As part of the new domain initiative launched by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, established businesses and speculators have filed applications for a wide range of top-level domains—from .amazon to .garden. While some applications would make new web domains open to any qualified applicants, others propose a “single registrant” model that would allow only one company to use the new top-level domain.

Before the experiment has gotten off the ground, some critics have expressed concern about applications to operate domains referring to a “generic” product or service, like .car, .book, or .app. News reports indicate that Microsoft and other Google competitors have filed complaints about Google’s applications, while authors’ organizations have raised questions about some of Amazon’s applications. These complaints assert that giving these applicants the right to operate these new domains would provide an unfair competitive advantage.

ICANN shouldn’t worry, however. The sky isn’t falling.

Granting Google, Amazon or any other company “single registrant” gTLDs does not threaten the competitive online ecosystem.

First, the “competitive advantage” (or value) any company can achieve from these gTLDs is uncertain. Previous TLD offerings like “.biz,” “.mobi,” or “.info” failed to draw large numbers of websites despite extensive promotional efforts. In fact, repurposed country code TLDs—including .ly (Libya), .me (Montenegro) and .co (Colombia)—earned their popularity unexpectedly.

To put a finer point on it—most alternative domains have flopped. Because of the highly uncertain value of new gTLDs, many of the concerns levied against bidding companies like Google and Amazon, which have applied to manage dozens of gTLDs, are completely speculative. Companies are bidding because they think there might be opportunities in new domains—but history suggests they will have an uphill battle. There is no evidence to suggest a genuine likelihood of harm to Internet users or the online ecosystem.

Second, the existence of alternative web domains will not disturb the fundamental openness of the Internet. Amazon’s use of the .book domain to market the latest bestsellers would in no way block any other bookseller from using a different domain to do the same. In fact, the use of .book does not seem to provide a company any kind of competitive advantage against its business rivals.

Despite linguistic confusion, there is no relation between an exclusive right to a domain and a “monopoly” over a specific economic market. Users can easily navigate to any site based on its quality, whatever its domain name. Sites that grow popular do so because of how well they meet their users’ needs, not because of their domain name.

Moreover, users today often rely on search engines to get where they want to go, rather than typing URLs out. There is even a term for such searches: “navigational searches.” Terms relating to Facebook including “Facebook.com” or “Facebook login,” for example, represented 5.62% of all searches conducted online in the United States, according to the information analytics firm Experian. If Facebook is on .com, .facebook, or .socialnetwork, people will be able to find it.

Finally, many of the worries about Google’s control over certain gTLDs have already been addressed. Google changed its applications for the .search, .app, .blog, and .cloud gTLDs so that the domains would be open to qualified sites, not just Google products. Others of its applications, including .map and .fly, were already drafted to be open for qualified sites. This means that if MapQuest wants to use mapquest.map, Wordpress wants to use wordpress.blog, or Yahoo! wants to operate yahoo.search, all will be free to do so.

Google’s competitors also contend that Google has the incentive to tweak its search algorithm to favor any site on a Google domain. Google has already pledged not to do this. Further, Google has little financial incentive to make its results less relevant to users, because some users would switch to other search engines.

If ICANN’s experiment is successful, it has the potential to generate tremendous value for companies and offer users a better online experience. Existing companies will be able develop domains centered on their brands to draw more customers and enhance their business performance. Operators crafting new business models for these domains may also improve how users interact on the web. As ICANN’s At Large Advisory Committee observed, “there may be innovative business models that might allow a closed TLD to be in the public interest.”

While the benefits remain uncertain, the harms are clearly exaggerated and should find a home at a new domain called .premature.