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 12th December 2014
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
13 finish user domain name sales from final week - RestaurantUniforms.com leads the list. Sedo handled 458 transactions last week for a total of about $1.0 million of domain name sales. The biggest public sale was RestaurantUniforms.com, purchased by New York uniform company Paragon Uniform Apparel, Inc. Another notable sale was GIII.com. Although the price tag was only $5,000, the buyer is a $2.1 billion (market cap) clothing company. Here’s the list of some of the week’s end user sales at the Sedo marketplace: (You ... read more ...
Thu 11th December 2014
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Over 200 Expired Domain Sales Results, including Kickbox.com - Joseph Peterson reviews the past week’s expired domain name sales. The combat sport that brought Jean-Claude Van Damme to the silver screen (and eventually put “the Muscles from Brussels” to work in maracas-shaking GoDaddy commercials) had a notable expired domain sale last week: Kickbox.com ended at NameJet just a dollar shy of $12k. I’d say Kickbox.com is agile enough to be used inside or outside the literal ring, and we may see it developed with no ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Blast from a past: Tucows relaunches RealNames (and it’s really different) - Tucows uses name of dot.com bubble era company to launch new service. Remember RealNames? Tucows has brought back the name of the the dot.com bubble darling, but for a very different purpose. RealNames was a system designed to replace or circumvent domain names. Instead of typing a domain name like Money.com in your browser, you could just type “Money”. RealNames would resolve the query to whomever had registered the keyword “Money” with RealNames (at a cost, ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
6 new tip turn domain names launched yesterday, and a many renouned is… - Six new domain options launched, and you might be surprised by which one had the best first day. Donuts and Rightside combined to launch six top level domain names yesterday. Rightside launched .auction and .software. Donuts launched .business, .immo, .network and .pizza. Guess which one had the most registrations? If you’re an English speaker, you probably guessed wrong. According to nTLDstats, .immo ended the “zone file” day with the most registrations at ... read more ...
Wed 10th December 2014
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
A outline of unequivocally engaging information in Rightside’s Investor Presentation - Investor presentation shows initial results from five of Rightside’s TLDs, explains how the company picked TLDs to acquire, and describes the method used to identify premium domain names. One of the great things about having publicly traded domain name companies is that we can get more data from the companies than we can from private ones. Rightside (NASDAQ: NAME) is a prime example. Rightside held its first Investor Analyst Day last Friday. You can view the entire ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Which domain name registrars mislaid (and won) transfers according to many new central data - Latest published data shows August performance of Moniker and other domain name registrars. ICANN just published Verisign’s official .com numbers from August, which gives us a chance to check in on how certain registrars are doing from a customer standpoint. I’ve been checking these reports over the past few months to see how many domains Moniker is losing after changing its account interface. What I thought would be massive hemorrhaging has proven to be just ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Heritage Auctions to reason super-exclusive domain auction during Waldorf Astoria Hotel - Auction will be limited to 30 high quality domain names. Heritage Auctions is trying something different for its next domain name auction: it will be a super-exclusive event held at the Waldorf Astoria Hotel in New York. What makes it so exclusive? There will only be 30 domain names at the auction. That’s the smallest (in terms of number of lots) live domain auction I can recall. It also means the inventory will be limited to high quality, one word domain names ... read more ...
Tue 9th December 2014
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Analyst reiterates new TLD foresee and cost aim for Rightside - After Rightside investor day, analyst says forecast is on target. B. Riley Co analyst Sameet Sinha has reiterated his forecast for new top level domain names and his $15 price target for Rightside. Rightside (NASDAQ: NAME) is currently trading for $8.29. Sinha forecasts that 29.1 million registrations will be made under new to level domain names by the end of 2016. Based on 3.4 million domains registered to date, he believes his forecast of 3.6 million by the end ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Donuts and Rightside recover 6 new domains on Wednesday - …And they’re some of the better domains released so far. Remember the good ole’ days of the middle of 2014, when mega-registry Donuts would release four of five new top level domain names every week? Well, they’re back. For one week, anyway. Donuts will launch four new domain names at “regular” pricing this week after the conclusion of their early access phases: .business, .network, .immo and .pizza. .Business and .Network are interesting because they ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
GoDaddy gets another Domain Appraisal patent - Patent covers using comps for domain name evaluation. GoDaddy has been issued another U.S. patent related to domain name appraisals. The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office today issued patent number 8,909,558 for “Appraising a domain name using keyword monetary value data”. The patent basically covers using comps for a domain name appraisal, i.e. looking up sales of other domain names including similar keywords and using this to determine value. GoDaddy has a number ... read more ...
Mon 8th December 2014
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
CentralNic sells $2.5 million value of reward domain names - Sales were from the company’s portfolio of domain names. CentralNic plc, (AIM:CNIC) announced today that it has sold $2.5 million worth of premium domain names. These domain names are part of the group’s 20,000 domain name holdings that are not related to new top level domain names. The company did not disclose which domain names it sold. CentralNic also cited delays in new top level domain names coming to market for lower-than-expected sales in new TLDs. In its ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Rightside rings NASDAQ shutting bell [Photo] - Domain name company holds investor day and rings closing bell. On Friday, domain name company Rightside rang the closing bell on the NASDAQ. The company became listed on the NASDAQ earlier this year after being spun off from Demand Media. Rightside trades under the ticker ‘NAME’. Earlier in the day Friday, Rightside held its first Investor Analyst Day event at Nasdaq MarketSite in Times Square. Rightside is pitching new top level domain names as the future, and ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
New TLDs & Minds + Machines with Antony Van Couvering – DNW Podcast #10 - A discussion about new top level domain names. Antony Van Couvering, founder and CEO of new TLD company Minds + Machines, shares his thoughts on new top level domain names on this week’s podcast. We discuss registry pricing of premium domains, niche TLDs, domain name registration channels and more. It’s an enlightening discussion with the founder of one of the largest new TLD companies. Also: Two warnings for domain name owners, the Dark Side of Domain Parking, ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Oops: Moniker comment balances are apparently borked - Incorrect balances shown on accounts dating back to October. The hits keep on coming for Moniker…and its customers. When the domain name registrar switched to a completely new registrar platform over the summer, it lost all previous invoices that customers used to be able to view within their account. Customers got access to new invoices, and could see an up-to-date balance, but couldn’t see their transactions from before the platform switch. Then, some time around ... read more ...
