Author Archives: The Domains

About The Domains

Michael Berkens, Esq. is the founder and Editor-in-Chief of TheDomains.com. Michael is also the co-founder of Worldwide Media Inc. which sold around 70K domain to Godaddy.com in December 2015 and now owns around 5K domain names . Michael is also a Director of RightoftheDot.com which is a consultant in the new gTLD space and a broker of super premium domains. Michael was also one of the 5 Judges selected for the the Verisign 30th Anniversary .Com contest this year.

Tue 15th April 2014
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
The ICA Comments on ICANN Preliminary Issue Report on IGOs and INGOs - Phil Corwin of the ICA has sent a comment to ICANN regarding the Preliminary Issue Report on Access by IGOs and INGOs to the Curative Rights Protections of the UDRP and URS. In that report, the staff recommended the GNSO Council initiate a PDP (Policy Development Process) to see if they should modify the UDRP and URS process so that IGOs and INGOs could access these as to basically go after their acronyms at the sld level. This could subject legitimate domain owners to having to engage in a legal ... read more ...
Mon 14th April 2014
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
Google Acquires Drone Maker That Facebook Was Eyeing - Todd Wasserman  is reporting for Mashable that Google has purchased Titan Aerospace, a 20 person drone maker that Facebook was also interested in purchasing. There were no financial terms on the deal released on the acquisition. Apparently Facebook was interested to the tune of $60 million. Google has purchased Titan Aerospace, a maker of drones that Facebook was reportedly interested in buying as well. “Titan Aerospace and Google share a profound optimism about the potential for technology to ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
From $355 Purchase in 2005 to $200,000 Sale in 2014 -

Mike Berkens and his MostWantedDomains.com sole a domain youpay.com for $200,000.

The domain was purchased in 2005 for $355. The new owners is Inter-Mark Corporation out of Las Vegas, Nevada.

Congrats to Michael and good fitness with a name to a new owners.

 

