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 14th August 2014
Written by The Domains in EN
Group On’s ideeli, Acquires & Rebrands As ideel.com - ideeli, the online retailer, announced today it has acquired the domain name and rebranded itself to ideel.com The company recently acquired the domain ideel.com back in June from a domain holder in France in a sale that has not been previously reported. “The company which is a discount fashion site was acquired by Groupon earlier this year. The website has been expanding its offerings in women’s apparel, shoes, home and men’s, while testing the use of “ideel” branding across the site ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
This Weeks 1st Day New gTLD Totals; .Dental 1,971; .Clinic 1,447; .Care 1,395; .Surgery 534 - Four new gTLD’s went into general availability yesterday, meaning domain names could be registered on a first come first served basis. Including domain names registered during the Sunrise period for trademark holders and in the Early Access Program (EAP) where people paid a higher fee to get early access to domain registrations here are the totals after the first day of GA according to ntldstats.com .Dental 1,971 .Clinic 1,447 .Care 1,395 .Surgery 534 So we are looking at a total of just over 5,000 ... read more ...
 
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Overstock Sees Positive Earnings Impact from Accepting Bitcoin - Overstock sees Bitcoin having a postitive effect on earnings for 2014. The company told Reuters they expect Bitcoin to add 4 cents per share, they are expecting $1.5 billion in sales for the year. From the article: Overstock.com Inc’s sales through bitcoin are expected to add 4 cents per share to its earnings this year, the online retailer’s chief executive, Patrick Byrne, told Reuters. Bitcoin sales at Overstock (OSTK.O), which started accepting this type of currency as payment for items on ... read more ...
 
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For The 1st Time, There Are More Than 114 Million .Com Domain Names Registered - According to Verisign, (VRSN) which operates the .Com and .Net registry,  the number of .Com domain names passed the 114 Million mark for the first time in history today. The number of .Com domain names according to the Verisign Daily Zone Count is 114,017,341. Just a few days ago Verisign published the Domain Industry Brief for the 1st Quarter of 2014. According to the report, as of March 31, Verisign reported there were 113.2 Million registered .Com domain names. So the number of registered .Com ... read more ...
Wed 13th August 2014
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Suit Filed Against BestRegistrar Over “Ransom” to Transfer Over 5K Domains Out - A company has filed a federal lawsuit against the company that owns the ICANN accredited registrar, BestRegistrar.com a few alleged resellers of BestRegistrar and the owners of the company that owns Bestregistrar.com, to “recover control of approximately 5,000 Internet domain names rightfully owned by Simon Property Group (SPG), and to recover damages both compensatory and statutory in nature arising out of: (i) Defendants’ wrongful exercise of control over the 5,000 domain names and (ii) unlawful ... read more ...
 
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Verisign: Only 3% of New gTLD Domain Names Are Resolving To Business Websites - Verisign issued a report on new gTLD registrations through June 29, 2014, finding that 41% of all new gTLD registrations are parked and only 3% of New gTLD Domain Names Are resolving to Business Websites. Of course Verisign operates the .com and .net registries and have a lot  to lose in the new gTLD world, yet the numbers are the numbers. The report entitled Website Usage Analysis in the New gTLDs: “We thought it would be an interesting exercise to extend similar analysis to the new gTLD market. ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN
Sedo Transactions Total $1.6 Million Led By Chat.Fr for 99,999 Euro; ecal.com $25K; Havana.club during 8K - Sedo reported that over the past week, 527 transactions took place on Sedo’s marketplace and via SedoMLS, totaling $1.6 Million, 52% of total sales were the result of Buy Now listings. All sales were led by Chat.fr which sold for 99,999 Euro’s (about $134,000) and Chat.de which sold for 65,000 Euro’s (about $87,000). The buyer of both domain names is Xedoc Holding, SA which is a large adult domain name owner. There appears to be no reason the .de sold for any less than the .fr I think its just ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN
Warning: WOI.com Reported Stolen - The three letter domain name WOI.com has been reported stolen. The domain name was at Godaddy until just a few days ago registered to a Bernard Naiborhu of Jakarta, when it moved over to the domain name registrar, eName Technology Co.,Ltd. of China WOI.com is now registered to: Admin Name: linyu Admin Organization: xia men yi ming wang luo you xian gong si Admin Street: zhen zhu wan ruan jian yuan Nice whois record. We sold the domain name last year through Afternic.com and the domain was transferred ... read more ...
 
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1 & 2 Character.GD and .VG Domains Will Be Charged A Higher Registration Fee - The registry for the .GD and .VG ccTLD announced today that beginning on September 2, 2014,  all 1 and 2 character domains under .GD and .VG will be considered as premium domain names and will be charged with a higher domain registration fee. The renewal fee for these domains will remain on standard pricing. Currently registered 1 and 2 character domain names will remain registered to their domain holders until deletion by them and will be renewed on standard pricing. After the deletion these domain ... read more ...
 
