Thu 9th July 2015
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Do 3 minute domains have any genuine value? - Is a domain name worth something if it’s just traded amongst investors with limited potential value to an end user? Three letter .com domain names are very popular right now, with prices increasing significantly over the past year. Much of the demand comes from domain traders in China. China itself is experiencing a bubble in tech stocks that rivals (or surpasses) the NASDAQ 15 years ago…perhaps including the ensuing bust. Will the value of three letter .com domains face a similar fate to other ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
.Site Now In Early Access: Here Are Some Non-Premium & Low Premium Domain Names - .Site a new gTLD that is being launched by Radix and is in the Early Access Period (EAP) where for any extra fee you can register a .site domain ahead of General Availability (GA) which starts on July 15th at 16:00 UTC. If a domain is still available after the EAP it can be registered on a first come, first served basis. We asked Radix to provide a list of non-premium .Site domain names, that is domains that do not carry a premium registration and renewal fee  which can be ordered in EAP or in GA. Here ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
The normal compensate per staff member during ICANN in 2014 was over $187,000 - Ion Mag did an article that broke down the money that ICANN is making and the kind of salaries being paid out. It is a pretty thorough look at what goes on over at ICANN. Average pay per staff over $187,000 stood out to me. From the article: ICANN’s 2014 tax return (IRS form 990) shows a net trading loss. The true picture is somewhat masked by ICANN’s new gTLD cash windfall. In 2013, ICANN turned over $230 million and spent over $120 million, and made a slight profit in 2014. Result: happiness. But ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
Thesis.com Purchased For $100K By Parent Co. Of WordPress Saved In UDRP - In a very interesting UDRP, Chris Pearson who owns the WordPress Theme of Thesis, lost its bid to grab the domain name Thesis.com from the parent company that owns and operates WordPress, Automattic, Inc. According to the UDRP, Respondent and Complainant were both approached by a third-party about purchasing the domain name thesis.com and Automattic, Inc. was the high bidder, paying $100,000.00 for the domain name The three member UDRP panel of the Hon. Neil Anthony Brown, QC, Hon. Richard DiSalle, ... read more ...
Wed 8th July 2015
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
Playa Games, Maker of Online SFGame Played By 40M: Found Guilty Of Reverse Domain Name Hijacking - Playa Games GmbH which is the creator and operator of an online game called “Shakes Fidget” which it says is known as “SFGAME” was just found guilty of Reverse Domain Name Hijacking on the domain name SFGame.com The decision was handed down by the one member UDRP panel of Alistair Payne. The UDRP was decided by the On-line ADR Center of the Czech Arbitration Court (CAC). The domain holder is CBS Interactive a subsidiary of CBS Corporation, which owns 250 domain names that include the term ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Workbetter.com lawsuit discharged after decider disses case - Judge says it looked like a “set up”. Just one day after appearing in court and having the judge deny a motion for preliminary injunction, Office Space Solutions has dismissed a cybersquatting lawsuit over the domain name WorkBetter.com. The company, which is launching a new business called Work Better, filed the case last month in an effort to get the domain name from Jason Kneen, who registered the domain name in 1999. Today, attorney Roman Popov of The Bostany Law Firm filed to voluntarily ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
Qatar Airways Loses 2nd UDRP in a Month On 15 Year Old DiscoverQatar.com - Qatar Airways Q.C.S.C. of Doha, Qatar, just lost a second UDRP in a month, its attempt to grab the domain name DiscoverQatar.com Last month the state owned Airlines lost a UDRP on two other generic domain names, discoverqatar.org and qatartourism.org last month. The domain holder represented himself in the UDRP The sole panelist of Adam Taylor found dismissed the UDRP but failed to Find Reverse Domain Name Hijacking even though Qatar Airways told the panel it had a US trademark on the term but did ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
WordPress wins another turn opposite Chris Pearson - Thesis creator loses cybersquatting case. Automattic, the company behind WordPress, has successfully defended a challenge by Thesis developer Chris Pearson over the domain name Thesis.com. Pearson had a high profile spat with WordPress founder Matt Mullenweg about five years ago. Pearson had released his Thesis software with a licensing fee; Mullenweg argued it should be released under GPL because it contained lots of code from WordPress. The issue was apparently settled in 2010. Late last year, ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
