Monthly Archives: March 2010

Thu 18th March 2010
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Prevent another Parava By Mining Domain Registry Reports - Data mining could identify problem registrars before it’s too late. It’s always a headache when an ICANN-accredited domain name registrar loses its accreditation. But often times that’s just the beginning, as customers of Parava Networks learned last year. Parava was allegedly bilking its customers by accepting payments for multi-year renewals, and then only renewing the domain names a year at a time. This becomes fairly evident when you look at VeriSign’s ... read more ...
Wed 17th March 2010
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
Is Verification Of Identity Going To Become A Requirement To Own A Domain? - A couple of interesting developments on the issue of whether registrars should be required to verify the identity of the registrant of every domain name. First today the authority charged with running the .Ru ccTLD, the Coordination Center for TLD RU,  announced that effective April 1, 2010 all registrants of .RU domain names, must file proof of their identities with their registrars in order to maintain their existing domain names or to obtain new ones. If the registrant is an individual the registrar ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
PlayFree.com Sells For $26K On SnapNames ShowCase Auction - The SnapNames.com showcase auction for March ended yesterday with a total of 30 domains selling for a total of $41,895 The highest sale was on the domain PlayFree.com which sold for a whopping $26,300. I sure didn’t see that one coming, the domain does have an Alexa ranking of $15M and gets between 100 and 1,000 visitors a month. There were 5 bidders battling it out in that auction. Here are the rest of the domains that sold: hghsupplements.com          $2,950.00 igiftcards.com                        ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
Google Denied Trademark On “Nexus One” - The United States Trademark office denied Google’s application to trademark the name of their new phone ‘Nexus One“. Integra, a provider of voice and data services was granted a trademark on the term Nexus in 2008. The Trademark Office said that if it issued a trademark to Google it would confusion as  because both companies exist in a similar business channel. “””Here, the applicant seeks registration of the mark NEXUS ONE for use in connection with “mobile phones”.  The registrant ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN
Mike Mann Claims Sex.com Over $10 Million in Debt - Companies claim Sex.com owner in debt over $10 million. Three creditors filed an involuntary bankruptcy petition against Sex.com owner Escom, LLC today in U.S. Bankruptcy Court, Central District of California. The petition, obtained by Domain Name Wire (pdf), lists three creditors, all of which appear to have investor and BuyDomains founder Mike Mann as the chairman. All three entities have the same address in Potamac, Maryland: Washington Technology Associates, ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Fact Check: UK Registrar World’s Largest New Domain Name Supplier? - Reviewing the numbers behind DomainMonster’s claim. Yesterday domain name registrar DomainMonster.com sent out a press release “UK Company Confirmed as World’s Largest New Domain Name Supplier“. According to the release, Measured by the largest number of domains registered in the first month of public door opening at a domain registry, the closest retail competitor was US based Go-Daddy, some 36% behind Domainmonster.com. It may come as a surprise that a ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
.Canon: Why Would You Want .Brand? - I’m still trying to understand .brand. I’ve never understood the lure of a brand owning .brand. Yesterday Canon announced that it will launch .canon when new top level domain names are allowed. Why? I’d really like to understand everyone’s opinion on this, but let me first clear the air of common claims I hear. If I own my .brand, I don’t need to register all of my products/services in .com. So if you’re Verizon, you won’t care anymore if someone ... read more ...
Tue 16th March 2010
Written by The Domains in EN
Huffington Post Celebrates 25th Anniversary Of Domains With A Look At The “Most Inappropirate URL’s” - The Huffington Post marked the silver anniversary of the first domain name registration, by publishing what it calls, “The Most Inappropirate URL’s On The Web” including pictures. Ok so take a deep breath and either hope one of your domains is, or is not included, and check it out, its pretty funny. Google+Michael Berkens ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
Quick Poll: Is Canon Going For Its Own gTLD Going To Be The Exception or The Rule? - Now that Canon announced it will seek its own extension,  the question becomes is Canon just the first of many Fortune 500 companies that will apply for its own gTLD or just one of the few that will apply? You can vote on the poll on the right and of course leave any comments below. Google+Michael Berkens ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN
HitWise: Facebook Takes #1 Spot As Most Visited Site On The Net, Passing Google - According to the market research firm Hitwise, Facebook.com has overtaken Google to become the most popular website in the United States for the first time. For the week ending March 13, Facebook had a  7.07% market share, beating Google’s 7.03% market share. “The market share of visits to Facebook.com increased 185% last week as compared to the same week in 2009, while visits to Google.com increased 9% during the same time frame”. Alexa and Compete continue to rank Google #1 and Facebook ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
Even A WIPO Panelist Says Even He’s Concerned With Inconsistent Decisions: You Got To Read This Quote - Yesterday in a decision a sole panelist had some interesting words about the WIPO decisions: “””This Panel is concerned that if panelists develop their interpretation of the Policy as they go along to meet the needs of trademark owners who are suffering at the hands of domain name registrants, a stage will be reached where they will be acting beyond their remit. At some stage the issue must be a matter for the legislators and not the panelists. The Panel is concerned that that stage is ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
Head Of Sales Of Yahoo Quits To Join Demand Media - According to AllThingsDigital, Yahoo’s Senior Vice President of U.S. Revenue and Market Development, is planning on leaving Yahoo for a new gig at Demand Media. Joanne Bradford will according to report, leave Yahoo just after 18 months on the job and will join Demand Media as Chief Revenue Officer. In addition to serving as Yahoo’s top sales executive, Ms. Bradford was leading the sales integration for the Yahoo-Microsoft search deal. Yahoo has not named a successor. Google+Michael Berkens ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
