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 14th November 2013
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Frank Schilling’s initial new tip turn domain name is live - You can now visit a .tattoo domain name. Frank Schilling’s .tattoo is alive with nic.tattoo. Yes, that’s a domain name. And it’s now on the internet. It’s the first second level domain of Schilling’s TLD bids that you can actually visit from your browser. Included on the site, which is a pitch “artists, studios, and individuals” about the future availability of .tattoo domain names, is a video of Frank Schilling philosophizing about tattoos. If he does ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Type a new TLD in Chrome, and a browser will ask we if we unequivocally meant it - Did you really mean to go to nic.tattoo? New top level domain names are being delegated to the root, but Google Chrome wants to make sure you really meant to type them in. Here’s what happens when you type one of these new domain names into Chrome: It defaults to a Google search for “nic.newtld”, and you have to click a link to go to the actual web address. You only have to click the link once and then you don’t get the message when you visit the domain again. ... read more ...
Wed 13th November 2013
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Sedo auctioning off 100 of Yahoo’s domain names including AV.com - AV.com, Sled.com, and other Yahoo domain names go on the auction block. Sedo is holding an auction this month in which it is selling over 100 of Yahoo’s domain names. The auction runs November 11-21. Currently there are just 29 domains listed on the auction page, but an email I received from Sedo says there will be more than 100 domains in the auction. The names are quite good. Here are some of my favorites: Sled.com – would be good for a winter sportsgoods site ... read more ...
 
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Motorola spends $7,500 shopping MotoG.com domain name for the new phone - Motorola buys domain name for phone at last minute. This week’s Sedo end user sales report includes a few big companies. One of the companies buying a domain on the aftermarket was Motorola, which bought MotoG.com for its new moto g phone that comes out today. It forwards the domain to its moto-g.com website. Here’s the list: EasyLoan.co.uk 3,500 GBP – Easyloans LTD, a UK company. It doesn’t seem to be the same company that owns EasyLoans.co.uk. MiamiWatersports.com ... read more ...
 
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ICANN cautions about new TLD pre-registrations - ICANN weighs in on pre-registrations for new top level domain names. With more and more domain name registrars offering some sort of pre-registration or pre-reservation service for new top level domain names, ICANN has published a word of caution. Cyrus Namazi, Vice President of DNS Industry Engagement for ICANN, published a blog post today titled “Pre-Reserve a Domain Name, or Not? ICANN Answers the Question.” Namazi warns against services that “guarantee” ... read more ...
 
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Tucows shares rocket to $3.00 on earnings, new TLD deal - Deal with Donuts bolsters Q3 earnings. Shares of Tucows (NYSE AMEX:TCX, TSX:TC) shot up 15% to $3.00 in after hours trading after the company announced third quarter earnings. The company got a big cash boost from its deal with Donuts to withdraw its applications for the .marketing and .media top level domain name applications. Although the exact dollar figure of the deal was not disclosed in the earnings release, there’s a huge jump in the company’s “portfolio” ... read more ...
Tue 12th November 2013
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
22 finish user domain sales, including a slurl - More end user domain name sales. These are GoDaddy/Afternic sales from two weeks ago that appear to involve an end user. One of these domains is a slurl. See if you can spot it! SGCP.com $20,000 – SG Capital Partners in Stamford, Connecticut. Suzan.com $2,000 – Japanese company Suzan, which uses Suzan.co.jp ForTheRide.com $5,600 – Triumph Motorcycles ResidentialFlagpoles.com $3,000 – Concord Industries, maker of flag poles. LillyLaw.com $3,333 – law firm ... read more ...
 
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Coffee Bean Direct loses second box opposite CoffeeDirect.com (and no response!) - Online coffee seller fails to snag CoffeeDirect.com through a UDRP for a second time. Coffee Bean Direct’s two attempts to get CoffeeDirect.com through UDRP have been a train wreck. Or maybe a hot coffee spill?Coffee Bean Direct LLC, an online coffee seller, has lost its second UDRP against the domain name CoffeeDirect.com. In both cases the owner of CoffeeDirect.com didn’t bother to respond but still won the case. If you look at the facts, this won’t come as ... read more ...
 