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Tucows Earnings Call: gTLD’s & ccTLD’s Increase Margins & They Bank Money Off .Group -   In the earnings call Tucows (TCX) which reported earnings yesterday revealed some interest facts and figures. In general profit margins from domain name is increase due to new gTLD’s and ccTLD’s, sales of domains are slowing, and Tucows revealed they had a minority interest in an application for .group which lost a private auction. While those funds won’t be booked until Tucows 3rd Quarter, Tucows increased their guidance of profit for the 3Q by by $1 Million Here are the highlights: “As ... read more ...
Tue 12th August 2014
Written by The Domains in EN
Tucows Hits 52 Week High & Reports Earnings - Tucows Inc. (NASDAQ:TCX, TSX:TC), reported its financial results for the second quarter ended June 30, 2014 in a day that saw intraday 52 week high for the shares. Tucows.com closed at $16.20 a share after hitting an intraday 52 week high of $16.33 per shares. Yummy domain sold less than $1 Million in domains for the quarter Summary Financial Results(In Thousands of US Dollars, Except Per Share Data) Net earnings per common share reflects the 1-for-4 reverse split of common shares that became effective ... read more ...
 
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As .Clinic Launches Into General Availability Tomorrow Here are The Taken Domains - The new gTLD .Clinic launches tomorrow into general availability here are the more interesting domains that were taken in Sunrise or Early Access Program (EAP) and therefore will not be available: 24hour.clinic airway.clinic alabamaallergy.clinic asthmacontrol.clinic autism.clinic babyscan.clinic bitcoin.clinic boi.clinic bone.clinic breath.clinic brisbane.clinic childcustody.clinic dermatology.clinic detox.clinic diabetes.clinic doctors.clinic euro.clinic familytherapy.clinic harley.clinic hipandknee.clinic hormone.clinic hypnosis.clinic implant.clinic keith.clinic kids.clinic lung.clinic male.clinic marijuana.clinic marriagecounseling.clinic medicalmarijuana.clinic meds.clinic mycare.clinic networking.clinic nose.clinic nutrition.clinic oncologist.clinic onsite.clinic ortho.clinic paediatrics.clinic pets.clinic porn.clinic pretty.clinic psychiatry.clinic psychologist.clinic respiratory.clinic skincare.clinic sportsmed.clinic success.clinic target.clinic top.clinic ultrasound.clinic vascular.clinic virtual.clinic virtualpsychology.clinic walk-in.clinic weed.clinic which.clinic Some ... read more ...
 
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Warning: Some Registrars (Godaddy) Are Making The Radix $160 Landrush Fee NonRefundable - Radix a new gTLD registry,  landrush for three new gTLDs .Host, .Website and .Press opens up on August 26th and runs until September 15th. Applying in landrush for a new gTLD domain gives the applicant early access to domain names ahead of general availability. The wholesale cost to apply for a .Host, .Website and .Press domain in landrush is $160. Radix has been advertising on social media calling their landrush a “no risk landrush” meaning that the $160 landrush fee is fully refundable if ... read more ...
 
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From shopping Guns with Bitcoin to Consumer Protection Warnings a the Crypto Corner for 8/12/14 - A lot of news over the last two days on the crypto currency front, from guns for Bitcoin to Consumer warnings about the dangers and risks of virtual currencies. Let’s start out with the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, they want to let consumers know that virtual currencies like Bitcoin and Litecoin are targets for hackers and that there are costs many may not be thinking about. Electronista wrote: The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) issued a warning on virtual currencies like ... read more ...
 
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Robin Williams Domains Regged in a Aftermath of His Passing - Hollywood and fans around the world lost one of its most popular and famous icons on Monday. Robin Williams passed away from an apparent suicide at the age of 63. Robin Williams won an academy award for Good Will Hunting, I always thought just the scenes of him and Matt Damon talking alone made the movie great all by itself. I am always interested in the dialogue far and away above any other component of a movie and those scenes made that one of my all time favorite movies. After the news broke a ... read more ...
Mon 11th August 2014
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Demand Media Names New CEO Shares Sink; Now Down 20% From Last Week - Demand Media, Inc, named one-time Ticketmaster Chief Executive Sean Moriarty as its new CEO and the market didn’t like the news sending shares down over 8% to close at $8.97 a share. You may recall it was just a week ago when Demand split off its Rightside division it traded as high as $11.10. Demand also said today it acquired Saatchi Online, which runs online art gallery Saatchi Art, for $17 million. Moriarty had been CEO of Saatchi Art since August 2013, and was CEO of Ticketmaster from 2007 ... read more ...
 