14 Year Old GSUS.com (Jesus in Spanish) Saved In UDRP From TM Holder of G-SUS - G-Hold License B.V. just lost its bid to grab the domain name gsus.com which is owned by Vertical Axis, Inc in a UDRP. gsus.com issued phonetically and slang for Jesus in Spanish. Vertical Axis registered the domain name Respondent registered the disputed domain name on October 14, 2001. Vertical Axis was represented by ESQwire.com The three member panel of Petter Rindforth, The Honourable Neil Anthony Brown QC and Jonas Gulliksson found that the domain name that was registered in 2001 was not Registered ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
A Dozen finish user domain name sales - Newell Rubbermaid among end user domain name buyers. The holiday week slowed sales at Sedo, with the company handling 501 transactions for about $1 million last week. I had difficulty finding the usual number of end user sales, but there are some goods ones in here. Newell Rubbermaid got a steal on KnifeSkills.com, a machinery company bought the .com to match its .us, and Orange County’s bus system got OCBus.com. Here’s the list: ProvidentLoans.co.uk £750 – Provident Financial PLC, a UK lender. NIHA.org ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
Verisign Announces $30K Winner of #InternetOfficial Contest: KidsCookDinner.com - Verisign the registry for the .com registry has announced the Grand Prize Winner of it’s #InternetOfficial contest. It’s KidsCookDinner.com, registered through Network Solutions. I was one of the five judges selected by Verisign to judge the contest however the Grand Prize winner was selected by the public. Here is the announcement: “”New York-based Kate K. submitted the most descriptive, memorable and original new .COM domain name that resonated with our five judges and received the most ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainHack.er in EN and tagged
NetNames has a pop at Vox Populi - A third competition regulator has been brought into the dispute over Vox Populi Registry’s pricing strategy for the .sucks gTLD. Online brand protection company NetNames has filed a complaint with the European Commission, arguing that charging brand owners $1,999 per year while others pay just $10 is unfair. Vox Populi demanded $1,999 from brands during sunrise, with yearly renewals charged at the same rate. But during general availability, which opened in late June, consumers only had to part ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainHack.er in EN and tagged
NetNames has a pop at Vox Populi | IPPro The Internet news | ipprotheinternet … - A third competition regulator has been brought into the dispute over Vox Populi Registry’s pricing strategy for the .sucks gTLD. Online brand protection company NetNames has filed a complaint with the European Commission, arguing that charging brand owners $1,999 per year while others pay just $10 is unfair. Vox Populi demanded $1,999 from brands during sunrise, with yearly renewals charged at the same rate. But during general availability, which opened in late June, consumers only had to part ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN
June's Top 5 stories on Domain Name Wire - Two lawsuits headline last month’s top stories on Domain Name Wire. What happened to lawyers taking extended summer vacations? The top two stories on Domain Name Wire last month were about lawsuits, one involving WordPress and one that could result in a reverse domain name hijacking complaint. Here’s a look back at the past month in the domain name business. 1. WordPress Foundation sues owner of WordPress domain names – WordPress forbids using the WordPress mark in a domain name. It filed a ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
BlackBerry Limited Registers Android Domain Names - BlackBerry Limited registered two domain names that are interesting: AndroidSecured.com |.net This is interesting because it was recently rumored that a new BlackBerry phone would run the Android operating system. Since “Android” is a registered trademark of Google Inc. this may be a solid clue that BlackBerry and Google have come to terms for a BlackBerry phone to run Android? An article on Fut-Science.com plays out that the phone will be called BlackBerry Venice and the article resembles that ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
Paul Allen Decides To Go With .Fish instead of shopping a .com from Most Wanted Domains - Jay Westerdal blogged on Tuesday about Microsoft co – founder and billionaire Paul Allen going with a .Fish domain. Allen chose to go with SmartCatch.fish instead of purchasing SmartCatch.com. Allen registered the domain at the end of March and regged it out til 2020. The interesting thing about this story for us here at TheDomains.com, Mike Berkens and his company Worldwide Media Inc. owns SmartCatch.com, registered in 2004. If Mike starts getting offers I think the price quote will be pretty ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
A demeanour during Dot Luxury One Year Into The Process - Tony Kirsch of ARI Registry Services posted an interview with Monica Kirchner of Dot Luxury. Tony was looking to get some perspective on how things are going one year into the process. Dot Luxury names are not cheap, checking out a few registrars: TheDomains.Luxury $780 101Domain TheDomains.Luxury $724.99 Name.com TheDomains.Luxury $799.99 Go Daddy According to ntldstats.com there are 1,186 registrations. From the article: What was one of the key challenges you faced and how did you overcome this? Monica: ... read more ...
