the legal details and ghastly financial incursions these domains require, that opening up the domain world allows companies to do much more unique things with their urls. These new domains aren't very prevalent yet, but based on this Gizmodo article, it seems there are some bidding wars in the works. 

Though I find this article hilarious and that is my primary reason for posting today, I think this brings up an interesting question: do certain entities have a right to certain domain addresses and if so, what's

Versus this guy

the criteria for that right? 

Way back when I wrote a POV on ICANN and this new ruling, my understanding was that it was a game largely based on the awareness of your entity and the depth of your pockets. Small companies likely couldn't even afford to front the cash allowing the big well known corps to grab the domain. Now governments certainly can afford the fees associated with the domain, but do they, because of their landmarks and history, have any more claim than a digital behemoth like Amazon? Members of today's youngest generation probably know more about Amazon than they do about THE Amazon after all. 

I'm having a harder time than I expected taking a side. I feel like Bezos and other corporate entities have earned their claim to these types of domains, especially because so much of their businesses are centered around the web. But I can see the other side too, these natural resources are part of a larger geographic culture and, one would think that might be more important than a digital property. 

This is an interesting battle and I'll be curious to see what other versions of this pop up as time goes on. Let us know your take in the comments section below!