Adobe Trademarks Air & Goes After Domains

It’s been reported that Adobe is sending letters to people using the word AIR. James Whittaker, creator of the freshAIRapps.com says he was on the receiving end of a letter.

“You may not incorporate the Adobe AIR trademark, or any other Adobe trademark, in whole or in part, in the title of your Developer Application or in your company name, domain name or the name of a service related to Adobe AIR.”

It sounds like oxygen theft to me.

.UG Regulator Takes A Chill Pill

Back in 2006 the The Uganda Communications Commission (UCC) expressed some concern around the .ug ccTLD. Now there seems to be a change of heart. In an interview, Patrick Mwesigwa, UCC’s technical manager said “There is no immediate intention of claiming that domain name”.

It’s been reported that entrepreneur Charles Musisi has managed Uganda domain names for the past 12 years. He got it from IANA back in 1995.

Apparently there are 4,000 .ug domain names in a country where 50,000 people use the Internet.

ICANN Domains Redirectred & Blog Hacked

For about 20 minutes on June 26, 2008, the domains iana.com, iana-servers.com, icann.com and icann.net displayed this message:

“You think that you control the domains but you don’t! Everybody knows wrong. We control the domains including ICANN! Don’t you believe us?”

ICANN was quiet about this until recently where it posted a Response to Recent Security Threats stating:

“The redirect was noticed and corrected within 20 minutes; however it may have taken anywhere up to 48 hours for the redirect to be entirely removed from the Internet.”

“In a separate and unrelated incident a few days later, attackers used a very recent exploit in popular blogging software WordPress to target the ICANN blog. The attack was noticed immediately and the blog taken offline while an analysis was run. That analysis pointed to an automated attack.”

“ICANN has started an internal review of its existing security procedures to see if there are any lessons that can be learnt”

Do you get the feeling that ICANN’s decision of .WhatEverYouWant could be the issue?

Snapnames SSL Cert Expires

It seems that Snapnames is still working on the problems. When you search for domains using the advanced search or search box, you get warning about a certificate expiring:

This is really quite strange as Overture belongs to Yahoo. When you visit the link you get:

To VIP Status: OK
Server Status: OK

The title tag changes to “Hello from Apache ”

and then it diverts to the Overture Small Business website. Perhaps Snapnames has included some Yahoo code somewhere?

Snapnames Returns After Outage

Snapnames sent me the email (below) a few hours ago. I have highlighted in bold the interesting bits.

—

Dear SnapNames Customers:

As you are likely aware, the SnapNames service was unavailable between last Thursday evening U.S. Pacific time and today.  We are pleased to tell you functionality has now been restored and that important data, including transaction history, has been fully retained.

Please note that auctions scheduled to close between July 4-7 will now close at (time EDT) on Tuesday, July 8. Please monitor any auctions accordingly.

We apologize for any inconvenience you may have experienced during this time.  Should you have furtherquestions, you can reach us here:

Technical Support:         supp...@snapnames.com
Telephone:                    (800) 385-4075 (toll-free in the U.S.)
+ 1 503 241-8547 (outside the U.S.)

Sincerely,
The SnapNames Team
—

Their website reads:

Thank you for your patience during the recent outage to our service. The SnapNames system is again fully functional and ready to accept your orders and bids.

Please note, auctions scheduled to close between July 4-7 will now close on Tuesday, July 8 or later. Please monitor any auctions accordingly. If you have questions, please contact us at supp...@snapnames.com.

Snapnames Down – No Answer!

One of the 3 major backordering companies is currently down. I put a call into the SnapNames support phone number, nobody answered and it went to voicemail – so I left a message.

Not only is this very unprofessional, but it gives their competitors such as NameJet and Pool a  clear advantage.

There has been some discussion on DNF and a thread on NamePros regarding this issue, but nobody from Snapnames has posted. If you know what the situation is, please contact me.

Exclusive interview with Ron James from NamePros

In an exclusive interview, Ron James from NamePros tells us how he got started, his views on the various domain name forums, what investment strategies he undertakes and the future of the industry.

This interview is not to be missed.

1. Ron, you founded NamePros in February 2003, but were in the domain name industry beforehand. How and when did you get started?

Yes, I’ve been in the domaining business for 10 years, full-time for eight.

My first experience registering a domain name and building a website was in 1996 while working as “the tech guy” for an industrial manufacturing company. The following two years I starting stumbling through building websites for myself and discovering more about domain names. I learned the in’s and out’s of the dropping names, but didn’t devote much time or money into it in the beginning.

I was laid off my full-time job in 1999 and tried my best to make it on my own as a freelance web designer and programmer. As it turns out, my side hobby of buying and selling domain names would ultimately pay the bills. I’ve been my own boss ever since. When people ask what I do for a living, I either say I’m a domainer or a webmaster. Both are true.

2. How did NamePros come about?

I founded NamePros in February 2003. I wanted to be a part of a fun and free community for domain owners. Not seeing one since the demise of the original Afternic, I started NamePros.

