Can the .xxx domain boost the porn business?

Eleven years after the ideas was first floated, ICANN — the body that governs internet addresses — has finally set aside a new domain, .xxx, specifically for pornographic websites. Existing porn sites can keep their current addresses, but many popular sites have already registered a dual address at the new domain to avoid confusion. Though ICANN claims the .xxx designation will help keep explicit material away from children, the idea isn't popular with adult-video makers, who fear being ghettoized online, or with conservative groups, who fear that legitimizing the porn business will encourage the creation of more porn. Even the Obama administration has come out against the plan. Why is everyone so upset?

This will lead to censorship: The new domain will make it easy for foreign governments to block material they find offensive, says Diane Duke, head of a porn industry group, in a press release. ICANN has ignored the "overwhelming outpouring of opposition from the adult-entertainment industry — the supposed sponsorship community — dismissing the interests of free speech on the internet."

"Welcome to the Free Speech coalition"

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up

This only benefits .xxx profiteers: "Porn already owns the best .com real estate it ever needs," says Violet Blue at ZDNet. But now, the "pimp daddies" at ICM, a Florida company managing the .xxx names, are forcing already-established players into "domain squatting and defensive registrations" of addresses that will serve no purpose. This is no windfall for porn companies. It's ICM that will be raking in money — it has already made more than $20 million in registration costs.

".xxx approved: Now begins the era of meaningless TLDs"

And this is really bad for kids: "Our children experience the brunt of American society's inaction against pornography every day," says Penny Young Nance, CEO of Concerned Women for America, at Fox News. Pornographers try to lure children to their traditional .com websites, and with the new domain name, they will have an even tighter grip on children already "inclined to experiment with pornography," because they'll now "know exactly where to go to find it."

"A warning to parents, .xxx and a pornography boom may be headed to your home"