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.

Thu 28th August 2014
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.Host Announces 15 Pioneer Partners - Radix, announced 15 top players of the global hosting community as  Pioneers of the .host namespace, which rolled in to Landrush on August 26th. The Pioneer lineup includes big international names like MediaTemple, Bluehost, OVH, Arvixe, and the UK2 Group, in addition to regional leaders such as Natro (Turkey) and UOL (Brazil), HostPapa (Canada), Blacknight (Ireland). Several top global wholesale registrars, such as OpenSRS, ResellerClub and InternetX have also signed on as Pioneer Partners. “Jumping ... read more ...
 
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Nominet Handles 674 Domain Complaints Down 17%; 55% Result in Domain Transfer - Nominet the company that operates the .co.uk and now the .uk domain name extension (ccTLD)  just released its report for its Dispute Resolution Service in 2013 (DRS). In 2013 Nominet handled 674 complaints down 17% from 2012 although the number of domain names registered increase 2,7% Brands using the DRS in 2013 included Lego, Swarovski, Cash Converters, O2, Virgin, L’Oreal, Coast Fashions, Barclays and St Johns Ambulance. Of the 674 cases, 437 (65%) progressed through the formal dispute resolution ... read more ...
 
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Minds + Machines Launching 1st Of Its String in September; Expects 25% Of All Landrush Domain To Go To Auction - Minds + Machines (LON:MMX), is going to launch its first new gTLD’s strings into General Availability in September, actually 9 in all. The following new generic top level domains (gTLDs) in which Minds + Machines has an interest will go on general availability (GA) to the public on the following launch dates in September: September 9th .London On September 15th  .Cooking, .Country, .Fishing, .Horse, .Rodeo, .Vodka September 25th .Beer, .Surf September 30th .Bayern. On entering GA, all domain names ... read more ...
 
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.London Tops 15,000 Domain Registrations; General Availability Starts Sep 9th - One of the most anticipated new gTLD domain extensions .London,  now has 15,038 domain names registered, counting Sunrise registrations and now registrations granted to companies with a .London presence who had priorty to register .London domains. .London is now in 23rd place in terms of number of registered new gTLD’s domain names according to nTLDstats.com DomainMonster.com,  part of the Host Europe Group is the largest registrar of .London domains todate, with over 62% of all registrations. Tucows.com ... read more ...
 
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1st Day New gTLD Totals; .Hamburg 13.7K; Discount 1,819; .Fitness 1,271; .Furniture 605; .Schule 373 - Several new gTLD went into general availability yesterday and here are the total number of domain registrations including those domains registered in Sunrise by trademark holders and in any landrush or Early Access Program (EAP) which allows registrants to pay an additional fee for early access to new domains. .Hamburg had by far the biggest new gTLD 1st day total in a many months winding up with 13,737 registrations landing it in 26th place for all new gTLD’s. .Discount finished its first day ... read more ...
 
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Kevin Fink of Flippa Confirms Fire.Glass sale during $5,000 is legitimate - I want to thank Kevin Fink of Flippa for confirming that the auction for Fire.Glass that concluded on 8/26 is a legitimate sale. With all the hoopla and hype around the new gtlds, domain investors want to see sales being verified especially when its an auction format with just one bid. FireGlass.com/net/org/co/info/biz/us are all registered. The .com is registered since 1996 and is a developed site. What is “Fire Glass”? Fire Glass is tempered glass manufactured in pebble-sized fragments, used ... read more ...
Wed 27th August 2014
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Largest .org sale of 2014 Dolphin.org sells for $45,000 - pic courtesy of James DeMers Dolphin.org just crossed the Sedo sales tape as sold at $45,000. This is the highest .org sale of 2014, year to date. The domain was registered in 1994 and had been owned by a Miles Fawcett of SAI Comm. The domain is currently parked and the whois is currently Sedo. Congrats to the seller. ... read more ...
 