There were a couple other domain related forums that existed at the time. I did not want to detract from their userbases, so I did not invite anyone from any other forums. Instead I sought out domain owners from other sources. It was a plan that worked out well and help create an identity for NamePros as a place you can meet people you wouldn’t normally see at other places. Over time the more seasoned domainers discovered NamePros and joined in the discussions to form the community we have today.

3. What was that moment, that you said to yourself “This is what I want to do” ?

I never had any doubt NamePros would be successful as a forum. I poured my heart into it and plowed ahead from Day 1 as if it were already a success. However it was about four months later that it really “took off” and I knew I would be doing this for a long time to come.

4. There are a number of forums for domainers that have sprung up over the years. How do you see yourself in comparison to other sites such as DNForum? Is there a key differentiator at NamePros?

All three forums have overlap in their memberships. The thing that distinguishes them from one another is the feel or “vibe” that members get while participating there. To oversimplify things, DNForum is business oriented, DomainState is more community centered. I feel NamePros is a perfect blend of business and community.

You’ll find all kinds on NamePros, from the new domainer with only a few names to the full-time professionals. We welcome anyone who is able to abide within our code of conduct, which is basically “be respectful of other members and straight in your dealings.”

5. It takes a lot of resources to run a successful community like NamePros. Over the past few years there has been various discussions around paid subscriptions. Would you consider moving to a paid model or are you completely ruling this out?

Paid membership sites are a big turnoff for me. NamePros will always remain free to participate in.

6. What do you think makes a great domain name?

A great domain is easy to remember… and hard to replace. There isn’t an exact formula for identifying one, it’s more like you’ll know it when you see it.

7. For newcomers to the industry, do you believe it’s “all too late” or is there still an opportunity to make some serious money? If the opportunity is there, where do you think that is and why?

There will always be opportunities for newcomers to make money in domains, though it takes more work and research to identify the opportunities that are available. It’s not as easy finding good unregistered domains today as it was 10 years ago but the opportunities are still there. I still hand register 10-20 new domains every week. Browsing the auctions is a good place to find values too if you’re careful not to get caught up in the excitement and overpay for a name.

8. If you were a newcomer to the industry, what investment strategy would you undertake and why?

The days of quantity over quality are well past us. It’s easier and smarter to manage a smaller portfolio of quality domains. This is especially true now that registration and renewal fees are on the rise. I would focus on buying a few good names from existing registrants rather than registering a ton of mediocre ones, and set aside half my budget for development purposes to build out a couple of the best ones into useful websites.

9. What’s your view on the future investment opportunities with regard to ccTLD’s and newer TLD’s such as .mobi, .asia and .me ?

I advocate cautious optimism with all new TLDs and domaining trends. It’s never wise to invest all your time and money into a narrow niche of domains. There are opportunities in new TLD launches, but mostly for those that get the best names early on. If I were entering the market now, I would avoid investing much in .MOBI or .ASIA since the initial window of opportunity is gone.

Investing in ccTLDs requires more premeditation and research before jumping in too deep. Established country codes like .co.uk and .de are safer bets where I’ve seen some good values compared to the more obscure ones.

10. Looking into the future, how do you see domaining evolve over the next 3-5 years?

I like that you mentioned word ‘evolve’ because that’s exactly what we’re seeing. It’s more of an evolution than a revolution going on now in the business.

Squatting on typos and trademarks is not the brilliant business model it once was. We’re going to see more domainers retiring from cybersquatting and become trademark holders themselves. It’s a maturing of our industry that I’m excited to see.

As far as parking is concerned there is a real obvious trend away from domain parking and towards development. It’s hard to be proud of a domain name that ends up on a page full of ads. Domainers want more that than, and I think we’ll start seeing more companies offering parking alternatives to domain owners. One reason I got involved with iModo.com was it’s goal of providing useful content based sites in place of traditional parked pages.

11. If you could give one piece of advice to someone new to the industry, what would that be?

Think outside the box, try different things until you find a strategy that works for you, and then stick to it. There is no one-size-fits-all business plan in this industry.

Thanks for your time Ron, I really appreciate it. I’m sure the domaining industry will find this interesting reading.

ICANN – Kill Off & Recreate The Domain Name Industry

Is ICANN the right entity to provide oversight of the Internet? Given the crazy proposals that have received board approval, I believe its time for a change before the Internet crosses that “point of no return” and ends up in a total mess. ICANN said in a recent press release:

“The Board today accepted a recommendation from its global stakeholders that it is possible to implement many new names to the Internet, paving the way for an expansion of domain name choice and opportunity” said Dr Paul Twomey, President and CEO of ICANN. A final version of the implementation plan must be approved by the ICANN Board before the new process is launched. It is intended that the final version will be published in early 2009.”