Via: thedomains.com

 
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
Neustar – 80 % of Local Searches on Mobile Phones Convert - Neustar put out a study and an infographic on the high conversion rates experienced  in local search by those using mobile phones. Jessica Lee covered this on Search Engine Watch From the article: How Local Searches Convert Four out of five searches via mobile devices lead to a purchase, often within a few hours, the survey said. Compared with other devices, the mobile phone showed the highest conversion rate, with nearly 80 percent of mobile phone searches ending in a purchase. And, nearly three ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
Big Week For New gTLD’s Including .Buzz, .Link, .Pics & 1st Singular/Plural Battle - Its a big week in new gTLD world as 14 new domain name extensions go live, as they become available to be registered on a first come, first served basis. Here are some of the extensions going live starting tomorrow: .BUZZ .Pics .Guitars .Gift .Link .Holiday .Marketing .ONL .Pink .Red .Blue .Kim and two IDN’s Also of note this will be the first time that a singular/plural new gTLD will be live. .Photos has over 9,300 registrations and is the 16th most popular new gTLD domain extension. .Photo which ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
.Guru Becomes 1st New gTLD To Pass 50,000 Registrations - .Guru has just become the first new gTLD to pass 50,000 registrations according to ntldstats.com .Berlin is firmly in the number 2 spot and might pass .Guru shortly. .Photography has passed 30,000 registrations and .Email has quickly jumped into 4th place with over 22,000 domains .Tips rounds out the top 5 There are now 14 new gTLD’s that have 10,000 or more registrations. Interesting to note that Uniregistry’s .Sexy which got off to a slow start has made it into the top 20. There are now over ... read more ...
Sun 13th April 2014
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
U.S. Internet Advertising Surpasses Broadcast TV For a First Time Ever - For the first time, U.S. Internet advertising revenue has surpassed that of broadcast television due to sharp growth in mobile and digital video ads. Search accounted for: 41% of Q4 2013 revenues,down from 44% in Q4 2012, as mobile devices have shifted Search-related revenues away from the desktop computer. Search revenues totaled $ 5.0 billion in Q4 2013, up 10 % from Q4 2012, when Search totaled $4.6 billion. ... read more ...
Sat 12th April 2014
Written by The Domains in EN
Luxury Brands Get Their .Luxury Domains: Bugatti; Cartier; Prada; Chopard; Dior & More - I just reviewed the zone file for .Luxury, which appears to have gotten over 400 sunrise registrations by trademark holders and many of the top luxury brands in the world got their  .luxury domain name. Many luxury jewelry  brands including watch manufacturers, participated along with fashion designers, auto makers, and Champagne producers including Chanel, Prada, Cartier,  Chopard,  Dior,  Jimmy Choo; Versace, Harry Winston, Escada, Bugatti, Maserati, Rolls Royce, BMW, Patek, Panerai, Montblanc, ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
Google: Anyone In The US Can Purchase Google Glass On Tax Day Apr 15th - Google.com has just announced that anyone in the United States can buy Google Glass on Tuesday April 15th. Up to now to purchase Google Glass you needed an invite.  However on Tuesday a limited number of Google Glass will be sold to anyone in the United States for the normal price of $1,500. If your asking, Yes I did receive an invite, but no I didn’t buy Google Glass up to now and don’t plan on buying it this week either. I have seen people wearing them out in the wild and personally I don’t ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
EURid Gets 5 More Years To Run The .EU Registry - EURid which has been operating the .EU domain name extension since it was launched,  has been confirmed as the registry manager of the .EU top-level domain for the next five years. “We feel honored to have been chosen again to serve all the .eu registrars and registrants,” stated Marc Van Wesemael, CEO of EURid. “The decision comes nine months after we responded to the European Commission call for expression of interest and after ten years of management of this unique top-level domain. At ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
Heartbleed.com Regged a Week Ago Already a US Top 5000 Alexa Ranking - Finnish security firm Codenomicon is the company that registered Heartbleed.com on April 5, 2014. Headquartered in Oulu, Finland and Silicon Valley, with offices in Singapore and Hong Kong, the company markets its testing software and services directly and through international partners. Codenomicon’s customers include Alcatel-Lucent, ATT, Cisco Systems, Microsoft, Motorola, Google, Verizon, NSN, Huawei, and T-Systems among many others. The company is privately held with investments from Verdane ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
Go Daddy Off The Hook in Revenge Porn Case - So back in January of 2013 a class action suit was filed against the revenge porn website  Texxxan.com, GoDaddy who hosted the website, its uploaders and its subscribers. Eric Goldman who regularly contributes to Forbes on intellectual property law and Internet law, said at the time he felt the case was weak. Now to give some context Mr. Goldman has been a staunch proponent of 47 USC 230, section 230 of the the Communications Decency Act, he has been worried that with the recent cases involving ... read more ...
Fri 11th April 2014
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
KSregistry Becomes Registry For .VG But ccTLD Is Frozen Until Apr 15th; Registrations Resume May 12th - The Telecommunications Regulatory Commission of Virgin Islands (TRC) has sourced out the operation of .VG, the ccTLD of Virgin Islands to KSregistry GmbH. Due to the difficulties with the former .VG zone manager, IANA performed a re-delegation which brought back the .VG zone under the control and the responsibility of the TRC on April 11, 2014. However, the .VG zone will remain frozen until April 15, 2014, 10:00 UTC. While the .VG zone is frozen, no registrations, modifications, transfers, deletions ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
Dune.com Hit With UDRP - The domain name Dune.com has been hit with a UDRP. The complainant was filed by Dune Holdings Limited which was formed in 2001 and uses the domain name dunelondon.com According to BusinessWeek.com, “Dune Holdings Ltd. designs and retails fashion footwear and accessories for men and women. It offers boots, shoes, sandals, bags, scarves/gloves/hats, and sunglasses, as well as belts and jewelry. The company provides its products through its stores and department stores worldwide, as well as online. ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
