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.

Wed 15th June 2011
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Go Daddy Sued for Sending Domain Renewal Notices - Does sending renewal reminders violate patents? This isn’t meant to be a shock headline. It’s true. WhitServe LLC has filed a patent infringement lawsuit (pdf) against GoDaddy.com based on the renewal notices it sends to customers. WhitServe says the method by which Go Daddy sends these notices and allows customers to renew their expiring domain names violates two of its patents: -US Patent 5,895,468 for System Automating Delivery Of Professional Services -US ... read more ...
 
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What we Think About Latona’s 5 Latest Web Sites for Sale - Opinions on Rick’s latest batch of web sites for sale. Rick Latona has posted his five latest web sites for sale, which he says his team hand picked from 1,000s of sites. I’m a big fan of buying and selling revenue-producing web sites and I’ve done it myself. Latona’s announcement asked for feedback, so here’s mine on the five sites. EasyToInsureMe.com – this property has approximate annual revenue of $100,000 and an asking price of $170,000. The description ... read more ...
 
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Moniker Auction Sells Another 5 Domains Plus Data.com - Houses.co.uk leads premium domain name auction. Moniker’s “make up” auction from last week’s Barcelona conference has found a home for five more domains on top of the multi-million dollar sale of Data.com to Salesforce.com. Data.com was pulled from the auction after Salesforce.com made a significant offer on the domain name. The sales included: Houses.co.uk $50,870 Gado.com $3,000 SEMexpert.com $600 SEOagencies.com $900 Pilsners.co.uk $300 It’s worth noting ... read more ...
Tue 14th June 2011
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GoDaddy.com Goes Down for “Several Hours” Last Night - Domain name registrar’s web site goes down. [Updated story to reflect timeline as last night, not this morning. Note that if you still can’t reach GoDaddy.com it’s probably your ISP’s cache. You can test any site here to see if it’s just you. Also, if for some reason your Go Daddy hosting isn’t working, this is unrelated. You should call Go Daddy support.] Customers trying to register new domain names or manage their accounts at GoDaddy.com last night ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
U.S. Shuns .Music Trademark Ahead of New TLD Launch - Trademark office questions use in commerce of .music logo. Constantine Roussos has made it clear that he plans to use international trademarks to help him win the .music top level domain name during the application process. But the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office isn’t playing a long. On December 31 Roussos filed a trademark application for a .music logo. The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office wrote back saying there were two problems: 1. The mark hasn’t been ... read more ...
 
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Expired Domain Rule Changes Closer to Reality - Group issues final report with recommended changes to how registrars handle expired domain names. ICANN’s Post-Expiration Domain Name Recovery (PEDNR) Policy Development Process Working Group has issued its final report (pdf) with 18 recommendations for handling expired domain names. Although the recommendations have increased from 14 in the previous report, many of them are merely “best practices” and not requirements. One of the most important changes is a ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Oversee.net Sells Chop.com for $60,000 - No price chopping with Chop.com. Oversee.net has sold Chop.com from its owned and operated portfolio with the help of Afternic. A UK company that appears to be a battery importer purchased the domain name for $60,000. As of right now the domain name still resolves to a DomainSponsor parked page. Chop.com was by far Afternic’s biggest sale of the week, although it has the usual strong list of four figure domains. Here are some of the top ones: antonio.net $11,000.00 netstars.com ... read more ...
 
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My Picks for Moniker Premium Auction Ending Wednesday - Some picks — including some big ones — for Wednesday’s auction. Moniker’s premium domain name auction, which was moved to an online-only event after technical problems in Barcelona last week, ends on Wednesday at 3:15 PM ET. As with recent auctions, I think some of the activity will take place outside the auction. We’ve already seen the monster sale of Data.com to Salesforce.com before the auction even started. All we know for sure is that the sales ... read more ...
 
