[Video] Female Golfer Targetted By Cybersquatter
January 9, 1 CommentCasie Cathrea became the youngest Monday qualifier for an LPGA event at Blackhawk Country Club. Her official website is Cathrea.com.
Her father, Harry Cathrea tracked down Leonard Meng Lee who registered CasieCathrea.com; he threatened to sue Lee under the Federal Anticybersquatting Consumer Protection Act.
“It cost him two bucks and he wanted to charge me a thousand dollars”
“And he was also nice enough to say he accepts Paypal.”
Its been reported that Lee has registered more than 1,300 domain names of famous people, including Eldrickwoods.com.
In a statement to ABC7 Lee said “As far as I know, the name is not trademarked and I was legally in the right to register the domain”.
Apple Wins 16 Domain Names via UDRP
January 8, No CommentsApple has won 16 domains from Daniel Bijan, including macbookpro.com. This is by far the most domain names I’ve ever seen awarded to Apple in one hit.
Here is the official list:
blueipod.com
iphonecheap.com
iphonetoys.com
ipodaccessories.info
ipodkits.com
ipodsbaratos.com
macbookpro.biz
macbookpro.com
macbookpro.net
macbookpro.org
macfriend.com
redipods.com
macbook.us
macbookpro.us
macbooks.us
macpro.us
Claim Numbers: FA0911001294886 and FA0911001295941.
Google Loses Domain Arbitration To Canadian Start-Up
December 30, No CommentsAnnounced today, the National Arbitration Forum has dismissed Google’s complaint that it was entitled to the domain name, Groovle.com.
Young Canadian entrepreneurs Jacob Fuller and Ryan Fitzgibbon, launched the web site in 2007, to provide users the ability to upload photos and customize their Internet start page.
Jacob Fuller stated “Google never had anything to fear from our web site. The arbitrators’ decision that the two domain names are sufficiently different should put Google at ease and we look forward to a renewed positive relationship with Google.”
auDA Puts Domain In Pending Delete & Goes On Holidays
December 23, No CommentsOn the afternoon of Thu 17th, 2009 SAPIA Pty Ltd registered the domain name “stephenconroy.com.au” as a satirical platform on which to air grievances and promote debate about the Australian governments proposed mandatory Internet filtering scheme. By 5pm the next day, the website was forcibly taken offline by auDA.
SAPIA was given merely 3 hours to issue a response which is an unusually short period of time for domain eligibility complaints to be arbitrated. A request for additional time was denied personally by auDA’s CEO shortly before the domain was taken offline.
The domain name stephenconroy.com.au is now in PendingDelete and the auDA office is closed for the holiday season – Merry Christmas.
Meanwhile, Electronic Frontiers Australia has expressed its surprise and concern:
“This incident reflects worrying concerns about the power that private domain
name regulators have to silence critical political speech without going
through legitimate legal channels.”
SAPIA Pty Ltd appears to have re-established the site (out of the range of auDA’s jurisdiction / claws) at stephen-conroy.com (no more .au).
Just in case you don’t know what the fuss is all about regarding Internet censorship in Australia, have a look at this video:
More information is available at: PRWeb, Open Letters & EFA.
How Domainers Can Profit From Companies That Go Bust!
December 4, No CommentsIn my opinion, the GFC presents us with an opportunity to make some serious money. Consequently, when I came across this “text book case” of Joe’s Sports, Outdoor & More – I just had to share it.
Bricks and Mortar Goes Bankrupt
The Oregon retail outlet “Joe’s Sports & Outdoor” filed for Chapter 11 around March 2009. The company listed both assets and debt ranging from $100 million to $500 million. It apparently owed its 30 largest unsecured creditors a total of $12.8 million.
Domains Acquired
Alberta-based UFA Co-operative Ltd acquired the domain names JoesSports.com and GIJoes.com. They outsourced the fulfillment to GSI Commerce – the same company that did it for the old bricks’n'mortar Joe’s. Essentially all that UFA Co-operative Ltd does now is sit back and earn a commission from all the sales.
A great story – very smart.
Sources: Oregon Live and Oregon Business News.
Halvarez Registrant Of Parked Domains – Who’s Getting The Ad Revenue?
November 10, 8 CommentsGiven Snapnames opened up their auction history, I decided to login and take a look at some auctions where I’d encountered Halverez – there were quite a few. It was like a trip down memory lane…. I remember back in 2005 when I bid on …. 
While plowing through the results, a few things came to mind when I reviewed this auction below:
Question #1
Should people be compensated by Snapnames when they lose the auction to Halverez? In other words, Halverez ends up with the domain name they were bidding on?
Snapnames has stated they ” will offer a rebate, with 5.22% interest” but that’s only to those whose bids were inflated by the fake auction bids.