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1St Day New gTLD Totals .Black 156 Registrations .Hiv 153 - Two new gTLD lanched into general avaliabity already this week .Hiv and .Black launched and including any sunrise application wound up with, well not much .Black is has 156 registrations while .HIV has only 153 registration. A .Hiv domain registration is pricy around $200 on the low side. A .Black domain registration is priced at $41.99 at Godaddy You can read more about .Black here and .HIV here. Here are the .Black registrations including Sunrise: addictedto.black adsense.black advisor.black adwords.black aerogel.black ahron.black air-king.black all4.black alldata.black alwaysbeton.black andi.black aquatimer.black autoanything.black autozone.black aws.black back-in.black basic.black beatriz.black beautiful.black beluga.black blackbay.black blackshield.black blaque.black blisssalon.black bmw.black bpm.black cafe.black callgirls.black cam4.black cellini.black chanel.black chocolate.black chrome.black clairderose.black container.black cosmograph.black crack.black creative.black date.black datejust.black davinci.black day-date.black daytona.black deals.black deepsea.black deeptwo.black digital.black engineeredformen.black entice.black escorts.black estate.black explorer.black fastrider.black fire.black flickr.black fuck.black galapagosislands.black gdmes08-20-2014qatest-preregga.black gdmes08-26-2014qatest-ga.black gdmes08-26-2014qatest-ga2.black gdtestmesblackga.black get.black glamour.black gmt-master.black gothic.black grantour.black grid.black group.black heels.black hennessy.black heritage.black horse.black hotel.black ingenieur.black intuit.black iwcportugieser.black jackpot247.black johnnywalker.black jonny.black kamenrider.black kevingablack001.black kindle.black linkedin.black lord.black markmonitor.black markxvii.black maskedrider.black matte.black merck.black microsoft.black milgauss.black mingle.black more.black naughty.black nic.black a0.nic.black a2.nic.black b0.nic.black c0.nic.black onceyougo.black opal.black opals.black oyster.black oysterperpetual.black paint-it.black pearlmaster.black pelagos.black pepper.black portofino.black prime.black pulp.black pure.black purse.black racist.black ranger.black realty.black redand.black rlnd.black rolex.black sale.black sea-dweller.black singles.black siyah.black size.black sky-dweller.black skylr.black spitfire.black ssi.black submariner.black supercasino.black target.black team.black thenew.black think.black tights.black top.black topgun.black true.black tudor.black tudorwatch.black tumblr.black turk.black uber.black usa.black verf.black wearing.black weddings.black weusi.black whisky.black whoswho.black williamhill.black wisdom.black yacht-master.black yachtclub.black yellow.black younggifted.black   Here ... read more ...
 
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.Global Ends Sunrise With Almost 400 Registrations, Apple Registers 22 - .Global just ended it Sunrise period and did very well, getting almost 400 registrations by trademark holders. Apple was the largest registrant with 22 domain name registrations although Microsoft, Sun, Amazon, Google, HSBC, Ford, Dell, are just some of the big brand holders that participated. In all  2.2 domains were registered per registrant on average. A Sunrise application cost $250, $150 application fee, and $100 registration fee, so .Global made back $100K of it $185K application fee just ... read more ...
 
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T.R.A.F.F.I.C. Reveals The Nominees for a 2014 T.R.A.F.F.I.C. AWARDS - T.R.A.F.F.I.C. revealed  the Nominees for the 2014 T.R.A.F.F.I.C. AWARDS today Each of these Nominees received nominations from at least 3 individuals. While nominations are open industry wide, voting is not. You MUST be on our mailing list to vote and have your vote counted. If you received this ballot, you are on the list. If not, you are NOT on the list. Subscribe to nominations@targetedtraffic.com by Friday September 12th to be eligible to vote. Escrow.com will be counting and certifying all ... read more ...
 
