Monthly Archives: December 2005

Thu 15th December 2005
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
How NOT to win a cybersquatting case - I came across an interview in The Gothamist today about author Ron Hogan. Hogan is author of “The Stewardess Is Flying the Plane!”, co-editor of Galleycat; and editor of of Beatrice.com. One of the questions made me laugh:Q: What prompted you to start Beatrice.com, and where does the name come from?A: Actually, the site was named after Beatrice Foods, specifically the whole “Hi, we’re Beatrice” ad campaign. I always hoped that one day they’d decide to ... read more ...
Wed 14th December 2005
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Over 4M .org domains registered - This is a couple weeks old but hasn’t caught a lot of press yet… Public Interest Registry (PIR), the .ORG registry, announced that more than 4,000,000 .org domain names are registered worldwide. The .org domain was created in 1984 and is the 5th most registered domain including country code domains. By comparison, there are 45.4 million .com domains registered and 6.6 million .net domains registered according to Whois Source. There are more .org domains registered ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
What about Bob? - Where’s Bob Parsons, the outspoken leader of GoDaddy? He hasn’t posted on his blog since November 17. He typically posts four or five times a month. Perhaps he’s learned that writing about why he’s a proponent of torture doesn’t help him sell domains, but it certainly loses customers. Or his November 17 post about time saving tips, which reads as though he’s now too important to talk to his (former) friends but has enough time to tell the world about ... read more ...
Tue 13th December 2005
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
The $6.45 Click - Domain name investors hope to earn a return on domains in a couple major ways. First, we hope to get domain parking revenue. But let’s face it. We really just want to get this revenue while we wait for someone to offer top dollar for the domain. Many of my domains earn enough in parking revenue each year to pay for the renewal fee. Some earn much more, but most earn less than the renewal fee. This doesn’t discourage me from parking these low traffic domains. ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Wifi.us and Fax.info - I made two domain name acquisitions over the past week that landed in slots #6 and #7 at DNJournal’s New TLD sales chart. The first is Wifi.us. I have plans for developing this domain into a wifi hotspot finder in the United States. The second domain is Fax.info, which I picked up for $1,850 at Afternic. Clicks for the term “Fax” top out at $4.00. I plan to develop this site as a comparison guide to online fax services. Don’t underestimate the value ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Someone mislaid a $250,000 lottery ticket - If you had a lottery ticket worth $250,000, would you just toss it in the trash? If you had a nice car worth $250k, would you abandon it on the side of the road? That’s basically what the previous owner of A1.com did. The domain expired and was auctioned off for an astonishing $260,250 at SnapNames. Someone left over $250k on the table! It always amazes me when this happens. There must be an explanation. Most likely the current owner changed contact information ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
GoDaddy $6.95 domain registrations - Don’t you just love competition? Now that Dotster has lowered its domain registration price to $6.99 through the end of the year, GoDaddy has created a special link that gives you registrations for $6.95 (plus the ICANN fee, of course). Offer ends Dec 31. You must use the special link to get the price: Go Daddy $6.95 Domain Sale ... read more ...
Mon 12th December 2005
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Two fined $2.3M for promulgation feign domain renovation notices - If you own more than a couple domain names then you’ve surely received one of those emails or letters telling you to renew your domain or risk losing it. The notification is actually a trick to get you to transfer your domain to another registrar. Two fraudsters charged with copying Whois data from Nominet and pulling a similar scheme must pay $1.3M damages plus $1.0 million in legal fees. The pair copied 2.2 million records from Nominet’s Whois database. Scammers ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN
Church tries to register Sex.eu - Here’s an interesting story from the Netherlands. A Christian church was one of the applicants to register the sex.eu domain name. They filed a few minutes late and won’t have a chance at the domain. There were 232 applications for the sex.eu domain. Why would a church try to register a sex domain? To prevent it from getting into the hands of pornographers, of course. Article link ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
eBay Scammer is back… - In October I wrote about a person listing domains on eBay that he didn’t own. When someone would bid on the domains he’d subsequently register them. He also added a bogus $15 transfer charge to the domains. This insured that he never lost money. (See Nailing an eBay domain name scammer). I followed this seller, TopNotchDomains, on eBay but stopped watching after it appeared he was no longer on eBay for the second time. When searching for his ID on eBay I ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Court manners opposite domain owners provotownecenter.com - I find this story interesting because it involves a domain owner who has no chance of winning but keeps fighting. Steven Rasmussen lost a UDRP for the domain provotownecenter.com but is still fighting in court. Provo Towne Centre is a mall in Utah. The 10th Circuit Court in Denver recently upheld the UDRP decision and ordered the domains go to General Growth Properties Inc., the owner of Provo Towne Centre. Rasmussen says he’s going to appeal the decision. ... read more ...
Sat 10th December 2005
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
2006 Domain Name Survey - Domain Name Wire is doing a study of the domain name market and where we’re headed in 2006. Please take a few minutes to complete our survey. Survey results will be provided free of charge at the conclusion of the survey period. If you have a domain name web site or service, please announce the survey link to your visitors. Click here to take the survey! Topics covered include registrars, parking services, sales venues, forums, ICANN, policy, etc. Thanks, Andrew ... read more ...
Fri 9th December 2005
Written by DomainNameWire in EN
Domain Name Wire Site Redesign -

As we might notice, Domain Name Wire has perceived a facelift! Please take a demeanour around and let me know if we learn any problems. If we notice something out of strike greatfully send an email to me including a browser we are using. Thanks!