Minds + Machines Heading Off To Private Auction To Settle At Least 3 More New gTLD’s - The Directors of Minds + Machines Group Limited (AIM: MMX) announced today that they will be participating in a minimum of three top-level domain (“TLD”) private auctions will be held on April 22md, 2014 and be conducted by Applicant Auction, Inc. The new gTLDs the Company will definitely be bidding for in this round are .garden, .property, and .yoga. The Company expects the format and rules for each of these TLD auctions to broadly follow earlier private auctions administered by Applicant ... read more ...
Thu 10th April 2014
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
CBS Picked Colbert 18 Months Ago But Didn’t Register Any Domains But Someone Else Did Today - As you probably heard today CBS named Stephen Colbert to replace David Letterman as host of the “Late Show” when he retires next year. According to Mashable.com CBS has been planning on Colbert to replace Letterman since 2012, which makes it pretty surprising that CBS didn’t lock up the bang on domain names LATESHOWWITHCOLBERT.COM, LATESHOWWITHSTEPHENCOLBERT.COM, or even THELATESHOWWITHSTEPHENCOLBERT.COM all of which were just registered today. And not by CBS. Two of the domains were registered ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
URS Denied On Aeropostale.uno - A Uniform Rapid Suspension examiner, Alan L. Limbury, has denied the complainant of the clothing company, Aeropostale Procurement Company, Inc The domain name aeropostale.uno “Complainant here submitted with its complaint copies of the certificates of registration of seven United States AEROPOSTALE trademarks, four of which are in the name R. H. Macy Co., Inc., two of which are in the name Aeropostale West, Inc., and one of which is in the name Aeropostale, Inc. Complainant submitted no evidence ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
Thamesrivers.com Lost in UDRP - FC Management Limited of London, United Kingdom of Great Britain just got the domain name thamesrivers.com awarded to them by a UDRP panel based off of a Community Trade Mark registration. The domain holder did not respond to the complaint Here is the relevant facts and findings: The Complainant states that it is an international company which specializes in investment and asset management and has operated since 1868. It acquired Thames River Capital Group Limited and its subsidiary companies on ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
BCE.com Acquired By Bell Canada - The domain name BCE.com has been acquired by BCE Inc, of Quebec Canada. The administrative contacts email is trademarks@bell.ca which belongs to Bell Canada. The company already owned and uses the domain name bce.ca The domain name was parked and for sale at Sedo although was not made public The seller of the domain appears to have acquired in back in 2008 for $28,001. I’m pretty sure this is yet another six figure sale. Congrats to the buyer and seller Google+Michael Berkens ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
Famous Four Wins .Party - Famous Four Media, the registry operator for Domain Venture Partners announce today that is has resolved contention set for the new generic Top Level Domain (gTLD) .PARTY. Domain Venture Partners along with Blue Sky Registry came to an “agreement” with the other applicant for .Party, Oriental Trading Company, Inc whereby Oriental Trading Company, Inc has agreed to withdraw its application. Domain Venture Partners looks forward to launching and operating the .PARTY gTLD for the benefit of all ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
CentralNic acquires resources of DomiNIC GmbH - CentralNic publicly traded on the AIM Exchange under the symbol CNIC, announced an acquisition of the assets of  DomiNIC GmbH. Since 1994 DomiNIC has been continually developed into an all-round domain and DNS management system with integrated customer and user administration. In January 2014 CentralNic acquired all rights to the DomiNIC software with the intent of offering this solution to a wider market and combining its existing technology with the DomiNIC software to continue its tradition of ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
Google Extends “Not Provided” to Paid Search - Google is making a change that will bring paid search in line with organic search when it comes to relaying referrer information. Now when people using secure search click on AdWords ads, they will not have their search query show up in the referrer string, this info will no longer be available in analytics packages and third party providers of related software. Ginny Marvin wrote on Search Engine Land: As suspected, Google is moving to secure search for clicks on paid search ads. In an announcement ... read more ...
Wed 9th April 2014
Written by The Domains in EN
Verisign There are 271 Million Domains In The World .Com/.Net Up 5% in 2013 - VeriSign, Inc. VRSN just issued the 2013 fourth quarter Domain Name Industry Brief reporting that five million domain names were added to the Internet in the fourth quarter of 2013, bringing the total number of registered domain names to 271 million worldwide across all top-level domains (TLDs) as of Dec. 31, 2013. The increase of five million domain names globally equates to a growth rate of 1.9% over the third quarter of 2013. Worldwide registrations have grown by 18.5 million, or 7.3%, year over ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
$448,551 in Sales during Heritage Domain Auction – LK.com Leads a way - There were 99 lots on the block today at Heritage Auctions.  28 lots sold with the top lot being LK.com at $287,500 (15% Buyer’s Premium). After LK.com, GunParts.com was the second highest sale at $57,500. 3 letter .com domains were certainly popular as they made up 9 of the 28 sales. I thought the auction moved really quick, maybe too quick. Here are the sales (All figures include the 15% Buyer’s Premium) : CardBroker.com,     $575.00    Sold to HA.com/Live GunParts.com,     $57,500.00   ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
LK.com Hits Reserve during $250K As Heritage’s Domain Auction Gets Set To Start - The domain name LK.com has hit its reserve price of $250,000 and will sell in the Heritage Auction, Domain name auction that will be starting in just a few minutes at 3:30pm EST Raymond will be live blogging the results on the Twitter account @hybriddomainer and will be posting the results here on TheDomains.com as well. I’m told two domain names have been pulled from the auction DEC.com and Digital.com which will be in the next HA auction. Other domains have hit reserve and will sell including ... read more ...