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U.S. Government to Drop .Gov Domain Names - .Gov domain deletions coming. Of course, you can’t have any. Via GovInfoSecurity.com comes news that the White House wants to trim the number of .gov domain names and associated web sites. I find it ironic that the Obama administration is the one to crack down on the number of web sites and .gov domains (numbered at 2,000 at the second level) given that it has probably embraced special purpose .gov domains more than any previous administration. Think Change.gov. But ... read more ...
Mon 13th June 2011
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Epik Releases Upgrade to Its Product Portals - Site creation tool releases improvements geared to more content. Epik has released an upgrade to its product sites dubbed Product Portals 3.0. The latest version is designed to offer more content on product sites, which is of course critical to search engine placement. Users can now create full articles using an article editor as well as import content from other sites. (So far content can only be imported from ArticlesBase.com.) The content module includes a scheduler ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
6 UDRP Cases to Watch - 6 notable UDRP filings this month. Here are a half dozen UDRP cases filed this month to keep an eye on for various reasons. ChrisFarley.com – I’m guessing it is the estate of the late comedian that filed this case. Twiter.com – Twitter files a UDRP against the owner of Twiter.com, a site that clearly tries to trick users who are looking for Twitter.com. IXO.com – I’m always suspicious of filings for three letter domain names. Let’s see what the deal is ... read more ...
 
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Tucows Wins Another UDRP, What Was Greenberg Traurig Thinking? - Lawyer makes some really bad accusations. Tucows has won another domain name that is part of its “Personal Names Service”. Tucows acquired the domain name Primm.com when it bought Mailbank (NetIdentity) in 2006. NetIdentity registered the domain name in 1996. The case was filed by Herbst Gaming, LLC with the help of Greenberg Traurig, LLP. Greenberg Traurig is no stranger to UDRP filings, having represented over 400 UDRP cases. This makes the arguments presented ... read more ...
 
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DOMAINfest Changes NYC Show Format to Meetup, Nixes Las Vegas - New York show changed to a meetup and Las Vegas show canceled. Oversee.net has made some changes to its remaining DOMAINfest shows for 2011. First, the New York show planned for August will now be an evening meetup instead of a one day “Power Networking” day. The event will take place August 23 from 7-10 pm at the Mad46 Rooftop Lounge. Registration isn’t open yet but the web site notes it will be $150. I’m a bit disappointed in this change because the ... read more ...
 
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3M Sues Whois Privacy Services and Web Hosts Over Gambling Domains - Company names major domain companies in basket of defendants for cybersquatting. 3M has filed a lawsuit against a who’s who of domain name whois privacy services, registrars, and web hosts, along with numerous John Does. The conglomerate alleges the defendants are using a number of domain names incorporating 3M’s trademark for gambling sites. Example sites include mmmbet.net, 3M-Asia.com, and 3m-sportbetting.com. A number of the site names have changed since ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Go Daddy Triples Auction Fees to 15% - Auction fees go up as domains get more exposure. Go Daddy Auctions has increased its sales commission three-fold from 5% to 15%. This change was noticed by Hybrid Domainer earlier today. The auction price increase makes sense given that auction listings now show up in the registration path when someone searches for the exact domain name on Go Daddy. A Premium Listing carries a 30% commission while the typical auction listing only cost 5% until now. This is steep ... read more ...
Sun 12th June 2011
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Cricket.com Changes Web Site After Lawsuit - Site no longer shows ads related to mobile phones. Cricket.com owner Global Cricket Ventures hasn’t formally responded to Cricket Communications’ lawsuit over the domain name Cricket.com — at least in court. But it has drastically changes its web site to eliminate all references and ads related to mobile phones. The site is now just a bare bones one page web site with a couple news feeds about cricket and a score board. Gone is the fantasy cricket offering ... read more ...
Sat 11th June 2011
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Gary Chernoff Sells AdNet.com for $60,000 - Chernoff strikes again. Gary Chernoff has made another big domain name sale with AdNet.com for $60,000. The updated whois information shows that RevNet bought the domain name. RevNet bills its business as the “Worlds 1st On-Demand Data Monetization Platform for businesses and publishers.” The company owns another “net.com” domain, CallNet.com. It’s clear RevNet understands the importance of domain names. Two of its other domains are monetization.com ... read more ...
Fri 10th June 2011
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Did Google Buy Wallet.com? - Domain name changes hands; Google is a possible buyer. Did Google buy the domain name Wallet.com for its new Google Wallet service? [Update: yes, it did.] World Media Group, LLC owned the domain name until the end of March. Then on April 1 the domain name was registered under privacy protection but at CSC, a corporate brand management firm and domain name registrar. Yesterday the whois information for the domain name changed to DNStinations, a group that frequently ... read more ...
 
