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 20th October 2010
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Sex.com Domain Name to Sell for $13 Million - Court filing shows proposed $13 million domain name sale. Over the past few weeks I’ve been checking the Escom bankruptcy court docket twice daily for an update to the Sex.com case. Earlier today the court posted a proposed order (pdf) for the sale of Sex.com for $13 million. The buyer is Clover Holdings Limited. The sale was handled by Sedo, which worked to broker a sale of the domain name on behalf of Sex.com owner Escom, which had been pushed into bankruptcy. ... read more ...
Tue 19th October 2010
Written by DomainNameWire in EN
Video from Opening Day of TRAFFIC Miami - Highlights from first full day of conference in Miami. The second full day of T.R.A.F.F.I.C. Miami is about to kick off. But before getting to that, here’s a quick video of a few scenes from the first full day in Miami. The day started off with a 10 am brunch and opening remarks by Rick Schwartz and Howard Neu. Next, congressman Cliff Stearns chatted with Howard Neu about some of the legislative issues facing the domain name industry. The afternoon included ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
TRAFFIC Awards Results Live from Miami - TRAFFIC awards ceremony concludes in Miami. Just moments ago TRAFFIC announced the winners of its annual awards at the TRAFFIC conference in Miami. The show organizers said they received a record number of votes. Best new monetization solution – Whypark Best overall domain solution – Sedo (second year in a row) Developer of the year – Rob Monster (with Epik) We get it award – National A-1 (owners of some of the best premium generic domain names) Best domain ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Don King Addresses TRAFFIC Conference - Promoter Don King addresses TRAFFIC Conference in Miami. Don King addressed the audience at the TRAFFIC conference in Miami. King said he came to promote what he’s calling the “People’s Internet”. It was difficult to understand exactly what it is, but he said it’s a way for people to broadcast instantly on the internet. He has two “First Amendment” trucks to capture video and man on the street interviews. King acknowledged the audience has the the ... read more ...
Mon 18th October 2010
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
GoDaddy Sponsors Its Own College Bowl Game - Domain name registrar sponsors a college football bowl game. After years of advertising in the Super Bowl, GoDaddy is upping its football ante by sponsoring its own college football bowl game. The company will be taking over what was the GMAC Bowl, and it will now be known as the GoDaddy.com Bowl. The game takes place January 6, 2011 in Mobile, Alabama, and features teams from the Mid-American and Sun Belt Conferences. It’s a smaller bowl game (last year Troy ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Cliff Stearns (R-FL) Addresses TRAFFIC Conference - Congressman addresses domain conference in Miami, Florida. Representative Cliff Stearns (R-FL) addressed the TRAFFIC domain conference this afternoon. About 75 people were in attendance during Stearns’ fireside chat with show organizer Howard Neu. Stearns was joined by retired Congressman Mike Ferguson. Stearns is a member of the Subcommittee on Communications, Technology and the Internet, and Ferguson was on this subcommittee while he served. Stearns said there ... read more ...
Sun 17th October 2010
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Scoop: Afternic Will Change Game This Week with eNom and Moniker Partnerships - Big announcements coming this week that will change the domain aftermarket. The business of selling domain names to end users will forever be changed before the end of this year. Domain Name Wire has learned that this week Afternic will announce it has inked agreements with both eNom and Moniker to be Premium distribution partners. They will join Network Solutions and Register, giving Afternic deals with 4 of the top 10 registrars for premium distribution. Afternic ... read more ...
Sat 16th October 2010
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
TheHill.com Covers Stearns’ Visit to TRAFFIC Plus Domain Lobbying - Influential political web site discusses domain name industry involvement in politics. The popular political site TheHill.com — which gets well over a million unique visitors a month — has published a post about Rep. Cliff Stearns’ (R-Fla.) visit to the TRAFFIC conference in Florida next week. The story mentions the types of people that will attend next week’s conference (including an optimistic 500+ attendee figure), as well as Stearns’ political ambitions. The ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Afternic Drops Basic Listings, Offers Commission Discount for Parked Domains - Listing level and commission changes at domain marketplace. Afternic has revamped its web site and made changes to listing options and commissions. Afternic previously had three listing options, one of which merely listed domains on Afternic. Now there will be two options: Afternic DLS Network and Afternic DSL Premium. DLS Network gets your domains listed on 20 domain reseller sites, reaching 25 million prospective buyers monthly. DLS Premium gets you two more ... read more ...