Via: domainnamewire.com

Thu 8th December 2005
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
BusinessChecking.com for usually $1,000? -

I’ve seen people get good deals on domains and consider I’ve picked some adult during good prices myself. But Afternic is stating a sale of BusinessChecking.com for usually $1,000!!!

Not usually that, though a seller appears to be BuyDomains.

This appears to be a take of a century to me. I’m we blank something?

Via: domainnamewire.com

Wed 7th December 2005
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
U.S. Government blasts ICANN for Whois Data - The U.S. General Accountability Office has issued a report claiming that over 5% of domains in Whois contain contact information that is “obviously and intentionally false”. This doesn’t surprise me. How many times do you find phone numbers like 555-123-4567 in Whois? Congress decided to investigate because of the rise in phishing scams. I think ICANN or the registrars should create a system to delete domains with obviously false information. They should ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
MyBlog.com sells for $400,000 - Last week was a slow week for domain name sales, but buyers were back in force this week. MyBlog.com took the top spot at $400,000, according to DNJournal. Blogs are popular, but this seems like an extremely high price for a two word domain! It makes me feel smug about my purchase of Blogs.info for $3,000 Sofa.com traded hands for $200,000 in a private transaction. Viajando.com, which means “traveling” in Spanish, sold for $90,000. FantasyArt.com expired ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Typosquatting: What’s a misfortune that can happen? - Own typos of popular domain names and think the worst case scenario is getting slapped with a UDRP? Think again. Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan filed a lawsuit against a Chicago jeweler accused of diverting typo traffic from competitors. The lawsuit charges the jeweler with violations of the Illinois Consumer Fraud and Deceptive Business Practices Act and the Illinois Uniform Deceptive Trade Practices Act. The lawsuit seeks a civil penalty of $50,000 and ... read more ...
Tue 6th December 2005
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Bills.com sale closes - The Bills.com sale that was reported on November 16 has closed. The total including the Bills.com domain and trademark was about $950,000. However, this also includes a web site development package and payment processing services, so the Bills.com domain itself didn’t sell for this much. You can read more here. ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Dotster slashes domain registration to $6.99 - Dotster, known for being one of the first discount registrars, has slashed its domain registration prices to $6.99 on one and two year registrations. This offer is good through the end of the year. No additional purchase is necessary. Click here to go to Dotster and take advantage of $6.99 domains! ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Boosting Google Adsense on Domain Names - Many domain name owners go beyond simply parking their domains with companies like DomainSponsor. They create mini sites of content related to the domain name and add Google Adsense ads to the pages. For example, see my CankerSores.com site. As a parked page it wasn’t getting traction in search engines and made minimal revenue, so I created a small site with Adsense ads. It now earns more money than as a simple parked page (I’ve had sites start earning 10x ... read more ...
Mon 5th December 2005
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
.asia Approved, .XXX in Q1 2006 - ICANN’s president Paul Twomey told reporters that a decision on the .xxx domain will likely be made in Q1 2006. .xxx was supposed to be on the agenda at the Vancouver meetings but was removed. ICANN gave tentative approval to a .asia domain extension. Now that .eu and .asia are on the horizon, will we be looking at .northamerica next? More here. ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
IPOWER adds giveaway Whois Privacy - Last month IPOWER sent a ripple through the domain name market by offering $2.95 domain names. Unlike offers from other registrars there were no strings attached. Now IPOWER is offering free Whois privacy as well. Some other companies charge $8-$10 for this feature. But I don’t recommend you run out to take advantage of IPOWER’s offer. The company is a Tucows reseller that uses the OpenSRS platform. Each domain you register generates its own unique login ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
.Travel, ICANN, and blurb interests - Commercial travel services companies have been able to apply for .travel domain names for a couple months now. Non-commercial travel entities, such as globetrotters, cannot register the domains. Edward Hasbrouck, author of The Practicle Nomad travel books, has been fighting ICANN about this issue since the idea of a .travel domain gained momentum a couple years ago. He’s making progress. This brings up a bigger issue to me. Do we really need industry specific ... read more ...
Fri 2nd December 2005
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Traffic Club Nov Results, Skenzo - Frequent readers of Domain Name Wire know that I park most of my domains at TrafficClub. TrafficClub optimizes your domains across a number of different parking services. Most traffic to date has been delivered to either Domain Sponsor or Google Adsense for Domains. TrafficClub just added Skenzo to the mix. Skenzo is unique by offering more than just pay-per-click ads. They provide pay-per-click, pay-per-impression, and affiliate ads. They have attractive landing ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Newbies Flood Domain Name Market - I bought my first domain name about 9 years ago. I have learned a lot along the way. Recent press, especially the Business 2.0 article, about making money with domain names has opened the spigot for newbies to enter the domain name market. The Business 2.0 article even illustrated how to get started. More domain name owners is great news for the industry. Scammers will find a way to take advantage of newbies in any business. Here are some things to look out for ... read more ...