Author Archives: DomainNameWire

About DomainNameWire

Domain Name Wire is a blog that deals with the domain name sector. The blog covers a range of domain related topics ranging from issues concerning expiring domains, monetization, domain registries and registrars, ICANN, policy, law etc. The blog began in March, 2005, after Mr. Allemann had dropped out of meetings to become involved in domain portfolio company, iREIT. The project began as a hobby to keep him involved in the domaining business, and then became his full-time business.

Fri 3rd August 2012
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Guy insane about CentralNic domains sues ICANN and Network Solutions - Hi Andrew: Quick work … I’ve not even received my ‘official’ AO440 forms, that need mailing to the above mentioned; and here thank’s to your effective journalistic efforts, they now know that my aggrieved plodding is moving forward. FYI ~ I DID NOT withdraw from the UDRP “Expert” services of Nominet! Nominet … DID NOT … do the work contracted, ample documents were presented to Visa for a charge back; and they conceded, now I’m moving forward, then back. I’m well ... read more ...
 
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Nat Cohen wins retreat domain name hijacking assign opposite sauna for SHA.com - Spanish spa and wellness center brought UDRP in bad faith. Nat Cohen’s Telepathy has successfully defended the domain name Sha.com from an attack by Albir Hills Resort, S.A., known as SHA Wellness Clinic. The panel also determined that SHA Wellness Clinic was guilty of attempting reverse domain name hijacking. I’ve got to say, this was a no brainer for the three person panel. First, SHA’s attorney said the resort had been “operating in the market for 15 years”. ... read more ...
Thu 2nd August 2012
Written by DomainNameWire in EN
Top 5 Domain Name Wire posts of Jul 2012 - CEO shuffle, G.me, and oogle.com among the most read stories on DNW last month. July’s big news came in at the end of the month: Go Daddy CEO Warren Adelman stepping down from the CEO post he took in December. Here’s a quick run down of the top five stories on Domain Name Wire last month: 1. Go Daddy CEO Warren Adelman steps down – in a move that surprised many in the industry, long time Go Daddy executive Warren Adelman stepped down from the CEO post about ... read more ...
 
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Ari Goldberger gets another UDRP win for Kevin Ham - Vertical Axis can keep Detur.com domain name. Kevin Ham’s Vertical Axis has won a UDRP over the domain name Detur.com with the help of domain name attorney Ari Goldberger of ESQwire.com. The complaint was brought by Detur International B.V., a tourism company that started in Turkey. Among Detur’s complaints: that the domain name linked to travel sites and that it forwarded to snog.com, which it characterized as a site with “sexy photos”. Vertical Axis claimed ... read more ...
 
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Meet a lady who bought a domain name instead of a house - Business founder spent house deposit on a domain name. I got a kick out of an article in the Sydney Morning Herald today. The story features Posse.com founder Rebekah Campbell. Campbell bought the Posse.com domain name with $28,000 of her savings. “My mother was upset with me about that,” says Campbell. “She had found me a house to buy and I told her: ‘I can’t buy it. I just bought a domain name.'” The domain name, normally a very cheap purchase, was ... read more ...
 
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UDRP row orders VS4.com transferred - Three character domain name lost in UDRP. A single member UDRP panel has ordered the domain name VS4.com be transferred to adult entertainment company VS Media, Inc. The company claims trademark rights to the term VS. It also owns the domain names VS1.com, VS2.com, and VS3.com. The owner of the domain name didn’t respond to the accusations. From what I can tell, the whois record for the domain name changed shortly before the case was filed. At that time, the email ... read more ...
 
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Marchex sells record $3.3 million in domains on Q2 - Not much else to smile about in its quarterly report. Marchex just released earnings for its second quarter. Most notable to the domain name industry is that the company had a record quarter for domain name sales — $3.3 million. There’s no additional insight into the sales in the company press release, but perhaps we’ll get more from its conference call. Marchex typically sells $1M-2.5M in domain names each quarter from its portfolio. Last time I checked the ... read more ...
Wed 1st August 2012
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Demand Media and Donuts respond to lawyer’s accusations about TLD eligibility - Companies respond to allegations about their eligibility to run top level domain names. This morning I (and a handful of other bloggers) received a copy of a letter written by McCarter English partner Jeffrey Stoler calling into question Demand Media’s and Donut’s eligibility for applying for new top level domains. The crux of the issue that Stoler brings up (pdf) is ICANN’s three strikes rule. The rule says that if you’ve been on the losing end of three ... read more ...
 
