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.

Thu 26th December 2013
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
HomeAway sues Airbnb over birdhouses - Airbnb irks rival by launching birdhouse ad campaign. Publicly traded vacation rental site HomeAway (NASDAQ: AWAY) has sued upstart rival Airbnb for trademark infringement after the latter launched an ad campaign featuring birdhouses. HomeAway’s logo prominently features a birdhouse, and the company uses birdhouses as its sort of “mascot.” A birdhouse is featured at HomeAway’s Austin headquarters and new employees design their own birdhouses. In its lawsuit ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN
NAR pitches .realtor domains (free for 1 year) and disses .re - NAR to provide free .realtor registration for one year. National Association of REALTORS (NAR) sent an email to its members earlier this month pitching “priority registration” for .realtor domain names. Priority Registration basically means they will email you a day before general availability to remind you about .realtor registration. The email points members to SignUpForDotREALTOR.com. .realtor will be offered for one year free to the first 500,000 members ... read more ...
Tue 24th December 2013
Written by DomainNameWire in EN
2013 in review: a tip Domain Name stories of a year - Check in daily from December 26 until the New Year for a recap of 2013’s biggest domain name stories. 2014 is going to be big for the domain industry. BIG. 2013 set the stage for 2014. So before moving on to the new year, Domain Name Wire is going to take a look back at what 2013 brought us. Starting December 26, stop in daily for a review of one of the biggest stories from 2013. Yes, there will be some talk about milestones in the new top level domain program. ... read more ...
Mon 23rd December 2013
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Water Night during NamesCon is open for registration - Charitable event hopes to raise $55,000 for clean water. Water Night, a charitable event benefiting The Water School, will take place on the last night of NamesCon next month in Las Vegas. The event is from 8 pm to midnight on January 14 at the Havana Room at the Tropicana Hotel, where the rest of the conference is taking place. Although free to attend for NamesCon attendees, registration is required. NamesCon attendees are asked to make a donation, but it’s not ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
A domainer looks behind during 2013 - One domainer says 2013 was more good than bad – but that had a lot to do with lowered expectations. It’s human nature that most people broadcast their successes yet hide their failures. That’s especially common in the domain name industry. That’s not the case for Eric Borgos of Impulse Communications. He lays it all out there – including his annual sales and income! Each year he also writes up a summary of how the year went for him, and it’s definitely ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
WIPO row awards StAndrews.com domain name to golf course - Famous golf course to get control of StAndrews.com domain name. A World Intellectual Property Organization UDRP panelist has awarded the StAndrews.com domain name to St Andrews Links, one of the oldest golf courses in the world. This was an interesting case because St Andrew is also the name of the town in which St Andrews Links is located, and also has several other uses. In fact, when I search Google for “St Andrews,” the first page of results has only one mention ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Calle: New TLDs will be good for .Co - .Co Internet CEO thinks new TLDs will gain acceptance over time and ultimately be good for his own .co domain name. Everyone has been asking the question about what new TLDs mean for .com. Few have been asking what new TLDs mean for existing alternatives to .com, such as .me, .info, and of course .co. .Co Internet CEO Juan Diego Calle has weighed in on the issue on the .Co company blog. It’s a well-thought out post worth reading in its entirety, but I’ll attempt ... read more ...
Fri 20th December 2013
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
More foolish supervision division with new tip turn domain names - The government of India should be thrilled that .ram was applied for as a .brand, which will protect the domain from potentially offensive uses.I’ve written before about hard headed governments and their challenges against particular top level domain names. I was reminded of another such case today, thanks to the Government of India sending a letter (pdf) to ICANN reiterating its opposition to a couple strings. The government is opposed to the delegation of .RAM. ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
WIPO pats itself on a behind for Legal Rights Objections - Even if it didn’t mean to, WIPO should pat itself on the back for its handling of Legal Rights Objections. World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) has issued a lengthy report (pdf) detailing the process and results from managing Legal Rights Objections to new top level domain names. Although the report is merely an analysis, it appears WIPO is quietly patting itself on the back for a job well done. While the two other arbitration groups are still finalizing ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN
Advertising on Domain Name Wire in 2014 - 2014 will be a transformative year in the domain name industry. Whether you believe that new top level domain names will be a huge success, a flop, or somewhere in between, there’s no doubt they’ll be the top news story of 2014. More focus than ever will be placed on the domain name industry and the business of domain names. Domain Name Wire, the longest running blog about the business of domain names, will continue to cover all aspects of the new top level domain ... read more ...
Thu 19th December 2013
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
A stellar week for large sheet finish user domain name sales during Sedo, 25 domains adult to $100k - Sedo racks up a number of big ticket end user domain name sales. Sedo sold $1.4 million worth of domain names last week. And for those of you that always complain about end users getting off too cheap, I think you’ll like some of the sales on this week’s list. The top one is Pizza.nl at €75,000 (appx $100k USD). See more end user reports here. Pizza.nl €75,000 (appx $100k USD) – Takeaway.com, a pizza and food delivery service. NextDirect.co.uk £1,500 ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Clear examples of craziness in Limited Public Interest Objections - Latest .health decisions show that Limited Public Interest objections are not consistent. An International Chamber of Commerce panel has handed down a decision on a consolidated limited public interest objection against .health. The decision shows more inconsistencies in how panels are handling limited public interest objections. The case against DotHealth LLC’s (pdf) and Donuts’ .health (pdf) applications was filed by Independent Objector Alain Pellet. Pellet ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN
Quick domain name news from around a web - 11 slapped for new TLD commercials, Donuts wins more auctions, and other domain name news from around the web. There was a lot of domain name news this morning that other bloggers have done a good job covering. Here’s a quick roundup. 11′s new gTLD ads banned for “misleading” viewers – Kevin Murphy writes about how the UK’s Advertising Standards Authority has ruled that 11’s “pre-registration” ads for new top level domain names have been banned for ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
This one striking threatens to derail swell in a new TLD program - “See, we told you this whole thing is a shakedown.” This one graphic below, as spotted by Michael Berkens earlier today and published on Vox Populi’s website, threatens to set the forward momentum of the new TLD program back quite a bit: (click here for full size) Any ground the Intellectual Property Constituency was going to give in its ongoing requests to ICANN. Any ground the Governmental Advisory Committee was going to give on its advice to ICANN. It’s ... read more ...