Tue 7th July 2015
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
Google Hates ICANN's Attempt to Eliminate Whois Privacy Calling it "Impractical & Ineffective -   Google filed it’s comment on the whois privacy issue with ICANN today. Google  seems to hate the proposal of the ICANN working group to prohibit  commercial domain registrants from using proxy or privacy services calling it unfair to small businesses and individuals. Google even cites it’s own Charleston Road Registry an example of how big companies will still be able to use shell companies to hide ownership of domain names,  something small businesses and individuals will not be able ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
From CBS to CNN To Fox To Google: New gTLD .News Has Almost 500 Sunrise Registrations - The new gTLD .News enters the Early Access Program (EAP) for Rightside Tomorrow, Wednesday July 8th with the highest number of Sunrise domain registrations the registry has had in any of its new domain name extensions, just short of 500. Matt Overman of Rightside told TheDomains.com, “out of our entire portfolio of 36 active TLDs, .NEWS had the greatest number of Sunrise registrations, clocking in at 498.” “We placed an estimated 75% of our premium .NEWS domain on a special list of non-premium-priced ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
Sedo Transactions Total $1m for a week led by Vigia.com - There were 501 transactions on Sedo’s marketplace and via SedoMLS, totaling $1m. 52% of total sales were the result of Buy Now listings.     Highlights of public sales are: Top .com: vigia.com at 25,000 USD Top ccTLD: charge.it at 7,000 EUR Top “other” TLD: grandstand.net at 6,800 USD New gtld sales: one.vacations    5,500    USD kazino.casino    5,000    EUR   ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainHack.er in EN and tagged
Afilias Adds .PROMO To Its Expanding List of Top Level Domains – SYS - <![CDATA[ ]]> Global domain registry operator Afilias announced today they are expanding their new top level domain (TLD) portfolio to include dotPROMO (.PROMO), the new home of promotional offers on the web. Promotions have become an integral part of almost every sales process worldwide, especially branded products. According Razorfish’s 2015 Global Digital Marketing Report, ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainHack.er in EN and tagged
NetNames files Complaint w/ European Competition Commission on Vox … - NetNames.com has filed a  complaint to European Competition Commission on Vox Populi’s .SUCKS pricing strategy that had Brand owners charged $1,999 each year (wholesale) for a .SUCKS domain name compared to others that are charged just $10 According to NetNames.com which is a brand protection company representing many trademark holders, Vox Populi created an uneven pricing structure that effectively charges brands a premium fee irrespective of when they applied to register a .SUCKS new gTLD domain ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainNameWire in EN and tagged
Verisign gets Domain Name Stockpiling patent - The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office has granted patent number 9,075,886 (pdf) to Verisign for “Systems and methods for detecting the stockpiling of domain names.” We’ll call it domaindar for short. The patent explains ways that a registry can determine what a domain name registrar is doing with domain names after they expire. Are they deleting them or keeping them for themselves (i.e., stockpiling.)? To discover what registrars are doing with the domains, Verisign proposes checking site information ... read more ...
 
Written by The Domains in EN and tagged
NetNames files Complaint w/ European Competition Commission on Vox Populi’s .SUCKS Pricing - NetNames.com has filed a  complaint to European Competition Commission on Vox Populi’s .SUCKS pricing strategy that had Brand owners charged $1,999 each year (wholesale) for a .SUCKS domain name compared to others that are charged just $10 According to NetNames.com which is a brand protection company representing many trademark holders, Vox Populi created an uneven pricing structure that effectively charges brands a premium fee irrespective of when they applied to register a .SUCKS new gTLD domain ... read more ...
 
Written by DomainHack.er in EN and tagged
AlpNames opens its premium domain store - AlpNames targets high-value, prestige domain customers with its new AlpNames Premium brand.Tuesday 7th July 2015, Gibraltar: AlpNames, now the world's second largest new gTLD registrar, is continuing its growth plans with the opening of its AlpNames Premium virtual store which markets highly valuable domain names.The company, which already manages over 500,000 domain names on behalf of its customers, is broadening its range of products to include highly sought after 'premium names'. Premium domain ... read more ...