Tuesday, February 05, 2008
What Grace period?
Well, it appears that Enom hasn't yet learned that "Domain Cherry Picking" doesn't earn them any points with their best customers. In fact some are so angry about this activity on the part of Enom, that they believe the best answer is a move to another registrar such as Moniker or Fabulous. "It's a slap in the face" says a long time enom reseller.
The process of "Domain Cherry Picking" is described as when a Registrar picks more valuable domain names from a client's renewal list ahead of earlier expired names, when moving names to eRGP. They then charge a renewal fee of $160 or sometimes higher. This of course makes it more likely the name will NOT be redeemed by the current owner and instead submitted to the Registrar's auction for even bigger profits.
It's been documented that Enom has gone so far as to pull some names over 7 days ahead of names with earlier expiration dates. Of course a Registrar can determine what names might be best Cherry Picked by placing it's own advertisements on them upon expiration and monitoring revenue. The Registrars have amended their terms of service (TOS) over the years to not only allow them the right to this practice, but to also keep the clients whois details on the name while they serve up ads that might put the client at risk.
Both of these actions are clear conflicts of interest between the Registrar and it's clients.
Originally the "Registration Grace Period" (RGP) was put in place to give the Registrar customer a buffer against the risk of losing a name after expiration. That Grace period has been under attack by the Registrars who see a better way to higher profits thru name auctions or keeping the names themselves called "Warehousing". More and more Registrars are continuing to shorten the Grace Period on one hand telling customers they have 30 days, but at a later time pointing to their (TOS) that offers NO assured Grace Period at all. None!
This practice by Enom and other Registrars becomes confusing to Domainers with large portfolios using 3rd party management software, and it appears that may be the Registrar's intent. The objective of course is to shift value from the domainer (the Registrar's client) to the Registrar itself.
Several of my domainer fans (both of them) have been badgering me to write more often. I don't think it has much to do with their appreciation of my chosen topics, but rather more so they can sit back and watch when the flame wars heat up and the .commie clique from Ricks descends down upon me once more.
Hey, I can take it. I'm old and take naps and forget who called me what very soon after having read it anway. Heck, I've been in this game for much longer than most of them, so what do they know huh? How long you ask? Long enough to have coined terms like .commie, alt extensions, domain front running, domain cherry picking, and long enough to have decided to NOT reg Stocks.com and Bonds.com etc etc at $0 cost. The first time I think I heard the term Domainer was in a Wallstreet room where the first dessemination of stock market news was being regularly fed over the Internet. We did it. There was talk of the undesirables laying claim to some URLs and planning actual commercial uses for them. God no! Were we concerned? Not much, because that would mean graphics, and that would just "slow down the Net". Couldn't work, and "they" wouldn't let just one person control those generic names for long anyway.
I'm still wondering when "they" are gonna jump in and take back all those names. Maybe it's not gonna really happen? Maybe Google and Microsoft/Yahoo are just gonna squeeze them so hard with the coming recession, that they'll just have to start thinking about developing and adding real content. Sounds to me like it'll be back to the future with US small business finally looking to get a significant website and buying brandables rather than type-in names. We'll see.
Tuesday, January 08, 2008
Network Solutions has instituted a 4 day lock on all domain names searched on their site. Big surprise?
The other "insiders" and industry news pundits finally picked up on the domain "Front Running" issue, and boy did they push out the headlines. The Domain State forum saw a ton of traffic.What gets me about all this is that it's "old news". We've watched other registrars doing "Front Running" for years now.
In fact, I'm the one who took the term from the stockmarket and first applied it to the practice involving domains.Back in 05 while watching some of my whois name searches get picked up and regged by some of the "accredited" registrars, I decided to seed some names and sit back and watch them take the bait. They did. I then notified ICANNt that these guys had evidently learned of a nasty trick called "Front Running" and were running it on their own clients. As usual ICANNt ignored the warning.
Spring forward to mid 2006 and my phone conversation with Jay at Name Intelligence (Domaintools) where I asked if he was aware of the problem of "Front Running" on domains? I pointed out some examples having been "run" by Chesterton Holdings of Oversee/NameKing/DomainSponsor? Jays take was somewhat skeptical and he seemed content with the idea that so many names were being tasted, that it was just coincidence.
It took another year of free and expanded reign by the "Front Runners" before Domainers started to make more of a fuss. In mid 07 Jay put out a piece in his blog referring to the fuss about "Front Running" as just "Hype". I posted a comment to this article and even included an archive shot of an example Front Run domain I had pointed out to him as proof back when. No reply.
ICANNt finally takes up the issue way late of course,( http://www.icann.org/committees/security/sac022.pdf ) and I'm pleased they have picked up on my term for the practice, but they still were in denial "What appears to a prospective registrant as an intentional act may prove to be a coincidence". This even after receiving documentation from me, as noted in the report.The bottom line that I see in this whole ordeal is that ICANNt has proved yet again that they do NOT represent Domainers or the Publics interest, and do nothing to protect that interest. They seem to function mainly as a taxing authority without providing representation for those paying the tax. They pass out accredations to registrars, and rarely withdraw one no matter what the proof provided of wrongdoing or fraud by the registrar. (See Registerfly)
I believe that those jumping all over Network Solutions for taking steps to protect their market share, need to focus their anger on the real problem.
