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 6th May 2015
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Carly Fiorina jokes about induction SethMeyers.org - Presidential hopeful jokes with comedian about domain names. There’s been quite a bit of mainstream coverage this past week about presidential candidate Carly Fiorina and domain names. The press has said that she forgot to register CarlyFiorina.org. Some other person registered it and is using it to highlight layoffs under her tenure at HP. (As it turns out, her company actually used to own the domain name and let it expire.) Fiorina is having a laugh about it, including on Late Night with Seth ... read more ...
 
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Organizer of "Great Run" events intent in retreat domain name hijacking - Panel finds that group brought was attempting to reverse domain name hijack GreatRun.com. Nova International Limited, the company that organizes the Great Run series of events, has been found to have engaged in reverse domain name hijacking in a UDRP for GreatRun.com. The complainants use the domain name GreatRun.org, which it registered in 2002. Panelist Gabriela Kennedy gave three reasons she believes Nova International brought its case in abuse of the policy: 1. It likely chose a .org domain ... read more ...
Tue 5th May 2015
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Which new TLDs I'm renewing (and not) - I’ve renewed most of my new TLDs so far, but that might change. New top level domain names have been out for over a year now, and that means those of us who registered them are facing renewal decisions. We already know early renewal results, at least from the biggest registry: for Donuts, early renewal rates ranged from 55%-72% per top level domain. I haven’t gone big on new top level domain names. I have about 60 in my portfolio and I’ve mostly registered domains in generic extensions. Some ... read more ...
 
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Verisign wants obvious for "Searchable Web Whois" - Company files patent application for improved whois searching across multiple registries. Verisign has filed a patent with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office for a “searchable web whois”. The application was filed in 2012 and just published today. The patent application suggests that current whois search, especially across multiple registries, is hard. It claims that current services only search a single registry per search request, it’s difficult to index whois records in real time, it’s ... read more ...
 
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.Com domain name winners and losers - eNom and Uniregistry do well on transfers, GoDaddy and eNom lead in new registrations. ICANN just published the most recent .com transactions report, reflecting registrar results for .com from January. There were no major outliers from January in terms of .com transfers, but Google Domains made an appearance on the top gainers list. 9,770 domains were transferred to Google’s new domain name registrar. I wonder if these were from consumers transferring their domains or if Google transferred some ... read more ...
Mon 4th May 2015
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People wasting income on Princess Charlotte Domain Names - I’m not sure why people are wasting money on these domain names. People register domain names whenever a celebrity baby is born, and the news of the latest British royal baby is Princess Charlotte is no exception. So far today, about 100 Charlotte-related domain names have been registered in .com and .net, according to Verisign’s DomainView tool. This only includes domain names with “Charlotte” in them (excluding any related to the city of Charlotte and other people name Charlotte). What ... read more ...
 
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The value of brief domain names with Andrew Rosener – DNW Podcast #31 - Andrew Rosener discusses the value of short domain names and his brokerage Media Options. Andrew Rosener, founder of domain name brokerage Media Options, discusses the rapid price appreciation of short domain names including 2 and 3-character domains (and even longer). Why are they shooting up in value? How much are they worth? Andrew also explains why the letters that many of us prized in these domain names a couple years ago aren’t necessarily the most valuable today. He also discusses his brokerage ... read more ...
 
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.XYZ Featured on HBO's Silicon Valley - Tech company on show creates division using .xyz domain name. The .XYZ domain name was featured on HBO’s Silicon Valley last night. A big tech company featured in the show, Hooli, creates a new experimental division for moonshot projects called Hooli XYZ, hosted at Hooli.xyz. The show created a website on Hooli.xyz. The site says: HooliXYZ = who? A select team of “XYZeniuses.” It also list a bunch of the projects Hooli XYZ will work on: Self-driving cars? Flying cars? Self-flying cars? A space ... read more ...
 