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PIR: .Org Grows 1.4%; Renewal Rate of Almost 74%; 6% Are Asian Registrants - Public Interest Registry, the not-for-profit operator of the .org domain , today released the results of its bi-annual domain name report, “The Dashboard,” detailing the worldwide growth of .org over the past year. The report reveals that in the past twelve months the total number of .org domains under management increased to 10,428,027 globally, a 1.4%increase in registrations since 2013. Other findings outlined in “The Dashboard” include the following: Germany, the United Kingdom, Canada, ... read more ...
 
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Fire.Glass Closes during $5,000 on Flippa - The domain name Fire.Glass just wrapped up its auction on Flippa. The auction had one bid at $5,000. The seller does have 18 transactions and 100% positive feedback on Flippa. Seller’s Notes Fire.Glass Premium .Glass domain. 40,500 Google Exact Monthly Searches for “Fire Glass” (12 month average). $2.39 CPC (Google). What is “Fire Glass”? Fire Glass is tempered glass manufactured in pebble-sized fragments, used in fireplaces and fire pits. It usually comes in small shards with rounded edges. Flippa ... read more ...
Tue 26th August 2014
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Rook Media/DomainSponsor We Will Be “The Best Parking Platform of All Time” - We just received this email from Rook Media which bought DomainSponsor.com a few months ago. If you have an account at DomainSponsor.com you should have an email where they are asking you to change your password, while promising that they are going to combine the best parts of Rook Media and DomainSponsor to be “The Best Parking Platform of All Time” Here is the email: “While you’ve hopefully been having a relaxing summer, we’ve been very hard at work upgrading nearly everything about DomainSponsor. In ... read more ...
 
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Why Did Philip Morris Spend $1,500 To File A UDRP On Buying-Tax-Free-Marlboro-Cigarettes.com? - Philip Morris USA Inc,  just won the rights to the domain name buying-tax-free-marlboro-cigarettes.com in a  UDRP. The fact that the corporate giant won the domain is no surprise,  but I have no idea of why the company would spend $1,500 in just filing fees to get control of a horrible domain name with 4 hyphens. According to Screenshots.com,  the only page they have indexed is a placeholder from the registrar Godaddy.com The domain had no traffic according to Alexa. To me it looks like a huge ... read more ...
 
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Sedo Transactions Total Just $900K -

Over a past week, 561 exchange took place on Sedo’s marketplace and around SedoMLS, totaling $900k.

53% of sum sales were a outcome of Buy Now listings.

Highlights of open sales are:

· Top .coms: ridescout.com during 60,000 EUR
· Top ccTLD: 888.ca during 20,000 USD
· Top “other” TLD: loan.info during 18,500 USD

Everyoption.com was the sale during $15,000

 

Via: thedomains.com

 
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.Black is Live Today But like The other New gTLD Colors, a on a Wrong Side Of The Dot - Today is the first day general availability for Afilias’ latest gTLD: .BLACK Its the fourth in a string of colored new gTLD domain names all operated by Afilias (.Red, .Blue, Pink) For us the issue for .Black, like the other colors, is Black is a term that used in normal language and commerce on the left of the term, not on the right. So its Black Cars, Black Card, Black Dress, Black Limo, Black Diamonds, Jet Black, Blackboard. Even the press release makes our point: “You know, when someone says ... read more ...
 
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Frequent Commentator On TheDomains, Joseph Peterson, Stars In Entrepreneur.com New gTLD Story - In a article just published by Entrepreneur.com asking the question “Should I switch my company’s URL to one of the new domain extensions?“ I was pretty surprised to read that the article was basically based on the thoughts of  Joseph Peterson who is a frequent commentator on TheDomains.com Here are the first two questions and answers by Mr. Peterson   Should any business with a .com or .net domain switch to an extension that may describe its product or service better? Not necessarily–.com ... read more ...
 
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As .Furniture Launches On Wednesday, Here Are Some Of Interesting Registered Domains - .Furniture goes into general availability on Wednesday August 27th where domain names can be registered on a first come, first served basis. Some very good domains were already taken in Sunrise by trademark holders and during the Early Access Program (EAP) where registrants paid a one time fee for early access to the domain names. Furniture is a huge vertical.  Its certainly something everyone around the world buys, owns, uses or rents. Many of the best .Furniture domain names are not available ... read more ...
 