At a high level, this is what the recent Paris junket meeting was about:

1. Domain Tasting

ICANN doesn’t *really* make any money out of this, so they decided to make the 20-cent registration fee (paid to them) non-refundable to reward their friends, they then made domain tasting almost impossible for everyone except the most popular registrars. As these registrars have high numbers of domain registrations, 10% could be a high enough number to perform a good degree of tasting.

2. Dot WhatEverYouWant

Give anyone the ability to create a .WhateverYouWant, thus decreasing the value of existing domain name portfolios. It would appear that ICANN is a little bit irritated by domainers who had the vision (and took high risks many years ago) to snap up valuable domain names. After all, ICANN didn’t make the millions the domainers did.

3. Foreign Superpowers

Allow non Latin characters such as Chinese, Arabic and Cyrillic. Chinese being the largest ccTLD, soon to be the #1 superpower. Arabic (that’s English for oil) and Cyrillic (Russia – say no more). While the PR spin is to make it a warm, fuzzy internet for everyone (lets hold hands now and sing koom-by-ah) – I don’t believe it for a nanosecond. It’s all about making money for a small group of people.

I’ve already covered domain tasting and other character sets in other posts, so lets focus on adding more domain name extensions.

Why Is This Bad News For Domainers

Allowing anyone to create an extension could:

1. Decrease the value of existing domains. What if a single company controlled .sex ? How much would that be worth!?!?! How do you compare the value of lesbian.com to lesbian.sex ? Yes, I had to use that as an example. Ok, well what about www.newyorkrealestate.com compared to www.realestate.newyork or newyork.realestate ? Get the picture?

2. Lead to mass confusion amongst the public. What is an Internet address? Wasn’t that .com ?

3. Change the flow of traffic on the Internet. This is because Internet browsers and search engines may give preference to other domain extensions. Say goodbye to “type it in traffic” to .com.

4. Increase the number of trademark violations. How does ICANN expect to handle that? That’s ok – there are a lot of lawyers who are on “advisory panels” that can profit from giving advice. For those around in the early days of the Internet, Network Solutions ran into the same problem (and largely ignored it for awhile until it got out of control).

5. Attract the wrong type of people to the industry. In recent times we have seen a lot of dodgy “management” around various extensions and ccTLDs. Do we need any more people getting attracted to this new “gold rush”?

Impact On Existing Domain Portfolios

If you hold a large portfolio of anything other than .com, then you might find it decreases in value. For example, .net, .org .biz and .info and .us are not in a good position. However, those people who have purchased geographic domain names (eg: newyork.com) are also at risk. I’ll just pay off ICANN and create my own .newyork extension.

Why Does ICANN Do This?

Again, I believe that it’s all about ICANN making money for a small group of people.

1. ICANN looked at tasting. I can imagine the conversation – “hmmm… we’re not getting a cut… I know, lets make the 20-cent registration fee non-refundable!”.

2. ICANN looked at Verisign. I can imagine that conversation went like “hmmm… how can we multiply this? I know, lets give anyone the ability to create .whateveryou like, and then they pay $100,000 a piece to us (ICANN) for the privilege.” Multiply that out, per every conceivable extention you can think of, and that’s a MASSIVE of money.

By the way, just in case anyone didn’t notice:

ICANNs memorandum of understanding with the U.S. Department of Commerce expires in September 2009.

What happens when ICANN gets so much cash in the bank it has more dollars than a small country? It already has gone about publicizing its view that it should be independent of the US Department of Commerce. Is ICANN going to be “a nation” that controls the communications infrastructure of the world?

How much $$$ is it worth to turn the Internet into a train wreck?

The Hidden Dangers In ICANN’s New Proposal

Today, ICANN is going to vote on allowing domain names with non Latin characters. For example, Chinese, Arabic and Cyrillic.

If this proposal goes ahead, its going to be very difficult to distinguish between domains in Latin characters and others such as Cyrillic. What does this mean? It’s going to:

a) increase phishing as organized crime is going to catch on that they can register ebay.com or bank.com using Cyrillic characters. Best of all, those domain names will not be registered because the character sets are different.

b) increase the number of dodgy, misleading domain names that are for sale on auction sites. We all know the good old trick of using an 0 (zero) as opposed to an O (oh). Introducing non Latin characters makes it all that more difficult. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not against it entirely – I just think its going to introduce problems – many of which haven’t been thought about or widely discussed.

Will there be another mini landrush to grab all those trademarks using Cyrillic? Who knows. It also presents a problem when you show Cryillic in italics and non italics:

We will see what ICANN comes up with later today.

Tucows and Afternic Auction Expired Names

Tucows Inc., (AMEX:TCX, TSX:TC) has announced an exclusive agreement with Afternic to auction Tucows’ daily inventory of expired domain names.

The guys at Tucows have prepared a little video with Bill Sweetman, General Manager, Domain Portfolio to explain it:

You could watch the video…. but this sums it up – “Instead of having to search Tucows, you can just use Afternic to find expired names”. Easy.