Rock star Sting has lost his bid to take control of the internet address sting.com from a computer game player who claims to have been using the name for eight years.

Samar Shamoon, spokeswoman for the UN's World Intellectual Property Organisation in Geneva, said the ruling by an arbitrator was in contrast to previous decisions that went in favour of celebrities such as Julia Roberts.

But, Shamoon said, there were significant differences in the case, such as a failure to prove "bad faith" on the part of the website owner.

Arbitrator Andrew Christie, of Australia, said a key difference was that Sting was not the real name of singer Gordon Sumner.