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.

Mon 23rd December 2013
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
St. Andrews The Golf Course Wins Control of 10 year Old StAndrews.com in UDRP - St Andrews Links Ltd of St Andrews, Fife, the United Kingdom of Great Britain just won control of the domain name standrews.com in a one member UDRP decision. The decision is no surprise, the domain was parked until very recently pull up golf related links. The only real question is why did it take the complainant 10 years to file the complaint? Here are the relevant facts and findings from the decision: St Andrews is a town in Scotland. It possesses several world famous golf courses, which are widely ... read more ...
 
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Is ICANN Going To Hold Registries; The $25K .Sucks One To What They Said In Application?? - Vox Populi Registry Inc. (VOX) was in the news last week when it put up a site taking Priority Registrations for .sucks domain names for $250 per domain, per year, and Trademark Priority Registrations of $2,500 per domain threatening trademark owners to act now because if they wait until the Sunrise Period, the cost would be $25,000. The $25,000 Sunrise fee is a per domain per year fee and of course unprecedented and especially troubling because its being offered to trademark holders in the Sunrise ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN
PC World: “Typos online aren’t only a hassle, they’re a hazard” - PC World did a story today on typos, they went on to look at the problems that typos cause as they are still being used by scammers and other shady online websites. They looked at at data from High Tech Bridge and how many typo domains were registered by people trying to pass themselves off as Anti Virus companies. Interestingly 107 domains were regged by the firms themselves to protect against phishing attempts. From the article: Typosquatting is one of the oldest Internet security problems and ... read more ...
Sun 22nd December 2013
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
Jennifer Wolfe: “Your .Com Won’t Be Worth Much Anymore” - Jennifer Wolfe is a digital strategy advisor and executive leader.  She is nationally accredited in public relations and the  Co-author of Brand Rewired and Domain Names Rewired. She runs a blog at Wolfedomain.com. On Friday Jennifer wrote a post entitled Dot Com Bubble (pt.2). I wanted to first find and read part 1, that post looks to have been written July 16, 2013 under the title of “New gTLDs and the Brand Bubble” In that article this is what stood out: What’s the Value of Your .com Now? A ... read more ...
 
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New gTLD Price Wars As United Domains Undercuts Godaddy - United Domains sent out an email making customers aware that they were now taking binding pre-orders on some new gTLD domain names. Interestedly Go Daddy which built its business being the low cost provider on .com, looks like it  may be taking a different path with the new gtlds as there prices are higher on a majority of the extension both are taking pre-orders on. UnitedDomains.com is basically under cutting Godaddy’s price on these new gTLD they are taking pre-orders  by up to  $10 a domain ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN
Georgia Mega Millions Winner Ira Curry’s Name Could Mean Big Bucks For Entrepreneur - IBTimes.com has a story on a lottey winner’s name being used by someone else looking to cash in. From the article: In the digital age, teenagers in their parents’ basements can make a quick few million dollars off a good idea, and Turner seems poised to take that idea to the bank. On Wednesday, just 14 minutes after CNN posted a story announcing that Curry was the first of the two winners (the other winner has yet to reveal his or her identity and come forward to claim the prize, but is known ... read more ...
Sat 21st December 2013
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
Google+ form links work with garland of Google domains like Google.me - Google has been rolling out the availability of vanity urls for a little while now. One thing that was picked up by Search Engine Roundtable back in October was the terms. Google actually mentioned they may one day charge a fee. TechWhack.co posted an article yesterday that included this tip: If you have gotten yours, here is a cool tip. You do not need to use it with plus.google.com domain. You can use it with Google.com and even Google.me. Google.me/+yourcustomurl definitely looks better!   ... read more ...
 
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.BUZZ Rolls Out Gift Cards In Time For The Holidays: “Give a Gift of .Buzz” - We knew that the new gTLD registries would come up with some creative marketing ideas. Today we got an email from the upcoming .buzz registry who is selling .Buzz gift cards “just in time for the holidays”; “JUST IN TIME FOR THE HOLIDAYS. GIVE THE GIFT OF .BUZZ” “dotStrategy, the parent company of the .buzz registry, is offering an easy solution for the last minute gift buyer — ‘Give the Gift of .Buzz. “dotStrategy is offering a Create.Buzz gift certificate good toward the registration ... read more ...
 