Fri 5th December 2014
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
2 weeks of lapsed domain name sales - This article covers a 2-week period on either side of Thanksgiving: 19 November – 2 December. For that reason, you’ll see the sales list crammed full to bursting like a ClownCar.com ($662). I was going to jettison everything below $300 to save space, but I figure readers can quite easily scroll past extra information. GoDaddy’s top expired auction last week comes as a bit of a surprise. Whatever its accrued merits for SEO, the 4-word, 23-letter BarnDoorSlidingHardware.com ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Porn site user sues cybersquatters - Company goes after alleged cybersquatters of its adult site brands. The company behind PornHub.com, RedTube.com and YouPorn.com has filed multiple lawsuits in U.S. District court against the owners of at least ten domain names it alleges are cybersquatting on its brands. The lawsuit was filed by Licensing IP International S.à.r.l., which is commonly known as MindGeek. Targeted in the suits are typos, country codes and other domains that contain its brands: PoernHub.com, ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
QNB.com domain name sells for $1 million - Bank sells domain name to another bank for $1 million. Qatar National Bank has paid $1 million to acquire the three letter domain name QNB.com. The deal was disclosed in an SEC filing made by the seller, another bank called QNB Bank. The seller changed its web presence to QNBBank.com. Changing a bank’s domain name is a big deal, and I’m not surprised at the price tag on this deal given the circumstances. Qatar National Bank uses the country code domain name QNB.com.qa ... read more ...
Thu 4th December 2014
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Companies don’t wish we to use Whois privacy, though they use it themselves - Brands owners benefit from whois privacy, even though they’d prefer their adversaries not be able to use it. There’s a common myth in intellectual property circles that, if it weren’t for whois privacy and proxy services, there would be a lot less bad stuff on the internet. I can bust a hole right in the myth. But instead, I’d like to point out something these companies don’t often admit: they are some of the biggest users of whois privacy. I was reminded ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Last week’s finish user domain name sales during Sedo - A Hong Kong game developer, investment firm and manufacturer bought domain names last week. Sedo handled 509 domain name transactions last week, for a total of $1.3 million. It was a little bit harder than usual to find obvious end user sales, but there are plenty of them. Once again, many of the sales were to people who owned one TLD version of a domain picking up another. Here’s the list of some of the week’s end user sales at the Sedo marketplace: (You can ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Researchers investigate a “Dark Side of Domain Parking” - A team of researchers says a number of domain name parking companies are up to no good. A group of researchers, mostly from Indiana University, recently presented a study about the “Dark Side of Domain Parking”. The study (pdf) was presented at USENIX Security Symposium in August, but I just became aware of it today and don’t recall this being covered elsewhere. The researchers wanted to understand the domain name parking business and if parking companies were ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
GoDaddy Hangout to explain Expired Domains - What happens when a domain name expires? GoDaddy is hosting a Hangout this afternoon that will be useful for anyone who wants to learn more about expired domain names. I think this will be a good online event for anyone who doesn’t understand the lifecycle of a domain name and what they should do if they want to acquire an expiring domain. It will also be helpful for domain name investors who want to learn more about GoDaddy’s expired domain purchasing options. ... read more ...
Wed 3rd December 2014
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Minds + Machines pockets another $4.4 million from losing new TLD auctions - Company now has $45 million in cash. New top level domain name applicant Minds + Machines continues to add to its pile of cash by losing new TLD contention set auctions. In a release out this morning, the company said it received $4.4 million for withdrawing applications for .latino, .school and one as-yet-unnamed application. .School was a four way race won by Donuts. Other applicants included Fegistry and Uniregistry. .Latino was a two way race won by Dish. Dish ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Exhibit 1: Why Whois corroboration for domain registrations is so stupid - Whois verification is just begging for phishers. A lot has been made about the new requirement this year for domain name registrars to verify certain aspects of Whois contact information provided by registrations. Over a million domain names have been suspended due to the failure by the owner to click a link in an email sent by the registrar for a domain name. But don’t click to quickly. It might be a phishing attempt. In fact, the way it’s set up, this verification ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN
How many people see domain investors - This guy got his name as a domain name, but he wasn’t happy about how it all went down. Want to know how a person trying to get his hands on a domain name sees domain name investors? Here’s a pretty good summary. Brad Frost, a web developer (and speaker, writer, consultant, musician, and artist, according to his bio) recently went through the ordeal of acquiring BradFrost.com. The domain was previously registered by another Brad Frost, and this Brad Frost waited ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Meet 8 people who spent some-more than $10,000 on a .NYC domain name - With over 60,000 domain names registered, the new .NYC domain name is off to a roaring start. During the “landrush phase”, over 1,000 .NYC domain names had more than one interested party and were thus headed to auction. Ten domain names, according registry records, sold for more than $10,000. One of the ten on the list appears to be a typo, so I looked up the remaining nine to find out who would spend so much money on a .NYC domain name. A general conclusion: ... read more ...