Six Namecheap Coupons – Just In Time For Christmas
December 11, 3 Comments
In any domainers portfolio there are always a handful of domains that expire towards the end of the year. I’ve just renewed my last three domains and in doing this I spent some time researching NameCheap coupons.
As such, I thought I’d post them up here for the benefit of others. By the way, its good to renew your domains for multiple years (at least 2). That way it keeps the administration overhead down.
NameCheap Christmas Coupons
1. snowneedle – Gives you $8.88 gTLDs.
2. switch2nc – $6.99 transfers (when you move your domain to Namecheap)
3. xmastree gives you 25% off shared/reseller hosting
4. santa gives you 50% off VPS for the first month
5. snowstorm gives you 10% discount for hosting packages
Remember, NameCheap gives you FREE whois privacy for the first year. I’ve personally found this valuable in keeping away spammers and others who spy on you.
6. WGSPECIAL – If you are renewing WhoisGuard (Privacy Protection) then use this coupon. It gives you Privacy Protection for just $0.99 instead of $2.88. If you do it now (I just tested it) you get a FREE PositiveSSL certificate.
If you have found these useful or if they have saved you $$$, please post a comment and let me know.
White House Dinner Party Crashers Miss Out On Domain Name
December 8, No Comments
Tareq Salahi appears to have missed out on the domain name TareqSalahi.com after it was registered on November 26 to an individual in Palm Beach Florida.
It appears that Tareq registered michaelesalahi.com on June 15, but forgot to register his own name!
He and his wife Michaele gained national attention in November 2009 by allegedly crashing a White House state dinner in honor of India’s Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.
Michaele Salahi has been filmed as one of the housewives for Bravo’s upcoming The Real Housewives of DC, and sources say cameramen for the show filmed their preparations for the dinner and followed the couple to the White House.
Russia Adds Domain Name To Olympic Emblem
December 8, No Comments
This is the first time a domain name has been part of an Olympic host city’s emblem.
The word “sochi.ru” appears above the number “2014″ in an apparent reflection, symbolizing the southern city’s water-based location on the Black Sea.
“It’s very appealing. It’s very creative, innovative,” International Olympic Committee president Jacques Rogge said at Tuesday’s unveiling. “I think it will appeal especially to the young population.”
It’s been reported that the IOC president then asked someone what a “domain name” was.
For those that believe there could be an opportunity – the .com, .net and .org is taken… as is the .ru.
National Center for Science Education Moves Away From .ORG
December 8, No CommentsThe US National Center for Science Education (NCSE) has moved away from .org to .com.
The move appeared to be facilitated by NameMedia who reportedly provided a substantial discount on the ncse.com domain.
About: The National Center for Science Education (NCSE) is a not-for-profit, membership organization providing information and resources for schools, parents and concerned citizens working to keep evolution in public school science education.
Kelsey Grammer Registers “Live” After Refusing To Pay For Domain
December 7, 1 Comment
Kelsey Grammer has reportedly given up on trying to get back kelseygrammer.com after someone else registered the domain name.
Grammer launched KelseyLive.com after refusing to buy kelseygrammer.com. The former Frasier star reportedly said:
“Twenty years ago, everybody bought everybody’s name and I never paid for mine back. I just said, ‘Screw ya’.”
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.
Dynadot Takes .EU IDN Pre-Orders
December 4, No CommentsThe central registry for EU domains will be launching support for IDN on December 10, 2009 at 10:00 UTC.
EU IDNs will support Latin, Greek, and Cyrillic character sets. Dynadot is charging the following prices for EU IDN registrations: $11.99 regular, $10.99 bulk, and $10.75 super bulk.
If you are interested in pre-ordering for .EU IDNs then head on over to Dynadot and start stocking up.
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.
Horse Race Stops Expired Domains In Australia
November 3, 1 Comment
It appears that AusRegistry didn’t release .au expired domains today. This would normally happen on National Public Holidays, but its not a National Public holiday….
It just so happens that in Melbourne, Victoria (where AusRegistry is based) its the running of the Melbourne Cup.
In February, 2009 auDA announced that it had extended its .au Registry Licence Agreement with AusRegistry until 2014. They have a few more Melbourne Cups to get it right.