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Internet is about to knowledge one of the biggest changes: ICANN - The Times of India sat down with Fadi Chehade of ICANN and conducted a small interview. Fadi Chehade is the president and CEO of the International Corporation of Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), an organization that allocates web addresses and assigns unique protocol numbers on the internet. In an email interview with Kim Arora, he discussed ICANN’s globalization efforts, digital surveillance and the future of the internet. Chehade discusses DNS security, his efforts to move governance of  ... read more ...
 
Fri 20th December 2013
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
Well Here’s The 1st: KPMG To Replace Its .Com With Its New gTLD - I know a lot of people in the domain industry have put the eventual success on the new gTLD program on whether big brands would actually switch from their .com to their new gTLD. Today we have the first. In an interview with worldipreview.com, Professional services firm KPMG  says they are going to replace KPMG.com with .KPMG the new gTLD they applied for. KPMG is a worldwide company, which operates in more than 155 countries and employs close to 155,000 people according to David Green, ... read more ...
 
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Czech Arbitration Court (CAC) UDRP Panel Awards Hijacked Domain - Virtually all UDRP panels in the past have refused to return an allegedly  stolen domain name back to the original registrant, generally finding such a matter to be outside the UDRP panel authority. However one of the two newest UDRP organizations, the On-line ADR Center of the Czech Arbitration Court (CAC) just gave the domain name  VIRTUALCOLLABORATION.ORG to the original registrant finding that “The Respondent transferred the disputed domain name to its own account without the Complainant’s ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN
Mr. Schwartz I’m Not Going To Let Readers Tell Me What To Write, But I’ll Answer The Poll - Rich Schwartz challenged me to repeat the poll he ran on RicksBlog.com last week after I called the results of the poll Bull Shit. I have no problem with running polls on blog, matter of fact at thedomains.com we were the first to build a polling feature into the blog, from the get go. Over the years we have asked 127 questions, (yes I had to check) however I have never attempted to take the results and analyze  them or hold them out to mean or represent anything. For one people can vote multiple ... read more ...
Thu 19th December 2013
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
Google Releases Their Transparency Report - Google reported today on their blog that requests from governments to remove content continues to rise. When you read the actual report, Google actually shows a percentage of compliance  for each country. For example Google complied in 55 % of court orders from the United States to remove some or all of the requested items.  Brazil which surprisingly had the second most court orders had a 46% rate of compliance from Google. The report looks at Court Orders in one column and then all other requests ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
You’ve Got To Be Kidding: $25K For A .Sucks Domain Name Registration - One of the new gTLD applicants for .sucks opened up Priority Registrations for .sucks domain names for $250 per domain and Trademark Priority Registrations of $2,500 per domain. The truly shocking part of today’s announcement is that the registry plans on charging $25,000 PER domain for Sunrise Registrations. Sunrise is reserved for registered trademarks which are registered with the Trademark Clearing House (TMCH). The registry is offering is a $250 priority registration “Reserve the name you ... read more ...
 
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After Asking For $40K To Sell; 14 Year Old Privata.com Lost In UDRP - BARBET  of  Spain, ust grabbed the domain privata.com which was registered and has been owned by the domain holder since 1999. The Complainant didn’t register its domain name privata.es, until August 6, 2001 The Complainant is a Spanish clothing company, which is engaged in the design, manufacture and sale of clothing (and accessories) under the “Privata” name. “The Complainant is the proprietor of a number of trade mark registrations of or including the name “Privata”, the earliest ... read more ...
 
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Indonesia will hurl out shorter .id Domains Next Year - TechInAsia.com reported that the country code for Indonesia will be getting shorter. From the article: Next year, Indonesians will have to get used to a brand-new ending to web addresses that sounds really short and sweet. It’ll be ‘.id’. The new domain ending will go on sale as early as January 20. The domain name was approved a couple days ago by the highest internet domain name authority in Indonesia, the Forum Nama Domain Indonesia. As with all new domain endings, the sale of ‘.id’ ... read more ...
 