Geraldo.com Sells On NameJet.com For $15K, What Would You Do With It? - The domain name Geraldo.com sold today on NameJet.com for $14,888. The domain according to Alexa and Compete.com has traffic Alexa ranks it between 1.5M 2M and Compete says its gets around 2K visitors a month. However a look at Alexa reveals that 48% of the people visiting the site are looking for info on Geraldo Rivera, and another 20% are looking for info about one of his shows. So the question is was this a good buy and what would you do with it if you bought it? Google+Michael Berkens ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN
Is Internet Access a Fundamental Right? BBC: 87% Of Users Say Yes - According to a new poll released by the BBC, 80%  of 87% of internet users feel internet access should be the “fundamental right of all people”,  like water and air. The survey was of more than 27,000 adults across 26 countries. According to the BBC, The UN is pushing for universal net access. “The right to communicate cannot be ignored,” Dr Hamadoun Toure, secretary-general of the International Telecommunication Union (ITU). “The internet is the most powerful potential source of enlightenment ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
How a iPad Will Further Fragment a Web — and Learning from .Mobi - iPad-friendly sites are a reminder of mobile-friendly web sites. In January I wrote about how the iPad could be bad for domainers because it will change the way some people navigate the web. Today news of a different sort regarding the iPad and web sites has surfaced: NPR and The Wall Street Journal will show different versions of their web sites to iPad users. At issue here is the iPad’s lack of support for flash, which both NPR and WSJ apparently use heavily ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
LogicBoxes Manages .Co Transition - LogicBoxes powers .co registrar for transition of domain names. LogicBoxes, a sort of “registrar/registry in a box” solution, announced today that it is the registrar backbone behind .Co Internet’s transition of .co domain names from Universidad de los Andes to its own platform. .Co is being commercialized into a global brand this year. As part of the process, the .co registry needed to transition 27,000 already registered third level domain names (e.g. name.com.co) ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Canon Announces Plans for .Canon Top Level Domain Name - USA.canon instead of USA.canon.com? Electronics company Canon has announced plans to apply for the .canon top level domain name, when such domain names become available. In a press release, Canon states: With the adoption of the new gTLD system, which enables the direct utilization of the Canon brand, Canon hopes to globally integrate open communication policies that are intuitive and easier to remember compared with existing domain names such as “canon.com.” ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Observations from a Brief Trip to SXSW - A few random observations about SXSW Interactive. Since I live in Austin, I often take for granted the size and scope of the annual South by Southwest (SXSW) conference. There are essentially three conferences in one: Interactive (tech), Film, and Music. Starting last Friday, there will be tens of thousands of techies, film buffs, and music fans cycling through town. Heck, there will be close to 2,000 musical acts taking the stage over just a half of a week. This ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Another French City Loses Fight for Geo Domain Name - Tignes loses domain name dispute for Tignes.com. Ah, France. Beautiful vistas, tasty food, and governments that think they have all rights to their city names. Following in the footsteps of Paris, Tignes has lost a UDRP for the domain name Tignes.com. Commune de Tignes originally filed a complaint against the domain owners in Tribunal de grande instance de Lyon (French Court), arguing that the domain name infringed the Complainant’s figurative trademark TIGNES. ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Yahoo Gets Patent for Behavioral Ad Targeting - Search company granted patent for delivering ads based on user profile and behavioral information. The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office issued U.S. Patent 7,680,786 (pdf) to Yahoo! today for “Optimization of targeted advertisements based on user profile information”. The invention covers using both behavioral and user profile information in combination with traditional keyword and event driven factors to deliver targeted ads. For example, a user might enter a ... read more ...
Mon 15th March 2010
Written by The Domains in EN
Australian Trademark Office: Apple Does Not Own The Letter “i” - In a case decided last week by the Australian trademark office, Apple, Inc objected to the trademark application filed by another company on the term, DOPi (iPod spelled backwards with emphasis on the “i”). Apple argued that the application of the trademark should be rejected as an infringement on its trademark because the “particular coloring and orientation of the letter “i” in the mark, which as a whole, of course, is made up of the letters of the Opponent’s IPOD trade mark in reverse ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN
MediaPost.com Covers Root Orange - Mediapost.com just published a story on one of the new companies in our space, Root Orange. The story give you some back ground on how it got started and its location splitting technology and the roll out of attorney.com. Basically as we discussed a couple of weeks ago the technology allows for many different, in the case of attorney.com, lawyers around the country to use and market the same domain name, and results will displayed only back to the attorney who bought the exclusive in that market. Lawyers ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN
Our Picks For The SnapNames Monthly Showcase Auction Closing Tuesday - The Snapnames Monthly Showcase auction for March, closes tomorrow on Tuesday March 16th at 3:15pm EST according to Snapnames.com normally closing rules. We went through the hundreds of domain in this auction and came up to what we think are the most interest domains in the auction: Google+Michael Berkens ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN
Wired.com Covers The 25th Birthday of Domain Names & The Registration of The 1st Symbolics.com - Wired.com just published a story on the 25th Anniversary of the first domain registration, Symbolics.com. The article highlights the history of the first domain registered including up to its recent acquisition by Aron Meystedt, of XF.com last August and well as some other important dates in domain name registration history An interesting article you should check out. Congrats to Aron Google+Michael Berkens ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
MusicVideos.com Sells for $250,000, .Info Snags $24,000 - MusicVideos.com takes home prize, but good .co.uk and .info domain sales as well. Sedo completed well over $1 million in domain name transactions last week, including helping Yahoo! sell MusicVideos.com for $250,000. The company also sold Gold.co.uk for 42,050 GPB, which is about $63,000 USD. Last week the company auctioned off MobilePhones.co.uk for about $137,000 USD equivalent, but the sale hasn’t been completed yet. Although these are all noteworthy sales, ... read more ...