Fri 15th October 2010
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Rick and Howard Pulling Out All a Stops for TRAFFIC Miami - Everything’s lined up for TRAFFIC Miami. It seems that it will deliver. I’ve been a vocal critic of some of the TRAFFIC shows in recent years. They seemed to have gone a bit stale and attendance had dwindled. That will not be the case with TRAFFIC Miami, which starts Sunday evening at the South Beach Loews. Perhaps Rick Schwartz and Howard Neu had something to prove. It doesn’t hurt that this is the only event they’re planning for this year (Rick Latona ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Demand Media Launches Blog Distribution Network - Blog network enables bloggers to syndicate their content across Demand Media web sites. Demand Media, which owns domain name registrar eNom, has launched a blog distribution network. Bloggers are able to syndicate their content across Demand Media’s properties including eHow.com and LiveStrong.com. Each syndicated article will include a backlink to the author’s blog. Bloggers will also share in the revenue Demand Media generates from ads alongside the syndicated ... read more ...
Thu 14th October 2010
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Domainer Personal Portfolio Auctions during Sedo - There’s a personal portfolio auction going on right now with some great values. Here’s something I wasn’t aware of: Sedo will run a portfolio auction for you through it’s auction system. That is if you have good domains at a good reserve. For an example, take a look at the Richard Whitney Portfolio Auction going on right now. Look quickly, because it ends at 12:30 EDT today. Whitney’s auction has a number of good deals that are (currently) priced very ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
LMC.com Domain Dispute Will Have You ROFLMAO - Some of the dumbest logic you’ll ever read in a UDRP. A recent UDRP complaint brought by FTR of Bondues, France is so misguided that I have to use a juvenile messaging acronym to describe it. Yes, when you read FTR’s logic, you’ll be ROFLMAO. FTR is a holding company that owns a number of subsidiaries, and also a trademark for LMC. It appears to be in the business of selling kitchen cabinets, light fixtures, and window coverings. The respondent is Synopsys, ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Reel.com Bankruptcy Auction Plan Submitted to Court - Domain name headed to auction block soon. Bankrupt entertainment company Movie Gallery has submitted its plan to the court to auction off intellectual property assets including Reel.com. Movie Gallery operated the Hollywood Video rental chain as well as Game Crazy. The intellectual property sale will be handled by StreamBank, LLC. According to StreamBank, LLC, the reel.com domain name: This domain and trademark originally served as a movie review site, online store, ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
AOL Owns Patch.com, But Can’t Win wwwPatch.com UDRP - AOL’s lawyers didn’t provide enough evidence of common law rights. AOL owns the web site Patch.com, yet it has failed to obtain the typo wwwPatch.com through a National Arbitration Forum proceeding. How is this possible? It seems that AOL’s lawyers may have taken this case for granted and not supplied enough evidence. The panel found that wwwPatch.com is confusingly similar to AOL’s PATCH mark, and that the respondent doesn’t have any rights or legitimate ... read more ...
Wed 13th October 2010
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Process, Not Technical Limitations, will Throttle New Top Level Domains - 200-1,000 new top level domains could be added in first year. ICANN has released two documents related to the number of new top level domain names that may be added to the web per year. The first document is technical in nature, covering how many gTLDs can be added to the root in any year. I previously wrote that it was determined 1,000 new TLDs could be added to the root in a year without problems. But after reading this report it’s clear that 1,000 was used ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
You Probably Shouldn’t Brag About Registering a Trademark Domain Name - This isn’t a very smart thing to do. If you’re going to register a domain name including a famous trademark, you probably shouldn’t brag about it. Like this guy did [update: removed link. Guy took post down. He also has a new post up that says “I recently decided it was time to migrate my personal blog away from this business as my view points at times can be a bit controversial.”] after registering Starbucks.im. I recently picked up a few good .im ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
.Ca Tops 1.5 Million Domains and Gets EPP - CIRA transitions registry system and hits a milestone. Canadian Internet Registration Authority (CIRA) has had a big week. First, it transitioned its entire registry system to EPP. That’s welcome news for registrars carrying .ca, and it alleviates a lot of burdens on CIRA: With the new system and policies, CIRA is effectively able to remove itself from many day-to-day transactions. Most transactions will be handled solely by CIRA certified Registrars. To ensure ... read more ...