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New TLDs (.XYZ?) boost Web.com's bookings - “Very aggressive” new TLD promotions paying off for Web.com. Many in the domain name community blasted Web.com and .xyz for the hundreds of thousands of free domain names Web.com gave away last year through Network Solutions. Was it, perhaps, a brilliant business move? Web.com reported a bookings boost this past quarter, and the company says this is due to higher-than-expected renewal rates on new TLDs. Here’s Web.com CEO David Brown on last week’s conference call: Yes, I want to be very ... read more ...
Fri 1st May 2015
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Northwest Austin is selling Weebly like crazy - Campaign to halt redevelopment is introducing people to website builder Weebly. Over a hundred of my neighbors in northwest Austin are advertising website builder Weebly. It’s a case where a non-paying customer does more good than a paying one. How did Weebly pull this off? It didn’t have to do anything at all. There’s an office complex in the area called Austin Oaks. The 12 building, 450,000 square foot complex has been around for quite some time. The owners want to tear down the complex and ... read more ...
Thu 30th April 2015
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.Porn and .Adult domain names mangle morning records - Provocative domains, low pricing, marketing and promotion with Trademark Clearinghouse boost early numbers for new adult domains. ICM Registry announced today that its .Porn and .Adult domain names each received about 4,000 registrations during the sunrise trademark period. That’s more than any other new top level domain names to date. The strong interest was certainly fueled by the nature of the domains and news about Taylor Swift buying her name, but it went beyond that. ICM Registry offered ... read more ...
 
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Short domain names lead lapsed domain name sales - Joseph Peterson reviews the past week of expired domain name sales at NameJet. China and the USA take turns as king of the mountain. Last week, an English domain was perched on top of our pile of expired NameJet auctions. This week China occupies both the #1 and #3 positions with PQA.com ($17.1k) and 058.net ($5k) respectively, while #2 currently remains indeterminate. METE.com ($12.3k) can be regarded as an English word, a verb meaning to measure and dispense some allotment. Yet it’s so archaic ... read more ...
 
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A name that unsuccessful a "radio test" was spiteful this genuine estate business - Old name led to a “word-of-mouth” issue for company. Technology-driven real estate startup TripleMint just raised $1.65 million from investors. It’s also changing its name from one that caused it problems. TripleMint used to be called Suitey, a name that I don’t know how to say, and if someone told me about it I wouldn’t know how to spell it. My guess is it was a play on “sweetie” and the real estate context of “suite”. Co-founder David Walker explained that the old name was “really ... read more ...
 
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ChinesePot.com owners can keep domain name notwithstanding not responding to UDRP - Owner of ChinesePod.com loses case against ChinesePot.com. Language instruction service Chinesepod Limited, which uses the domain name ChinesePoD.com, has lost a UDRP against the owner of ChinesePoT.com. It’s a case of a “typo” also being a common word. The owner of ChinesePot.com didn’t respond to the UDRP, but ChinesePod didn’t convince a World Intellectual Property panelist of the merits of its case. Although the parked page at ChinesePot.com consists of lots of links to language instruction, ... read more ...
 
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Who needs .Sucks? Microsoft registers Microsoft Edge Sucks domains in .com. - Company registers multiple derogatory domain names related to its new browser. There’s been a lot of chatter lately about the .Sucks domain name and how brands feel like they’re being coerced into paying big bucks to protect themselves. At the same time, a lot of these companies aren’t paying $10 to register BrandSucks.com. An exception is Microsoft, which is getting out ahead of feedback on its new Microsoft Edge browser by snapping up derogatory domain names. Among the company’s domain ... read more ...
 
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A demeanour during Neustar's domain name base - Company is counting on new TLDs for growth in domain name business, but it’s slow. Neustar reported earnings yesterday and released updated information on its base of domain names registered. .Co continues to perform well for the company, adding $5.2 million revenue in the first quarter. Additionally, the company has operating agreements with 122 new top level domains that have signed agreements with ICANN. 43 are already in market. This chart shows how many domain names Neustar is managing, both ... read more ...
Wed 29th April 2015
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Addiction.com launches after domain name sole final year - Rehab company launches site at great domain Addiction.com. Addiction.com sold last year and was recently launched.Elements Behavioral Health recently launched the site Addiction.com, and the company’s comments about the high cost of the domain name should be reassuring to domain name investors. Vera Appleyard, Elements Behavioral Health’s chief internet and media officer, told publication Behavioral Health that the domain name was very expensive but the organization considered the expense part ... read more ...
 
