New Domain Name Scam – 85% of Appraisal & No Affiliate Links

Like most domainers I get my fair share of spam, scammers, discount offers from registrars and the like. Here is a scam that I received last night.

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From: j.jo...@rocketmail.com

Subject: Regarding your domain YOUR-DOMAIN.COM

Hello,
I came across your domain name YOUR-DOMAIN.COM and I would be interested in buying it from you.
Here is my offer, you have to send me a professional appraisal from one of the following companies. and I will pay you 85% of the appraised price.
For payments under $2000 I prefer to use paypal. And for larger amounts of money I prefer if we used escrow.com

I accept appraisals from any of these companies:

-sedo.com
-pedma.com
-accuratedomains.com

If you already have an appraisal from one of those companies please forward it to me, and we will do business.

Regards,
James Johnson

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Pedma is a parking page, Sedo is self explanatory and Accurate Domains.. are they? I have no idea.

For me, the interesting question is…. Why would someone refer people to an appraisal website with NO affiliate link? The html version of the email doesn’t have an affiliate link. As such, the only people to benefit from this appear to be Sedo and/or AccurateDomains. That is assuming that the person(s) behind this scam are not going to take your domain away using some other means.

What do you think? Have you received a scam lately? Post and let us know.

Canadian Politician Forgets To Renew Domain – What Happens Next?

Canadian politician Rodger Cuzner appears to have forgotten to renew his domain name rodgercuzner.ca. It was renewed by someone else and is now showing dating links for Senior Friend Finder.

Cuzner told CBC News “Guys watch for these opportunities and they see the opportunity and then they come back and sell you back the domain site.”

Unfortunately for Rodger, he still hasn’t changed his Facebook page – its still showing “Website: http://www.rodgercuzner.ca” under Detailed Info. Good on you Rodger!

About Rodger

Born in Glace Bay, Nova Scotia, he is a current member of the Liberal Party of Canada in the Canadian House of Commons, representing the riding of Cape Breton—Canso. Cuzner is a former organizer of events. He was parliamentary secretary to former Prime Minister Jean Chrétien from January 13, 2003 to December 11, 2003.

Kosovo.com Auction At 32,500 EUR

Kosovo is a disputed region in the Balkans. Its majority is governed by the partially-recognised Republic of Kosovo.

There are 3 days left in the auction for Kosovo.com and its at EUR 32,500 right now. Considering iran.com sold for $400k and melbourne.com for $700k, Kosovo has a long way to go.

Its a buyers market; if you have the cash its time to pickup some bargains.

Live Sells Two Domains – US $1.65 million

Live Current Media Inc. (OTCBB:LIVC) has announced that it has entered agreements to sell two more of its non-core domain names for $1.65 million.

Live Current Chairman and CEO Geoff Hampson said “We believe the recent sales of three of Live Current’s non-core domain names for a total of over US $2 million is a testament to the inherent value of our domain name assets, especially in this challenging economic climate.”

From the looks of things it seems that they need the cash – “These sales form part of management’s strategy to achieve the goal of cash flow positive operations by the end of 2009.”

I will be interesting to see if other domaining companies follow suit and start selling the family jewels to keep their heads above water. Seems time to pick up a few bargains!

ICANN To Spend $1M On Ads – Reports $4.7M Investment Loss

ICANN is apparently embarking on a million dollar campaign to convince us to buy their story on generic domains. Its reported that the campaign will start in Q4 2009 with a series of announcements and PR.

The Australian is reporting that Dr Twomey said an independent panel would be appointed to decide who would be allowed to register a disputed domain, but no details were available about who might be on it. I’m sure its going to be “fair and balanced” – just like Fox news.

Best of luck to the ICANN Executive who are no doubt practicing their Jedi mind tricks – “these arent the domains droids your looking for”.

What do you think? Is $1million a waste of funds? After all, its 5,000,000 ICANN .20 cent fees for a .com!

Add this to the “Realized and unrealized investment losses of $4.7 mil thru year to date” which was very quietly disclosed in the unaudited financial results. Click on the down arrow on the left hand side of the graph and you will see a little pop-up that mentions this little gem!

Who in ICANN is being made accountable for this investment loss?