Wed 18th December 2013
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Domain name association Tucows headed to a NASDAQ - Company to list on NASDAQ and perform a reverse stock split. If you’ve watched Tucows’ stock over the fast few years, you’ve seen it go from under $1 to almost $3, and its market cap hit $125 million: The stock surge is due to a couple things. First, the company has grown its stock price the old fashion way: making money. Second, it has used some of its excess cash to buy back its own shares. Now the company is headed to the NASDAQ in addition to its existing ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
32 finish user domain name sales adult to $50,000 - Gaming company, natural food store, and rental car company make domain name purchases. GoDaddy and Afternic combined to sell over $1.8 million worth of domain names last week. Here are 32 that were sold to end users. See previous end user sales reports here. Humble.com $50,000 – Humble Bundle, which sells PC and Android games on a pay-what-you-want model and donates money to charity. Its websites is HumbleBundle.com. EconomyRentalCars.com $25,000 – Economy Rent ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
New TLD discussion finalizes bulletin for Mar event - Third installment of gTLD Strategy Congress returns to New York City in March. The 3rd Digital Marketing gTLD Strategy Congress is coming to New York City March 3-4 at the Dream Hotel. Momentum Event Group, the show’s organizer, has published the conference guide and agenda (pdf). It appears the show will be good for a wide variety of people involved with new TLDs as the domains launch next year. The audience at previous events has been primarily existing applicants ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Google updates URL dismissal tool, aka mugshot/revenge porn dismissal tool - System allows people to alert Google that a page has been deleted, blocked, or changed. Google has improved its tools for removing a page from its search results or cache on a website you don’t own. The tool is designed for people to alert Google that a page has been deleted, had robots.txt added, or the content has been changed. I think you can call this the mugshot removal tool, since one of its purposes is to remove mugshot pages from Google once the mugshot ... read more ...
Tue 17th December 2013
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Is there such a thing as a brandable general TLD? - Some generic domain extensions will need to create a brand to be successful. Over a thousand new top level domain names are headed to the web, and hundreds of them will be open to the general public for registration. A lot of them are generic in nature: .web, .site, .website… Much like .info, you can register these domain names for any use. The domain names make sense and they aren’t limited to a niche. But could a generic domain name become a brand of its own? One ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Frank Schilling sets a theatre for 2014. More domain parking revenue? - Will Google pay more to domain name owners in 2014? Frank Schilling thinks it’s possible. Frank Schilling just sent a newsletter to DomainNameSales.com clients, and in it he makes a couple predictions for 2014. One is that new top level domain names will be a big deal. It’s no surprise that Schilling, who has invested tens of millions of dollars in new TLDs, would say this. But he also argues that existing second level domain name owners will benefit from the ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Parajumpers wins a UDRP on third try - Company behind Parajumpers clothing brand takes UDRP more seriously and wins Parajumpers.org domain name. Ape Partners S. p. A. and licensee PJS International S.A. have finally won a UDRP for a Parajumpers domain name after three tries. The company sells winter clothing under the brand name Parajumpers. In May the company filed complaints against the domain names parajumpers-outlet.com and parajumpers.com. Based on the panel decisions, it appears the company and ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Domainers are going to adore and hatred a QLP.com UDRP decision - Complaint fails, by why did only one panelist find Quality Logo Products guilty of reverse domain name hijacking? Get On The Web, Ltd has successfully defended the domain name QLP.com in a UDRP brought by Quality Logo Products, Inc. While the overall decision in the case was good, domain investors are still going to be upset about some of the details. The obvious fact here is that QLP.com is a generic domain. It was also registered in 1999. That’s seven years before ... read more ...
Mon 16th December 2013
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
HomeAway gets 161 domain names with Stayz acquisition - HomeAway’s acquisition of Stayz included a number of descriptive Australian ccTLD domain names. Earlier this month vacation rental company HomeAway bought Australian competitor Stayz for a little over $200 million. The SEC filing about the acquisition lists 161 domain names (pdf) that were included in the deal. In addition to the many defensive brand registrations, it’s interesting to see some of the generic/descriptive domain names Stayz registered for its business. Some ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
This association competence be peaceful to compensate $12,500 for a new second turn domain name - Who would pay over ten grand for a new second level domain name? A lot of people were in shock last week when GoDaddy unveiled its pricing for Donuts’ Early Access Program registrations. The Early Access Program (EAP) is Donuts’ version of the traditional landrush period. Instead of accepting applications and auctioning the domain names off the the highest bidder, EAP is sort of like a Dutch auction. The EAP goes on for five days, and the price to register a domain ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
People are already frontrunning on a subsequent turn of new TLDs - .Whatever trademark applications are still being submitted to the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. Before the application period for the current round of new top level domain names opened, many people and companies filed trademark applications to try to claim superior rights to strings. They applied for trademarks on .app, .wedding…you name it. The practice was known as new TLD trademark fronrunning. This didn’t actually do them any good in the application process. ... read more ...