Question #2
What is Snapnames going to do about domain names that are currently registered to Halverez? The current whois record for this name that I lost at auction, has known contact details for Halverez. The creation date matches up perfectly to the auction date.
Question #3
Who is receiving the revenue from domain names that Halverez “won” at auction? For example, the domain name I lost to Halverez above is currently parked:
Who has been making money from this domain? How many other domains are there like this? In terms of compensation, how do you put a price on lost opportunity cost, revenue from parking/development and revenue from domain sales?
This is starting to take shape now that there appears to be a Class Action Lawsuit filed.
Tell us what you think! Have you have lost to Halverez? What happened?
Halvarez Stimulus Check From Snapnames
November 5, 1 CommentMany of us including Acro and myself have been discussing Halvarez for years – look at this thread on DNF. This isn’t anything new. Having experienced this first hand, you can see the date and time stamps I posted in the thread!
Unfortunately we may never REALLY know what went on. What is good, is that Snapnames had the guts (some could call it a moral obligation or duty of care) to admit they had a problem and are in the process of addressing it.
Can I suggest a few questions to be added to their FAQ:
Q1. Given all the noise (some could call it evidence) in the industry, why has it taken us 4 years and 8 months to identify this?
Q2. Given due diligence, accounting standards, segregation of duties etc.. how come we failed to identify this in the first place?
————-
I’m contacting you today to inform you of an unfortunate incident at SnapNames, and to let you know what the company is doing to address it.
- Bidding affected approximately five percent of total SnapNames auctions since 2005, most of which occurred between 2005 and 2007.
- The incremental revenue from the bidding represented approximately one percent of SnapNames’ auction revenue since 2005.
- Enhanced monitoring of bidding activity for suspect behavior
- Additional controls over financial transactions
- Specific domain name registration policies for employees
+1 (503) 241-8547 (outside the U.S.)
SnapNames, and all in the Oversee family of companies, are deeply disappointed with this incident. Since its founding in 2000, SnapNames has been committed to the principles of fairness and trust; the company wants to assure customers—through both words and actions—that it remains committed to those principles.
American Automobile Association Seizes AAA.net Domain
October 27, No CommentsKikabink News reports that The American Automobile Association has won its battle against alleged ‘cybersquatter’ James M. Van Johns over the AAA.net domain. Check out the article.
Australian Regulator To Review Domain Name Renewal, Expiry and Deletion
August 10, No CommentsThis afternoon I received an email from auDA requesting comment on their Domain Expiry, Renewal and Deletion Policy. auDA has specifically asked for comments around:
1. Whether the current 30 day pending delete period for expired domain names (ie. where the registrant has not renewed their domain name) is appropriate.
2. Whether the current “domain purge” procedure (ie. where domain names are purged from the registry at a random time between 10.30am and 5.00pm AEST on the next business day after the pending delete period ends) is effective.
3. What action (if any) auDA should take in relation to unofficial domain drop lists, and the domain-catching services being provided by some accredited registrars and other industry participants.
The closing date for submissions is Friday 11 September 2009. You can find all the submission details on the auDA web site.
OzBargain Typo Squatted – Diverts To eBay
August 9, 1 CommentPopular Australian bargain site, ozbargain.com.au has been typosquatted. That’s right – if you visit ozbargin.com.au (note that its missing an “a”) right now, the website diverts to eBay.
auDA has a “Prohibition on Misspellings Policy (2008-09)” which specifically states under section 4 “Scope of Prohibition”:
“4.1 The prohibition on misspellings applies where:
a) the domain name is a misspelling of an entity, personal or brand name that does not belong to the registrant; and
b) the registrant has deliberately registered the misspelling in order to trade on the reputation of the other entity, person or brand.
4.2 For the purposes of the prohibition, a domain name will be regarded as a misspelling if it falls into one of the following categories:
a) the singular version of a plural name, or the plural version of a singular name (eg. woolworth.com.au, safeways.com.au);
b) a name with missing letters (eg. yhoo.com.au);
c) a name with additional letters (eg. quantas.com.au);
d) a name with transposed letters (eg. goolge.com.au, wetspac.com.au);
e) a name with letters replaced by numbers, or numbers replaced by letters (eg. 9msn.com.au);
f) a hyphenated version of a name (eg. e-bay.com.au, micro-soft.com.au);
g) a name prefixed by “www” (eg. wwwseek.com.au); or
h) any other name that auDA determines is a deliberate misspelling, having regard to the surrounding circumstances.”
—
The ozbargin.com.au domain was last modified March 21, 2009; however its not known how long this has been going on for, nor how much the squatter has made in eBay affiliate sales (if any).
The company that owns ozbargin.com.au is YEE TECH PTY. LTD – ABN: 94102253734 registered in Baulkham Hills NSW.
A complaint has already been sent to auDA – lets see how long it takes them to act.