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Google Wins Control Of GlassForSnap.com Based On Its Trademark on Glass in UDRP - Google Inc. (“Complainant”), just won the rights to the domain name GlassforSnap.com. The one member panel of James A. Carmody, Esq., found the domain name GlassforSnap.com was confusing similar to Google’s trademark on the word “Glass”. The domain holder did not submit a response and the domain name went to a page which clearly targeted users of Google and Snapchat. All I can say is if you have a really good domain with the word “Glass” in it you better be careful what you do with ... read more ...
 
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Verisign’s Domain Industry Brief: There are 276 Million Domain Names As Of End Of 1st Q - Verisign (NASDAQ: VRSN), today published its Domain Name Industry Brief for the first quarter of 2014, and five million domain names were added to the Internet in the first quarter of 2014, bringing the total number of registered domain names to 276 million worldwide across all top-level domains (TLDs) as of March 31, 2014. The increase of five million domain names globally equates to a growth rate of 1.7% over the fourth quarter of 2013. Worldwide registrations have grew by 19.3 million, or 7.5%, ... read more ...
 
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A Lot of Good Domains Grabbed In The EAP Of .Care - We took a look into the zone file for The new gTLD .Care that goes into general availability on Wednesday meaning it can be registered on a first come, first served basis to see what has been registered during Sunrise and the Early Access Program (EAP). It looks like one drug company, Teva Respiratory, LLC heavily participated in the Sunrise program and got a bunch of registrations followed by the Mayo Clinic. Most of the registrations seemed to be taken in the EAP program Here are the more interesting ... read more ...
 
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CFF.com & COA.com Hit $25K On NameJet & Cash.org Is At $15K; Which Will Sell For More? - Three very good domain names are at auction on Namejet.com which today and tomorrow, CFF.com, COA.com and Cash.org. Each of the domain name have hit reserve and will sell. The domains as of publication have current high bids of: CFF.com $25,100 COA.com $25,000 Cash.Org $14,999 All of these auction are public, meaning that people can still join them and they are not restricted to just people who backordered the domains by a deadline. CFF.com has 14 bidders who bid $5K or more, COA.com has only 7 bidders ... read more ...
 
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RMIT University Loses URS On RMIT.Education, To A Parked Page With Links To It - RMIT University of Melbourne, Australia lost its bid to get the domain name RMIT.education suspended through a Uniform Rapid Suspension (URS) proceeding. Its a pretty amazing finding in that the  domain holder didn’t even respond to the URS, Complainant had a valid trademark, and the domain name  is parked and contains links to the school, on the parked page. According to the opinion the fault for decision may lay with the attorney for the School who represented it in the proceeding Here are ... read more ...
 
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More Brands Are Using Anonymous Apps To Market Their Product - Christopher Heine wrote a piece on Ad Week about the increasing ad campaigns on anonymous app platforms. The article looks at some of the big brands that are advertising on Whisper and Secret. As more and more people access at least apart of their daily online experience through mobile, brands are going to want to be on there. All the talk about new gtlds vs .com etc… This is where people should be spending some of their time, following what is going on with mobile and apps. I am not talking about ... read more ...
Sun 10th August 2014
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
EU Court to Decide if Bitcoin Transactions Are Subject to Value Added Tax - Jane Genova wrote an article on PaymentWeek.com about the EU deciding on whether or not to tax Bitcoin transactions. Earlier in the year Sweden asked for the EU to rule on whether or not Bitcoin should be taxed. The UK has ruled no valued added tax on Bitcoin. From the article: The European Court of Justice will rule if bitcoin transactions are subject to its value-added tax rules (VAT). If that top court decides to impose VAT regulations on member nations with bitcoin businesses, they could suffer ... read more ...
 
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Adam Strong Sells Racing.com To Australian Company; Racing Victoria - According to AFR.com, Racing Victoria based in Melbourne Australia has purchased the domain name ­Racing.com “a further step in establishing its own media business ­containing almost all of the state’s ­digital thoroughbred racing assets..for an undisclosed fee, and will launch the media unit and new, wider ­consumer brand for the industry by mid-September.” Racing Victoria website is at RacingVictoria.net.au and you can read all about the company here According to DomainTools.com, domain ... read more ...
 
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Where Does Your State Rank In Internet Speed? Va is #1; Alaska is Last - Broadview Networks released a report showing Internet Speeds by States If you want to see the map format check out the source site.   State by State Breakdown State Q1 ’14 Avg Mbps QoQ Change % (Q1 ’14 vs. Q4 ’13) YoY Change % (Q1 ’14 vs. Q1 ’13) Virginia 13.7 -4.3 30 Delaware 13.1 6.3 18 Massachusetts 13.1 2.6 22 Rhode Island 12.9 11 35 D.C. 12.8 5 18 Washington 12.5 8.5 29 New Hampshire 12.3 4 6 Utah 12.1 6 17 Michigan 11.8 13 42 Connecticut 11.7 7.2 18 North ... read more ...