Tue 12th October 2010
Written by DomainNameWire in EN
I’m Joining Directi’s Media Businesses - I’m joining Directi’s media businesses, but Domain Name Wire isn’t changing. Over the past several years I’ve been asked to join a number of established companies and startups. I’ve turned down these offers for various reasons. Until now. Today I’m announcing that in the very near future, I am going to start working with the following businesses – Media.Net, Skenzo BigJumbo. All three businesses are owned by the Directi Group (no introduction required) ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
CitizenHawk Nailed For Reverse Domain Hijacking, Chastised by Panelist - Typo recovery company embarrassed by TinyPrint.com case. For the second time, cybersquatting recovery company CitizenHawk has been chastised by a UDRP panelist for submitting a boilerplate complaint. This time the panelist threw in an added bonus, finding the company’s complainant guilty of reverse domain hijacking. CitizenHawk filed a complaint on behalf of Tiny Prints, Inc. for the domain name TinyPrint.com. Before discussing the merits of the case, panelist ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Moniker Prague auction Ends Wednesday, Monthly Auction Kicks Off - One big domain name auction ends and another begins. Moniker’s extended auction from DOMAINfest Prague ends Wednesday, and SnapNames’ October Showcase Auction is underway and includes 16 three letter .com domain names. The extended auction includes 890 domain names with starting bids and reserves ranging from $300 up to $6,470,590 for WorkatHome.com. A handful of domains have bids, most notably supplement.com for $61,330. AppetizerRecipes.com has a $3,050 ... read more ...
Mon 11th October 2010
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Internet Explorer 13? Microsoft is Covering the Bases with Domain Registrations - Microsoft registers domain names for future versions of Internet Explorer. How many versions of Internet Explorer, Microsoft’s market-leading web browser, will we see? Just in case, Microsoft has registered a handful of domain names up to version number 13. Through its domain name management company, Microsoft recently registered InternetExplorer12.com and InternetExplorer13.com. It also registered ie12beta.com and ie13beta.com. Microsoft is a slow learner. InternetExplorer8.com ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Microsoft Files Cybersquatting Lawsuit Over Bing Domain Names - Microsoft goes after Bing cybersquatters. Microsoft has filed a lawsuit (pdf) against a California man and several John Does over their registration of domain names containing the “Bing” mark. The suit lists 21 allegedly infringing domain names ranging from aolbing.com to BingPornTube.com to Bing-Search.com. Microsoft says that over 1,500 domain names containing “bing” were registered each month in the two months following the announcement of its search ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Go Daddy Gets Into Local Advertising with AdSpace - Registrar launches new service to drive leads to local businesses. Local advertising companies such as Marchex and ReachLocal have a new heavyweight competitor: GoDaddy. The domain name registration giant today announced the launch of AdSpace, an online advertising service to help local businesses start generating leads online. AdSpace is similar to services offered by competitors in this space. Customers provide some information about their business including description, ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
DotAsia to Get Internationalized Domain Names - Non-latin characters coming to .asia. ICANN Senior Vice President of Services Kurt Pritz has notified (pdf) DotAsia Organisation LTD that it is granting permission to start offering internationalized domain names on .asia. In the letter, Pritz praised DotAsia for its “leadership in promoting the coordination of the domain-name system in the public interest.” Meant for residents and companies of Asian countries, the .asia sTLD hasn’t really caught on. Registrations ... read more ...