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ICANN accredited RegisterFly implodes
February 21st, 2007 by 
Jay Westerdal
Reports are flying in about RegisterFly’s implosion. Registerfly’s web site went dark for most of the Monday after the CEO Kevin Medina changed the root password and locked everyone out. It started earlier in the month, on February 12th, vice president John Naruszewicz threw the first major punch by suing the CEO with a claim of misappropriation of corporate funds. The CEO and the Vice-President both own 50% of the company so they are in a dead-lock right now. It seems Mr. Naruszewicz has taken higher ground by sending Mr. Medina a letter of termination.
In the lawsuit, Mr. Naruszewicz claims Medina used company funds to buy a $6000 Chihuahua, $9,000 in escorts, $6,000 worth of liposuction, and $10,000-a-month Miami Beach penthouse. Meanwhile some customers are expressing suicidal thoughts. “I am about to lose 476 domains with registerfly,” he wrote. “In the batch of domains I am about to lose is my bread and butter domains that put food in my family’s mouthes and roofs over my employees heads… You know for a few minutes there I could relate with the people that take their own lives.” Another customer notes that even when he pays them his domains don’t renew, “.. so far 2 of my domains have been allowed to expire. They took my money for one of them, I believe that is called fraud and the other was funded in a quick checkout account, but was never processed after performing the renewal.”
Customers are livid and many have been criticizing ICANN. But Frank Fowlie ICANN ombudsman says ICANN has no power over registrars except to pull their accreditation completely. He notes that 70% of the complaints he received in the last 2 weeks were about RegisterFly. Naruszewicz flew out to meet with ICANN on Tuesday. Most likely in an attempt to save the company’s accreditation. If the accreditation is lost they will loose all their customers. ICANN is expected to make an announcement later this week.
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Posted in Domain Industry, ICANN, RegisterFly |
February 22nd, 2007 at 8:31 pm
I’ve had problems in the past week renewing domain names with registerfly. So far no response to my support request. Hopefully if they go under there is some kind of safety net for registrants.
May 9th, 2007 at 11:01 pm
This Is Insane, I cant understand it, it would appear that this type of scenario hasn’t came as a huge surprise to the majority, with exception to the individuals directly effected of course…
Please excuse my ignorance when registering a domain name typically one tries to choose something related to or pertaining to the services or products the internet company is providing or selling with the intent of generating a positive financial return.
That being said is it safe to assume people are actually creating multi million dollar internet business’s and being satisfied with a email confirmation after a 5 min online session stating that ones domain name was registered successfully. No binding agreement, no contract, not even a hand shake..
Currently is there nothing in place to protect the one registering or purchasing the domain..
Would this not be equivalent to creating a company outside the Internet, emailing the DBA with your company name request and being satisfied with a reply from Joe Blow at the DBA office stating the name was successfully registered with no legal binding agreement to insure it was or prove ownership and then only to find 10 years later and after establishing a productive business, that your company name is uuuuuhhhhhhh “is that crickets I hear chirping” and then to discover the name was recently obtained by someone else after 10 years of blood sweat and tears went into building your company and its reputation on, in and around its name you assumed you owned…Man, it would not be my life that I would be thinking of ending…Who would have thought a chiauha “ahhhh” A little Spanish dog, Hookers and a lot of loose skin could be so dangerous…