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Go Daddy To Sell .XXX Domain Names - .XXX domain names coming soon to Go Daddy. In a major win for ICM Registry, Go Daddy announced today that it will offer .xxx domain names to its customers. From the press release: “We’ve said from the beginning … when it comes to dotXXX, we are going to listen to our customers,” said Go Daddy CEO and Founder Bob Parsons. “A large number of our customers have spoken … and there is a demand for the controversial new domain name extension – for both brand ... read more ...
Thu 9th June 2011
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Company Files Cybersquatting Claim Against Twitter Username - Can a Twitter username be cybersquatting? One insurance company thinks so. Here’s an interesting lawsuit I just discovered that attempts to stretch the bounds of the Anti-Cybersquatting Consumer Protection act. Insurance company Conventry First has filed a federal lawsuit (pdf) against whomever is using the CoventryFirst username on Twitter, i.e. twitter.com/coventryfirst. But in addition to complaining about plain old trademark infringement, the company has thrown ... read more ...
 
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11 Questions to Ask Before Buying a Developed Web Site - Answer these questions before you buy a web site. The debate about how much a developed web site is worth has been rekindled in the domain name community with Rick Latona’s entrance into the web site brokering business. I interviewed web site broker David Fairley last year to get an idea of how much developed sites are selling for. Anyone considering buying or selling a site should read that article and the linked presentation for an idea of what the market is ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN
Why Movie Studios Won’t Pay For Domain Names - Movie studios aren’t willing to pay for great domain names. In an interview with NPR a few weeks ago I noted that movie studios rarely part with their cash for the “ideal” domain name for a movie release. I think one big reason for this is that most people gravitate to review sites and movie listing sites rather than the official site for a movie. They want to hear what other people are saying about the movie and when it is playing rather than the studio’s ... read more ...
 
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California Ecommerce Company Agrees to Stop Using UK Domain Names - FTC said company tried to dupe UK consumers into thinking it was a UK company. California online retailer “Balls of Kryptonite” has agreed to stop using .uk domain names as part of a deal with the Federal Trade Commission, according to a story in MediaPost. The FTC said the company used domain names like bestpricedbrands.co.uk and bitesizedeals.co.uk, listed prices in pounds, and said orders shipped via Royal Mail. Why the ruse? Apparently to make customers ... read more ...
Wed 8th June 2011
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ICANN “Hedge” In Singapore Will Kick off New gTLD Communications Plan - I predict new TLD marketing will start after ICANN’s Singapore meeting this month. Just about everyone — including me — is horrible at predicting what ICANN will do and when it will do it regarding new top level domain names. The only people who’ve been right are those that said “it’s not going to happen at this meeting”. That said, I’m going to take another crack at it. Here’s what I predict for this month’s ICANN meeting in Singapore: ICANN ... read more ...
 
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Technical Problems Postpone Moniker Auction - Auction postponed after web sites go down. If you tried to reach most of Oversee.net’s web sites this morning — Oversee.net, SnapNames, or Moniker — you probably ran into difficulty. The timing couldn’t have been worse for the company, which was scheduled to run a live domain name auction from Barcelona this morning U.S. time. The company has officially announced that the auction will be postponed, but the new date hasn’t been set. This isn’t the first ... read more ...