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UK Bans 1and1.com New gTLD Commercials As Being “Misleading” -   The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA)  which is the independent regulator of advertising across all media the United Kingdom has just banned 1and1.com new gTLD television commercials as being misleading. A television commercial similar to the one 1and1.com was running in the United States, was also running in the UK. The ASA applies the Advertising Codes, which are written by the Committees of Advertising Practice. Our work includes acting on complaints and proactively checking the media ... read more ...
 
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.Fail! ChicagoGrid.com Says Berryhill Runs a Domains & .Chicago, .Jeans & .XXX Are Coming - An Epic fail by a business publication covering the new gTLD’s, the Chicago Grid posted a story entitled “Will the switch from .com to .Chicago benefit businesses? Never mind the entire publication is wrapped with advertising from Dunkin’ Donuts and made my eye’s bleed. As Taylor Swift said “I knew you were trouble then” Of course there wasn’t even a new gTLD application submitted for .Chicago. The subtitle of the article: “Customers will have to embrace the 1,000 new domains opening ... read more ...
Wed 18th December 2013
Written by The Domains in EN
The Ship is on a Move Again, The Pirate Bay leaves Peru and docks in Guyana - We reported on December 12th that The Pirate Bay had moved to the country code of Peru (pe). Well now they have moved to the country code of Guyana (gy). Digital Trends and Torrent Freak covered the change. Here’s what a Pirate Bay insider had to say about the matter when speaking with TorrentFreak. “We have some 70 domain names left, so eventually we will find one that sticks. A few domains have been prepared so we can switch over whenever’s needed.” You may be wondering whether Pirate ... read more ...
 
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Is .Quebec The Motivation For The UDRP on Quebec.com? - We broke the news this morning that an agency of the Provence of Quebec filed a UDRP on the domain name Quebec.com. Anything.com has owned the domain since at least 1998 making the domain some 15 years old. The domain is parked but according to Screenshots.com has been parked since at least 2004 or about 10 years. So why now? Why did the government of Quebec decide to go after Quebec.com after all this time? We think the answer is that the government is supporting the new gTLD of .Quebec which should ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN
Domain Hall Of Fame Member’s House Is Subject Of Huffington Post Story - The HuffingtonPost.com just covered the Indianapolis house of Domain Hall Of Fame member  Chad Folkening. According to the HuffingtonPost.com,  the 26,000 square foot home is for sale for just $1.3 Million dollars. The story says in part: “The estate was eventually purchased by Chad Folkening, an Indiana-born entrepreneur who made millions buying and selling Internet domains. It’s now listed by Brian Sanders of Century 21 Scheetz.” “Folkening didn’t really change any of Hostetler’s ... read more ...
 
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12 Registrar Signup With TLDH; 7 With Minds + Machines; 25 New gTLD To Launch 1Q - The Directors of Top Level Domain Holdings (AIM: TLDH) announced the company has  Registry-Registrar Agreements (“RRA’s”) with an initial twelve ICANN-accredited registrars in the US, Europe and Asia. The Company plans to expand its registrar network in 2014 to complement its own direct sales channel to market through its wholly-owned registrar, Minds + Machines Registrar Limited. Of the initial 12 registrars that have signed RRAs, 7 have signed up with Minds + Machines OPEN Priority Reservation ... read more ...
 
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Wow UDRP Filed On Quebec.com - A government agency of Canada, Ministre des Relations internationales, de la Francophonie et du Commerce extérieur, has just filed a UDRP on the domain name Quebec.com Quebec.com is the direct match domain for the largest Provence in Canada by area and home to some 8 million people and include the cities of Montreal and Quebec City. The domain name Quebec.com is owned by Anything.com which has one of the best domain name portfolio’s on the planet. The domain is parked with all linked related ... read more ...
 
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SEOroundtable.com Has Google Boosted EMD In the Algorithm? - An interesting post in seroundtable.com,  yesterday say there is a bunch of chatter that Google may have adjusted their algorithm to give more credit to Exact Match Domains (EMD’s) especially Geo domains. “Google EMDOver a year ago, Google introduced an algorithm to reduce the amount of exact match domains from showing up when those EMDs are not as useful as other sites. “Some at WebmasterWorld have noticed that in some niches the EMDs are back. One said that he is now seeing old EMDs that ... read more ...