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End user sales news and a warning to TED - End user domain purchases from the past week. Before we jump in with this week’s end user sales report, I have a warning for the famous TED conferences: be careful with your new domain. TED bought xNetwork.org for $1,788. I’m not sure what it plans to use it for, but it should think twice before using this domain. The problem is that xNetwork.com is owned by an adult entertainment company offering “free legal images” for webmasters. Although the site’s homepage ... read more ...
 
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One chairman submits 467 comments on new tip turn domain applications - That’s a whole lot of work. If you visit the new top level domain comments site today, you’re going to be doing quite a big of pagination before you see any unique comments. That’s because one person — a trademark manager at Sunkist Growers, Inc. — has submitted a whopping 467 comments on individual applications. They’re all the same comment. But this must have taken some serious time given how cumbersome it apparently is to submit comments. The comments ... read more ...
Tue 31st July 2012
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GmbH applicant files U.S. heading application - Company wants to trademark GMBH. TLDDOT GmbH, an applicant for the top level domain .GmbH, has filed an intent-to-use trademark application with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office for the mark “GMBH”. Seriously. GmbH is basically the equivalent of an LLC (Limited Liability Company) in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, and other Central European nations. The application lists three goods and services: 1. Advertising and commercial information services, via the ... read more ...
 
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Disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff loses domain name quarrel with Democrats - Jack Abramoff fails in arbitration over domain name. The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) can keep the domain name JackAbramoff.com, a National Arbitration Forum panel has ruled. Former lobbyist Jack Abramoff filed the complaint arguing that the DCCC was using the domain name to disrupt his business, which includes speaking engagements and selling books. The democrats forward the domain name to a page on its web site blasting Abramoff and his connection ... read more ...
Mon 30th July 2012
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Sedo sales down 29% in Q2 compared to final year - Overall sales numbers down but trend toward fixed priced domains continues. Sedo’s domain sales in the second quarter were down significantly on a year-over-year basis, the company disclosed today in its quarterly report (pdf). Domain name transactions totaled $17,415,345 in the quarter ending this June. That’s down 29% compared to Q2 2011 and 19% compared to Q2 2010. Quarter-over-quarter sales were down 11%. Summer months are typically a bit slower for domain ... read more ...
 
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Salesforce.com buys Work.com domain name - Another confirmation that Salesforce.com bought Work.com domain name. In March I put together a fairly convincing argument that Salesforce.com had purchased Work.com. Now we have another good confirmation: the nameservers on Work.com have changed to Salesforce.com. Here are the nameservers currently on the Work.com domain name: In March I wrote about how all signs pointed to Salesforce having purchased the domain name. The whois record and brand protection company ... read more ...
 
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Go Daddy CEO Warren Adelman stairs down - The world’s largest domain name registrar is seeking a new CEO. Warren Adelman Warren Adelman is stepping down as CEO of Go Daddy, the company announced today. He will remain with the company as Special Advisor for Strategy and Global Policy. Adelman was promoted to CEO of the company in December when Go Daddy closed its investment round with KKR, Silver Lake and Technology Crossover Ventures. He has been with the company for nearly a decade, previously as President ... read more ...
Sun 29th July 2012
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ICANN deliberation singular collection for evaluation, though not for recover of new TLDs - New TLDs will still be metered even if evaluated in one batch. ICANN is seeking community input on its latest ideas for how to batch new top level domain names. In its call for comments, it states that it still plans to limit the addition of new top level domains to the root to 1,000 per year. It also wants to spread the additions to the root out over time rather than adding 1,000 at once. The group says that it has the capabilities to evaluate all 1,930 applications ... read more ...
Fri 27th July 2012
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Review: DomainTools Android app - Whois at your thumbtips. It’s been a couple years since DomainTools released its iPhone app. I guess DomainTools prefers to cater to the Apple fanboy crowd rather than the Android hipster crowd. Alas, my need for quick whois data can now be satiated: DomainTools released an Android app yesterday. The free app makes it easy to look up whois records. Of course, there are plenty of fast ways to do that. The magic is in the extra details: DomainTools’ registrant and ... read more ...
 