ICANNt failed again.
Saturday, October 20, 2007
Not many Dallas fans know that their beloved Cowboys were thrown for TWO big loses last weekend. One of which was their failed attempt to beat the Patriots, and the other (which could end up as more costly) was the loss of their own brand on the Internet.
The Cowboys managed to fumble the deal for Cowboys.com at a domain name auction in Florida. Get this, after securing the winning bid of $275k (other domains at the auction went as high as $2.2 million each) Dallas begged out after claiming they thought they'd won the name for a bid of $275. That's right folks, they (said) they thought they had won the name for less than it costs for a family to attend one of their games.
The domain was promptly put back into play and sold for $370k in overtime.
Friday, October 19, 2007
The Department of Commerce has announced the extended award of the registry contract for the United States Country Code Top Level Domain ( .US ) to Neustar Inc. This action has disappointed some of the largest holders and supporters of the extension who were calling for a takeover by the Alliance Registry created by a partnership pf GoDaddy and Afilias. Many of those with vested interests in the .US ccTLD believe that Neustar has mismanaged the extension and has done almost nothing to promote it's use. They say they have little hope that Neustar will change it's ways going forward.
Tombstone Link:
Friday, October 12, 2007
Just back, but then again I never left in the first place. The EcomXpo is 100% virtual and I think we'll be seeing a lot more of this type of trade show in the future. Just think, you can talk with sponsors at their booths and exchange cards and immediately see presentations of their products and services. Traveling to the next booth is done in the blink of an eye saving a lot of time and allowing you to see a lot more of what you came for. You can see and converse with other attendees and take in several seminars and panel discussions. Now this is without all the cost and time associated with flights, hotels, taxis, meals etc. etc.
It appears to be quite popular as well. Checking some of the stats for this show, there were some 3513 companies represented by attendees. A number of the giants were there such as Google and Microsoft and lots of affiliate related organizations such as ADtech, Linkshare, Doubleclick, Digital River etc. I especially liked the services offered by http://www.yudu.com/us/ and http://wink.com/ take a look.
Over in the education hall the top 5 presentations were; 30 Tips for Web Writing, Future-proofing Your SEO Strategy, Social Networking and Affiliate Marketing, Fast and Easy Affiliate Income, and Word of Mouth Marketing in Five Easy Steps.
I was so impressed by the show's platform, that I contacted the author Inxpo to see what it would take to do something like this for the financial industry.
Amanda Beard and Bob Parsons (CEO GoDaddy)
It's fun to be the first with news and our scoop about Amanda Beard as the new GoDaddy Girl was a kick. I wonder if she'll be wearing that GoDaddy swimsuit in her next olympic swimming competition? I expect Bob will be taking her to the big Motorcycle rallys and she'll be riding her bike to boot.
Wednesday, September 26, 2007
Scoop! Amanda Beard is the new GoDaddy Girl, and Bob Parsons is expected to announce it next week. You heard it here first folks. Bob has been spreading around some clues to the insiders, but with this post, the secret is out.
Amanda Ray Beard was born on October 29, 1981 in Irvine, California and is an American Olympic swimmer and model.
What's more important to me is that she loves motorcycles and rides one herself.
Friday, August 17, 2007
I guess when you've made it to the front page of the newspaper, it's all downhill from here right?
From our regional paper (Valley News) today about my messing around with the Weblo virtual geo site. I think Rick (the Domain King himself) said he had thrown in around $20k into that thing. I know Duke (editor of DNjournal) has played around with it too a bit. Anyway, here's how the article starts: xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
NEWS: He Owns This Town, And That One, Too
Canaan -- First things first: There would be no interview in person. Daniel Stager -- retired financial analyst, motorcycling enthusiast, mayor of the Internet incarnations of two Upper Valley towns -- frankly didn't see the need.
I wanted to go out to a movie today, but I'm a little concerned about the Paparazzi. Disquise time for sure.
Tuesday, August 07, 2007
Finally an audio tribute saluting the true heros of the Internet. Check out the link
Click here
The GoDaddy Chopper will be at the Sturgis Rally this year. Bob Parsons likes his biz on the wild side. Good for him!
Saturday, December 30, 2006
Some of us older folks remember when television was free. Then the powers that be (read rich corporations) brought out "cable" television and sold the idea to everyone on the premise that if you paid a subscription, you wouldn't be bothered with all those stinkin commercials. Sounded fair enough right? So we bot into it. Of course here we sit now paying for cable WITH commercials.
Now comes the attack on the neutrality of the internet. The rich corporations now want to provide high speed content only from those that agree to pay them a special fee. Those not willing to pay the piper, will be stuck in the slow lane, and possibly eliminated if Comcast et al get their way. Heck they think they own the net anyway. Watch the video to get the message, and then go to www.savetheinternet.com and sign the petition.
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