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.Website Gets Over 630 Sunrise Domain Registration; 2nd Highest Of Any New gTLD - .Website may well be the next big new gTLD success story. According to Radix the registry the operates the .Website extension there were 634 domain names registered during the Sunrise period which is opened to trademark holders. With the 634 Sunrise domain registrations.Website has the second highest number of Sunrise applications of all new gTLD’s to date A lot of the big brands grabbed domain names in .Website including Amazon, Apple, BWM, Chanel, Chopard, Dropbox, Escada, Facebook, Fox, Google, ... read more ...
 
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Snapnames BuyDomains Auction Ends Today; 17 Domains Out of 153 Have Bids - Snapnames.com’s online auction of domain names owned by BuyDomains.com ends today at 3:15Pm EST in accordance with Snapnames normal closing rules As of publication 17 of the 153 domain names have a bid but only 2 of the domain have hit reserve and will sell. The highest bid at the moment is on EOB.com at $13K and Hikers.com at $12,500 but reserve has not been met on either. Here are the domain names in the auction with the high bids (if any) as of publication along with the reserve ranges.   hikers.com $12,500 $10,001 ... read more ...
Mon 25th August 2014
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As New gTLD Registrations Hit 2 Million Domains, Here Is Our Take On The New G’s - We have been talking about the new gTLD program for well over 6 years and over the weekend we noted that the number of new gTLD registrations passed the 2 Million mark. So we thought this would be a good time to give some thoughts about where the program is at and where it is going. Since we have been writing about the new G’s we have pretty much said the same thing, we don’t know how they will do or what  effect they will have on the .com aftermarket. After the launch of 194 new gTLD’s into ... read more ...
 
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Sedo’s GreatDomains.com Auction Ends On Thursday & Has Over $250K In Bids - Sedo is holding its Month GreatDomains auction which closes at noon on Thursday EST and there are over $250,000 in bids placed altough as of publication the highest bid for a domain that has met reserve is $490 Here are all the domain names in the auction with the high bid (if any) and reserve range:   Domain Reserve met/not met High Bid Reserve Range musik.de Reserve not met 52,000 EUR 50,000 – 99,999 EUR apps.de Reserve not met 27,000 EUR 25,000 – 49,999 EUR j7.com Reserve not met 20,000 EUR 50,000 ... read more ...
 
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UPDATED: DotHIV Launching With A Social Purpose & a $200 Price Tag Today - The .Hiv registry sent us this information on the launch of the new gTLD .Hiv The domain is not being offered by some of the bigger registrars and is priced around between $196 and $230 a year at some of the registrars I checked, although a portion of the price is being given to HIV and AIDS charities. Here are some of the registrars that you can register a .HIV domain name at: NetNames.com Marcaria Safe names Markmonitor Blacknight 101domain Moniker.com Tucows United Domains Epag Key Systems 1 and ... read more ...
 
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Apple Goes In Heavy On .Discount Which Gets Over 300 Sunrise/ Early Access Domain Registrations - .Discount which launches into General Availability this week on Wednesday, is doing pretty well compared to the most recent launches with over 340 Sunrise and Early Access Program Registrations and we thought we take a look at the more interesting one’s. For me Discount is one of those terms that is usually used  more on the left side of a term than on the rightside, so discount travel, discount hotels, discount fashion, discount electronics for example seems more natural than say fashion.discount ... read more ...
 
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$55,000 A Year For A Domain Registration? Wecolme To .Attorney & .Lawyer - Two new gTLD’s that will be launching into general availability on October 8th 2014, .Attorney and .Lawyer premium domain names are carrying the highest costs of any extension we have seen so far by a mile. Both extensions are being launched with an Early Access Program (EAP). The good news is that very few domains are being reserved by the registry. The bad news is for those domains labeled as premium domains by the registry, .Attorney and .Lawyer domains are names are carrying the highest premium ... read more ...