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Behold, a .com ticker! - An up-to-date number of .com registrations. As I mentioned last night, Verisign has started released daily domain counts for both the .com and .net namespaces. The information is now available at this page. The data includes both domains that are in the zone file as well as registered domains that don’t have nameservers (and thus, don’t show up in the zone file). As of this morning there are over 104 million .com domain registrations and close to 15 million .net ... read more ...
 
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Yep, Google bought G.me and it now forwards to Google+ - Google adds another one letter domain name to its collection. In May I wrote about how Google may have purchased the domain name G.me. The domain name was registered to Mark Monitor’s DNStinations, which often times registers domain names on behalf of the company. Now it’s official: Google was the buyer. The nameservers for the domain also point to Google.com now. Type g.me in your browser and you’ll be forwarded to the plus.google.com. The domain name was ... read more ...
Thu 26th July 2012
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20 finish user domain sales from a past week - Fox Broadcasting Company among end user buyers this past week. Here’s Domain Name Wire’s weekly wrap of end user domain name purchases from Afternic and Sedo. Afternic Fox Broadcasting Company bought MidnightBlack.com for $3,588. Any ideas what it’s for? The owner of IrishCityTours.com bought eatplaystay.com for $1,350. This is a great domain and I see variations on this “slogan” from time to time. The only challenge is remembering the word order. Machines ... read more ...
 
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Go Daddy releases the 3 Olympic ads - Three ads explain that Go Daddy is about more than just attractive women. Go Daddy has released the three television commercials it will run during the Olympics. You may have seen the first one a few weeks ago, called “Inside Out – Otter”. The basics of Otter are the same as the other two commercials, “Bubble Bath” and “Berries”. In each one, a narrator explain that Go Daddy has two sides — the attractive models it uses in ads and the techies who actually ... read more ...
 
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Fire your UDRP lawyer, Thursday edition - I could have saved this complainant some money. Here’s an easy way to waste a few thousand bucks: file a UDRP against infringement on a subdomain. This is easily one of the weirdest claims I’ve seen in a while and it involved the domain names windoows.net and windooows.com. The domains are clearly typos of the term “windows”, although they are used as lead gen sites for house windows, not Microsoft Windows. And it wasn’t Microsoft that filed the complaint; ... read more ...
 
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VeriSign blames domain monetization for reduce renovation rate - Lower than usual renewal rate blamed on search engine changes. Verisign had its second best quarter ever for new domain name registrations last quarter, but its renewal rate was lower than usual. The company cites two reasons. First, there were large promotions by domain registrars a year ago (apparently mostly from one large registrar) that led to an uptick in new registrations that came up for renewal last quarter. Second, and more interesting, Verisign blames “search ... read more ...
Wed 25th July 2012
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Alarm.com raises $136 million - Company with a fantastic domain gets a big round of equity financing. Alarm.com, which offers wireless home security solutions and home automation, has raised $136 million in an equity round. I’m not going to get on my high horse talking about how the company’s fantastic domain name must have helped it surge to one million customers. But it certainly helped the company with credibility when it launched in 2000. It also helps the company rank #3 on Google for “Alarm”, ... read more ...
 
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.Tickets applicant files heading applications for new tip turn domain - Company files trademark applications for .tickets and dottickets. .Tickets is up there on the list of most contested top level domain applications. Five companies have applied for the name. Applicant Shubert Internet last week filed two intent-to-use trademark applications with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. The applications are for “.tickets” and “dottickets”. In addition to goods and services related to event ticketing, the company says the names ... read more ...