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Sedo reports stability decrease in domain parking - Sedo cites domain parking woes for revenue drop. Sedo Holding has issued its preliminary results for the first nine months of the year. This is likely to be one of the last public reports from the company before it gets rolled up into United Internet. The company’s affiliate marketing division saw revenue growth, but the domain business (what you know of as Sedo) continued to decline. For the first nine months of 2013, the company had sales revenue of EUR 20.8 million, ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
One Del Monte calls a other a Reverse Domain Name Hijacker - You’ve heard of reverse domain name hijacking, but can you RDNH a top level domain name? Del Monte International GmbH has filed its opposition to Del Monte Corporation’s motion to dismiss a lawsuit related to the .delmonte top level domain name. If you’re confused already, let me bring you up to speed. Del Monte used to be one company, but was split into two in the late 1980s. One of the entities (Del Monte International) was able to continue using the Del Monte ... read more ...
 
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Demand Media scores another $1.3 million from withdrawing new TLD applications - New TLD applicant gets $1.3 million from the withdraw of a couple new TLD applications. Demand Media realized $1.3 million in gains in the third quarter of this year due to the withdrawal of its interest in new top level domain name applications, according to the company’s latest 10-Q filing with the SEC. In gained $1.2 million in the second quarter, and the total comes out to $2.6 million so far. The gains are proceeds from settling contention sets via auction, ... read more ...
Mon 11th November 2013
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
GoTo.com is back! - The brand associated with the commercialization of pay-per-click search has found its way back to the internet. How’s this for a bit of nostalgia? Remember GoTo.com and its iconic green and yellow logo? It’s baaaack! If you weren’t around the domain and online advertising world in the late 90s, you might not be familiar with the site. GoTo.com basically invented the pay-per-click search marketing business that is the basis for Google’s search ads and became ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
1&1 starts pre-registration, and new TLDs are removing most some-more confusing - Top ten domain registrar 11 is now accepting pre-registrations on a first come basis, and the various pre-registration offerings are rather confusing. Last week I wrote about how GoDaddy was beginning to accept paid pre-registrations for a handful of top level domain names that will be coming soon. Other registrars are also offering some version of paid offering now, and more will begin to do so as the domains are actually delegated. 11, which has been running TV ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
What domain names General Motors and others recently purchased - GM buys a domain for $795 and other end user domain name sales. I was traveling last week, so I’m a bit behind on end user sales reports. This report is for two weeks ago. PhoneTracker.com $50,000 – Spy Phone Labs LLC, creator of the Phone Tracker software for monitoring your child’s cell phone. Propertybase.de 4,165 EUR – Real estate software company Propertybase, which already uses Propertybase.com. FirstBrothers.com $21,000 – Investment and advisory firm ... read more ...
 
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.Buzz registry launches ICANNBuzz forward of Buenos Aires conference - .Buzz registry makes website for sharing during next week’s ICANN conference in Buenos Aires. The domain name industry pilgrimage to Buenos Aires for ICANN #48 begins later this week. There’s a lot more excitement buzz in the air this time around as new TLD applicants can finally see the endpoint (or is it the starting point?). One of the registries making the trek is DotStrategy, which will be rolling out the .buzz domain name next year. The company has put together ... read more ...
 
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Donuts wins dual some-more fibre objections, settles another - Only four string confusion objections have not been decided. The contentious and highly unpredictable string confusion objection process for new top level domain names is coming to a close. International Centre for Dispute Resolution posted three more decisions today, leaving just four decisions outstanding. The three decisions all involved mega-applicant Donuts. Commercial Connect brought and lost two of the cases. The company claimed that .supplies and .商店 ... read more ...
Fri 8th November 2013
Written by DomainNameWire in EN
How we use amicable networking for Domain Name Wire - I use social networking to increase traffic and find good story ideas. Last week my Twitter account passed 10,000 followers. I thought I’d use the occasion to discuss how I use Twitter and Facebook in conjunction with Domain Name Wire. Twitter I have about 10,000 followers on Domain Name Wire, and I follow about 200 people. Why only 200? It’s because I use Twitter to find new and interesting stories, and I’ve found that following too many people makes it difficult ... read more ...
 