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150 Sedo Direct Auctions started on initial day - Domain name owners jump on Sedo’s new Direct Auction option. Apparently there’s quite a bit of demand to start an auction on the Sedo marketplace. Sedo’s new Direct Auction, which lets anyone start a domain name auction, had 150 orders on launch day yesterday. You can see many of the domains on Sedo’s Marketplace Auctions page. There’s no clear delineation between Direct auctions and others, but the scheduled auctions and some of the auctions with six days left include many owner-initiated ... read more ...
 
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24 End User Domain Name Sales - End user sales including a couple new TLDs. Sedo handled 569 domain name transactions last week for a total of $1.2 million, a pretty solid week for the domain name marketplace. A number of German companies bought domain names, sometimes finding shorter alternatives to their hyphenated domains. A popular golf equipment company picked up a descriptive domain for used golf clubs, a bath products company bought a creative domain, and the company behind Twix candy bars bought a brand-related domain. ... read more ...
Tue 28th April 2015
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Startup domain name fails: 68% destroy radio test - Majority of companies attending startup conference have problematic domain names. Name Ninja recently performed an analysis of the domain names used by startups going to the Collision conference in Las Vegas next month. The domain name consultancy found that only 21% of companies have the “ideal” domain name for their business. A whopping 68% of company’s domain names fail the “radio test”, meaning they are not spelled the way they sound. It’s pretty easy to spot some of these names ... read more ...
 
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Sedo now lets clients start their possess domain name auctions - Domainers can start their own reserve auctions…for a fee. Sedo is offering domain name sellers a new option to start an auction on its domain name marketplace. Called Direct Auction, clients can now select domain names to be auctioned, when they start and a reserve price. It costs $59 to start a Direct Auction. Previously, sellers could start an auction in response to an offer on their domain (aka “push to auction”) or by submitting it through Great Domains. They could also work with an account ... read more ...
 
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Are Zombie TLDs entrance this year? - Some of these TLDs can’t string along much longer. Hundreds of new top level domain names are now available. Some are doing reasonably well while others are not (to put it mildly). Will 2015 see the first new TLD “failures”, in which a top level domain operator calls it quits? We might have seen it already. The companies I’m most concerned about are the ones that operate just one or two TLDs and have a big staff (i.e., lots of overhead). If they aren’t getting traction after about a year, ... read more ...
 
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CentralNic doubled income in 2014 - Company posts big gains, likely due to acquisition of domain name registrar last year. Domain name services company CentralNic doubled its revenue in 2014 and increased its adjusted EBITDA by 65%. The company grew its topline from £3.891 million to £6.067 million. Adjusted EBITDA, which excludes acquisition deal fees and non-cash charges, grew from £1.015 million in 2013 to £1.724 in 2014. Its actual profits before tax dipped for the year. CentralNic doesn’t break out results from each division, ... read more ...
Mon 27th April 2015
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New TLDs this week: .Video, .Fit and .Sale - Minds + Machines and Rightside introduce new domain names this week. A few domain names hit general availability or Early Access this Wednesday. Minds + Machines will launch .Fit with retail pricing of about $25 or so. .Fit is one of the company’s wholly owned domain names, and is the last domain name the group has scheduled to launch until Q3. Rightside starts the Early Access phase for two domain names on Wednesday: .Video and .Sale. If you can wait one week until general availability you’ll ... read more ...
 
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Responding to Domain Name Offers with Bill Sweetman – DNW Podcast #30 - Name Ninja Bill Sweetman talks about his role as a domain buyer broker, and how domain name owners should respond to offers to buy their domain names. Domain name consultant Bill Sweetman of Name Ninja helps companies find and buy the right domain name for their business. In this episode, he discusses how he helps companies and provides tips for domain name owners about how to respond to an inquiry to purchase one of their domain names. Also: Analyzing GoDaddy’s $28.1 million purchase of Marchex’s ... read more ...