The Biggest Threat To Australian Internet Business

Do you have an Internet business? Are you an Internet Marketer, domainer or an SEO company? Then you better LISTEN UP as this will be the BIGGEST THREAT you will face in the next 12 months.

Did you know that every time you buy a .au domain name, included in that price is a hidden fee (some people would say tax). That fee is paid to a 3rd party called .au Domain Administration Ltd and is referred to as “auDA”. In Australia, auDA write the policies that govern domain names. One of these policies is called the Domain Monetisation Policy.

There is a Names Policy Panel that is reviewing this policy RIGHT NOW. The policy governs entities that earn revenue from a “monetised website”. According to auDA policy, a “monetised website” means “a website or landing page that has been created for the purpose of earning revenue from advertising, including monetised domain parking pages“. In my opinion, this policy clearly discriminates against people who make their living online. It discriminates against drop shippers, information marketers and those people that don’t have “physical stock” to sell. Rather than talk about registrants (people that register domains), it singles out and labels people as “domainers” who have the legitimate business practise of selling products and services online!

Let me spell out the threat in “Plain English”. If someone (such as a competitor / disgruntled customer) complains about your website/business, auDA has the power to take your domain away! They do this (from a technical perspective) by instructing the registry to put it into “Pending Delete”. Other people (such as your competitors) can then buy/backorder YOUR DOMAIN through the domain drop process. SAY GOODBYE TO YOUR BUSINESS. Goodbye to all the SEO you have done, goodbye to your mailing list!

How You Can Protect Your Business

1. Fill in this form TODAY (seriously, do it now)
Private individuals can become auDA members ( in a membership called Demand Class ). It costs $22 and no upfront payment is required.

2. Vote later this year
If you become a Demand Class member today, you can vote at the next election.

What I Am Doing About It

This year I will be running for election to the auDA board to represent the interests of small business, internet marketers and domain investors. I will be actively campaiging for you on this issue, to see this discriminatory policy scrapped!

This is only going to happen if you become a member. Please don’t come crying to me later (when your Internet business has been taken away from you). By then its too late.

Think of it like insurance. If you are serious about your business, you want to protect it. $22 is nothing in the scheme of things.

Just so that you are aware, the election is at the end of the year, but there is a sneaky “3 month membership rule” which prevents new members from voting. As such you cannot delay this application!

Can you do the industry a BIG favour? Fill in this form NOW: http://www.auda.org.au/pdf/auda-membership-form.pdf

After you have done it, drop me a line and let me know. I really want to know WHO the proactive people are – those that will help to safeguard our industry. If you have any questions (or need a stamp/fax), let me know.

Go here now.

Domainer Income Includes Trademark Checking

Over the past few months the team at Domainer Income has been testing out a new groundbreaking feature – automatic trademark checks!

That’s right. When you are viewing .au drops, all of those domains are now checked for trademarked keywords. This level of automation is something that is not offered anywhere else. It can:

1. Save you HOURS of time.

2. Potentially save you from a lawsuit.

3. Save you money, because you will be shown what auctions to avoid.

See the TM column? You can hover your mouse over it and get all the information on the trademark. Cool eh?

Why Trademarks?

Trademark infringement is one area that hurts domain investors and newcomers to the industry. It’s largely something that’s not widely talked about, so here are a few scenarios to be aware of:

Example #1

A newcomer to the industry gets sucked in by all the marketing hype around “buying aged domains”. They sign up to the latest and greatest auction site and start buying, only to find they get slapped with a lawsuit because the keywords in the domain name they just purchased were trademarked.

Example #2

Someone buys a domain at auction for $1,000 and a few days later receives a letter from the regulator that their domain infringes on someone elses trademark. The domain is taken off them, put into “Pending Delete” and the person loses their $1,000.

The Future

This will be the first in many new features that we are making available to our Professional Members. We have some VERY BIG surprises for 2011.

Thanks again to our customers who continue to support us and inspire our team to innovate.

auDA Caves In And Releases Secret Ballot Numbers

Over the past few days I’ve been receiving a lot of phone calls and email messages from auDA members who are angry and frustrated with what happened at the 2010 AGM.

I’d like to set the record straight.

I attend the auDA AGM as a demand class member, but more importantly, representing the interests of small business and professional domain name investors. As a small business owner myself, its something I feel very strongly about.

After the votes were cast into a box, a number of people went off to another room to count them. There was no truly independent 3rd party to review this process. There was no independent scrutineers – we were just told of the result.

Having spoken to many small business owners and domain investors I had a good idea of how many votes I had. What has shocked me, and has shocked the entire industry is that auDA refused to disclose the voting numbers because they claim it was a “secret ballot”.

Later that afternoon I posted the results on this very blog. What I didn’t know was that the auDA board was meeting behind closed doors and discussing this issue.

What has since transpired is that auDA has emailed its members and disclosed the numbers. This has never happened before and I’m told that it’s a direct result of my candidacy.

Here are the numbers:

Richard Bone – 2 votes
Kevin Fleming – 2 votes
Kim Heitman – 34 votes
Simon Johnson – 21 votes
Erhan Karabardak – 23 votes
Cheryl Langdon-Orr – 32 votes
Kelvin Markham – 2 votes

What is not clear is if these numbers include any votes that auDA may have deemed “invalid”. For example, people filling in the form incorrectly. Votes are sent in via fax to Maddocks (auDA’s lawyers). Who knows if your vote was counted or not!

At the end of the day, this is a huge win for our campaign for transparency. In the 10 years auDA has been going, its never disclosed this information… until now.

Introducing Episode 3 Of Our Domaining TV Show [Video]

Many domain investors are discovering ccTLD’s and are using them as a diversification strategy against the staple diet of com/net/org.

With that in mind, I recently sat down with George Pongas formerly from Dark Blue Sea (some may know them also as Fabulous) and had a chat about all things .au.

iTunes users – click here to subscribe to the video podcast and keep up to date with the latest episodes.

For everyone else (using a browser), you can check it out on our TV show website.

Simon Johnson Appointed To auDA Names Policy Panel

A few minutes ago we received confirmation from auDA that Simon Johnson had been appointed to the Names Policy Panel.

The purpose of the panel is to:

1. Review the policy framework underlying the allocation and use of domain names in the .au domain space
2. Provide recommendations to the auDA board about what changes should be made to the policy framework.

The Panel is expected to commence work in September 2010. If you have any specifics that you would like Simon to raise, feel free to leave a comment on contact us directly. Please also note that there will be a public consultation in December 2010.