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GoDaddy starts usurpation pre-registrations for new TLDs for adult to $1,200 each - Pre-registrations now accepted for fees of up to $1,200 per domain. Overnight GoDaddy started accepting paid pre-registrations for four new top level domain names: .uno, .menu, .build, .luxury. While many registrars have offered some sort of pre-reservation or pre-registration service that did not require any firm commitment by the customer, GoDaddy is the first major registrar I’m aware of to actually charge an upfront fee. And the fees are steep. Prices to pre-register ... read more ...
Thu 7th November 2013
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
The extraordinary box of .pets - ICDR posted two different panelist documents for the same exact top level domain string confusion objection. I’ve had a lot to gripe about the online systems for International Centre for Dispute Resolution when it comes to string confusion objections. One of those gripes was that the decision in Afilias vs. Donuts over .pets suddenly disappeared from the ICDR’s website in August. ICDR updated the case list earlier this week and the Donuts’ .pets decision is ... read more ...
 
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Parking your domain name can harm – or assistance – in a UDRP - Which ads show up on a parked page can make the difference in a UDRP. Yesterday WIPO posted its decision in a UDRP for the DriveUPS.com domain name, finding in favor of the shipping company UPS and ordering the domain name transferred. This decision did not hinge on the fact that the domain was parked with ads related to shipping and delivery. It had more to do with the domain owner reaching out to UPS to try to sell it the domain name. But the parked page ads certainly ... read more ...
 
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Independent Objector loses box for .health - Afilias successfully defends limited public interest objection against .health. There were a couple firsts in the new top level domain name program today, all involving one objection. An objection against .health was the first limited public interest objection to be decided, and also the first objection filed by the independent objector to meet its fate. A three person panel found in the favor of .health applicant Afilias. Limited Public Interest Objections were designed ... read more ...
 
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Domain parking clawback dings Demand Media earnings, and initial demeanour during Rightside numbers - Company hit with parking clawback from a previous quarter. Ask any domain parking company about their top frustrations, and clawbacks will be high on the list. Basically, their upstream ad partner will clawback previously paid revenue based on traffic quality. This often happens after the parking customer has paid its partner. These clawbacks can apparently be quite big, as evidenced in today’s Demand Media earnings call. Speaking about a tough third quarter, Demand ... read more ...
Wed 6th November 2013
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About that dotShabaka new TLD sunrise… - The first new TLD sunrise doesn’t look like much of a sunrise yet. Last week I wrote about how the sunrise for شبكة. (.shabaka) had begun. The only catch was I couldn’t find any place to actually place a sunrise order. I reached out to Yasmin Omer, General Manager of dotShabaka Registry, to find out why. It turns out there’s a good reason I can’t find any place to submit a sunrise order. Here’s what Omer had to say: dotShabaka Registry is in the process ... read more ...
 
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Marchex and Web.com recover earnings - Domain portfolio owner and large registrar group report earnings. Two domain name companies released third quarter earnings results after the bell yesterday. Marchex reported GAAP revenue of $40.6 million, compared to $33.7 million in the same quarter of 2012. Its adjusted EBITDA fell to $3.4 million from $4.8 million in Q3 2012. The company is primarily a pay-per-call business, but it also owns the Archeo domain name business. Archeo sold 81 domain names last quarter ... read more ...
 
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How Web.com upsells and cross-sells the customers - Whether you’re a DIYer or full service customer, Web.com wants to make a mint selling you more than just a domain name. If you’ve ever registered a domain name at Register.com or Network Solutions, then you’ve undoubtedly received their follow-on sales pitches. These pitches cover everything from Facebook services to premium domains. Web.com CEO David Brown gave a good, succinct description of how this works on the company’s earnings call yesterday. …let’s ... read more ...