Monthly Archives: May 2008

Mon 5th May 2008
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
Yahoo-Microsoft: Now What???? - While the chess game between Microsoft and Yahoo continues, domainers seem to be a pawn. After announcing that they were dropping there bid for Yahoo, the question becomes what will happen to Yahoo, Microsoft, Google and most importantly how will this all effect domainers. Yahoo stock price closed north of $28.50 Friday. Prior to Microsoft’s offer in January, Yahoo stock was trading around $20 a share. We expect Yahoo to trade somewhere between $20-$24 on Monday. Investors definitely will punish ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Sedo Sells Co.nu, MyCanvas.com - Sales data from Sedo shows handful of five figure sales. A fresh batch of sales data from Sedo shows a number of quality domain sales for the week, including a couple .nu domains. .Nu is the country code domain name for the island state of Niue. Sedo sold Co.nu for $16,111 and Info.nu for $12,500. According to DNSalePrice, the highest ever reported .nu domain name sale was Casino.nu, which sold for $69,269 earlier this year. Other notable sales at Sedo include: bucket.com ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Canada Leading a Way with Whois Changes - .Ca is getting a whois overhaul. Perhaps the rest of the domain world can use it as a framework. There have been a number of suggested changes to ICANN’s whois framework. But Canadian Internet Registration Authority (CIRA) is making changes to its .ca country code on its own. Canada-based domain registrar Tucows (AMEX: TCX) is reporting that CIRA will make sweeping changes to its whois policies on June 10: -Whois registrant data will be made private by default. ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Microhoo: Now What for Domainers? - Acquisition talks collapse…what it means for domainers. I’ve been torn about Microsoft’s proposed takeover of Yahoo! It could have been good for domainers but it also had a downside. Now that Microsoft (MSFT) has told Yahoo (YHOO) to “go search itself”, where does that leave the domain industry? My main concern is that Yahoo will get more in bed with Google (GOOG) for its advertising. Yahoo has already tried outsourcing some of its advertising inventory ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Afternic To Add Listing Verification, Feedback System - Domain aftermarket to add new features, time frame unclear. Domain name aftermarket Afternic is adding two new features. One I support 100%, the other one gives me a couple concerns. The first feature is a listing verification system. Domains will be verified for proper ownership when they’re listed. But the system will also periodically verify ownership while a listing is live. This is a great feature that will reduce the chances of “buying” a domain that ... read more ...
Sun 4th May 2008
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
NameJet.com/SnapNames.com Auction Updates - Some notable sales from NameJet.com and SnapNames.com over the past week alergia.com $23,000 yemen.org $12,400 cyberstore.com $8,255 shoeexpo.com $5,405 apartmentnews.com $4,100 chartz.com $3,303 popupstopper.com $2,800 Wisconsinsexoffenders.com $2,433 bargainmadness.com $2,300 kentuckysexoffenders.com $2,054 missourisexoffenders.com $1,931 onlinepokerschool.com $1,555 wedco.com $1,220 elmundo-lacronica.com $1,100 insurancetime.com $1,100 georentals.com $1,000 lifeinsuranceplanners.com $1,000 Google+Michael ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN
Interesting Ebay Auction names - A few Interesting names at auction at ebay.com RentalHomes.com auction is at $23,100, reserve has not been met. NewYorkers.org minimum bid is $22,000 Missouriforeclosures.com minimum bid is $15,000 isold.com minimum bid is $15,000 Set of 84 LLLL.com names Bidding is at $2,032, reserve has not been met, but there is a buy it now for $4,500 Google+Michael Berkens ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN
Microsoft Withdraws the Offer for Yahoo - Accroding to a report in cnet.com today Microsoft officially pulled its offer for Yahoo on Saturday In a letter to Yahoo CEO Jerry Yang, Microsoft chief Steve Ballmer confirmed that Microsoft was willing to offer $33 a share, but that Yahoo wanted at least $37 a share. Ballmer also says he is ruling out a hostile offer aimed directly to Yahoo’s shareholders. “This approach would necessarily involve a protracted proxy contest and eventually an exchange offer,” Ballmer said. “Our discussions ... read more ...
Sat 3rd May 2008
Written by The Domains in EN
UDRP: Are Domainers their possess misfortune enemy - We are all familar with the stat; in 85 percent of cases decided by the WIPO the panels transferred the disputed domain names to the complainant. I took a hard look at some recent cases in light of LH.com and this famous statistic. Certainly having this 85% figure out there is the pink elephant in the room. It hurts the perpection of domaining. It makes it sound to the layman that 85% of domains are just one complant away from being taken. Here’s the problem. Loser cases. When I was a practicing ... read more ...
Fri 2nd May 2008
Written by The Domains in EN
Business.com might come behind on a Market, again - According to a report in Fortune Magazine,  Business.com may be back on the market once again. As you may know, last year Business.com was sold to Donnelly, a publically traded yellow pages company for $345 million in cash. At that time, Donnelly was worth more than $3 billion. Today, the whole company’s market cap is worth less than what it paid for Business.com – $338 million at Thursday’s close of $4.91. Prior to the sale to Donnelly, Business.com  was purchased in 1999 for an record $7.5 ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN
Yahoo-Microsoft: Get Ready To Rumble - Accroding to a report by the Wall Strett Jounral Microsoft may go hostile in its bid for Yahoo Inc. as soon as Friday. The Wall Street Journal reported early Friday that Microsoft may be preparing to go straight to Yahoo’s shareholders. An announcement was “likely” to come Friday. Google+Michael Berkens ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
When Will Pizza.com Dough Arrive? - Sale yet to close. Will it? [Update: Pizza.com has now sold.] People outside the domain world were surprised to see that Pizza.com sold for $2.6 million a few weeks ago. But those of us in the domain industry have been on edge ever since. We have one question: will the deal actually close? As of today there’s no news on the deal. The whois on Pizza.com has been a private registration for many years, although Chris Clark’s (the seller) name is no longer attached ... read more ...
Thu 1st May 2008
Written by The Domains in EN
Microsoft: May Just Walk Away - Microsoft’s CEO Steve Ballmer reiterated today that he was prepared to walk away from his attempt to buy Yahoo if his other options don’t look good. Ballmer made his comments during a regularly scheduled town hall meeting with employees, during which workers questioned him about Microsoft’s pursuit of Yahoo. Recent reports have suggested that the software company’s rank-and-file are growing uneasy about Ballmer’s pursuit of the struggling Internet giant. Ballmer choices as we have pointed ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Not Everyone Will Be Welcome during TRAFFIC East - Don’t take the headline too literally. Read on. I just booked my plane tickets to this month’s TRAFFIC conference at Disney World. It should be a great event with wonderful surroundings. But there are handful of people who probably won’t be welcome at this event: Disney cybersquatters. “Disney” is certainly one of the most cybersquatted brands. In particular, typosquatting is rampant because many of the people looking for Disney sites are kids. A quick ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
How to Save UDRP from Bad Panel Decisions - A proposal to rectify bad UDRP decisions when there is dissenting opinion. If you read any of the domain blogs and forums out there, you probably read about the recent LH.com UDRP decision courtesy of a three person panel at National Arbitration Forum. The panel handed over the generic domain name LH.com to airline Lufthansa. Apparently two of the panelists (Hon. Carolyn Marks Johnson and David Tatham) didn’t find the irony in their acknowledgment that LH.com’s ... read more ...