DomainTools Blog

You heard it here first. The Industry leader in Auctions has been bought by Oversee.net. You may know Oversee.net better as DomainSponsor.com. DomainSponsor is a leader in Domain Monetization. We are not sure if OregonNames was sold as well but it would seem likely.

Snapnames has been for sale for a long time and but it came down to two bidders. Oversee turned out to be the biggest bidder.

Snapnames said nothing would change after the sale, it is business as usual and operations would continue as normal.

More details on this break news as it happens.

Update: Frank Schilling covered this just after us. He is reporting the sale is 25 Million. We are hearing it is much higher. Possible around 35 Million.

Registration is now OPEN for the August 13th-15th Domain Conference here in Beautiful Seattle Washington. We are excited to reveal some new technology this year which will make networking so much easier! We are the first Domain Conference to use this wireless networking technology.

Networking, Finding People and getting business done is the point of a Domain Conference. When you are at a conference you can get a years worth of business done in only a few days, but only if you have the right tools. Domain Roundtable as been raising the bar and getting more sophisticated every year. Domainers love technology and we think this wireless name badge will lend itself well to our conference.

The First 100 people will receive brand new eNom reseller accounts along with $100 in Credit. The accounts are top notch eNom accounts, no retail pricing. eNom values professional domainers and this community and its gift is one way of showing it.

A detailed agenda will be going live later this week and expect more big announcements as well.

We expect the eNom accounts to go fast, so please register before they are gone. As always, please feel free to contact as at 2007info [at] DomainRoundtable.com

http://www.domainroundtable.com/registration/

The conference is $1495, but if you complete our survey the price drops $50 and if you have a paid account at DomainTools it drops even more.

Stay tuned, sign up, get rich,
Jay Westerdal and the Entire Roundtable Staff

Some good auctions this week. Looks like Xn–hy1bj30dt7a.com takes top prize with $42K. For those of you that don’t read IDN that means Cell Phone in Korean. Which is different from the the Korean Cell Phone IDN of last week which also took top price. “The Garden of Eden.com” I think is a steal for $8,100. Wind Pump is another steal at $1,200. Call Solutions.com for $1,300 is great brand name at a Cheap price. “Owner Financing.com” looks expensive at $36,000 but I can tell that name is cheap when you think about the PPC that could be put on it. Bank Auction.com and DNS Service.com for around $3,500 are my favorite value domains this week. Awesome names for ultra cheap.

Xn–hy1bj30dt7a.com	$42,250	“Cell Phone” in Korean
Owner Financing.com	$36,361
Ybor City.com	$16,150	Ybor is a City in Florida
Dans Movie.com	$15,806	DansMovies.com is a popular adult site
Court Yards.com	$15,250	A place outside many houses
Home Test.com	$14,600	Good Brand and Very Generic Search
Play It Again.com	$14,249	Movie Name, Sports Store, and Very Generic
Hosting News.com	$13,250	Generic Category
Water Scapes.com	$11,751	Like Landscaping, but with Water works
Free Sex Trailers.com	$10,564	Generic Search Term
Usa 300.com	$10,361	Looks like USA 3000, the airline
Tamil Sex Movies.com	$10,350	Generic Search Term
Right Match.com	$8,900	Good Brand
Promotions.net	$8,100	Brand?
The Garden of Eden.com	$8,100	Bible
Seller Financing.com	$8,099	Quality Search Term
QQ Girls.com	$7,900	I have no idea…
Suck Me Off.com	$7,200	Search Term / Gay Expression
Washington DC Real Estate.com	$7,055	Real Estate Search
Pink World Sex.com	$6,655	Related to the Adult Site, PinkWorld.com
Diamond Games.com	$6,600	Search Term popularized by a few sites
Travel Sex Guide.com	$6,150	Search Term
Small Condoms.com	$6,101	Search Term, if you have this problem, you are more likely to shop online
Sex Vedeo.com	$6,100	4th graders look for Adult
Mobitel.com	$5,955	Good Brand or leading Slovenian mobile operator
Sexy Vedio.com	$5,500	4th graders look for Adult, again
Trend Spotter.com	$5,299	Term / Brand
Salpar.com	$5,250	Looks like Salpar.com
Asian Webcams.com	$4,700	Search Words
First Northern.com	$4,600	Sounds like a bank, Oh it is.
Wife Beater.com	$4,100	That White Shirt people wear
Acps.com	$4,100	5 or 6 groups use this acronym
Engineering Web.com	$3,909	Generic Brandable
Chinese Masks.com	$3,777	Search Term that is good for a micro-shop
Xn–2d3b41x.com	$3,700	“Music” in Korean
Bscc.com	$3,644	Clinical Cytology, Christian Church, Car Club, Community College, Corridor Coalition, Car Challenge, or Catholic Church. It seems everyone uses this acronym. Good Traffic name.
Bank Auction.com	$3,500	Good Brand for a Financial Product
DNS Service.com	$3,399	WOW, Great Generic
Stone Web.com	$3,300	Web Name, Sounds good.
VirtualWorks.com	$3,200	Common Term
Website Demo.com	$3,188	Vanity Brand
Epik.com	$3,100	Personal First Name
True Lovers.com	$3,000	WOW, Great Generic
E News Line.com	$2,803	Generic Brandable
Business Lodging.com	$2,767	Search Term
Basic Electronics.com	$2,766	Search Term
Datec.com	$2,500	Looks like a Corporation
E Engineering.com	$2,426	Generic but too many Es for me
Cine 5.com	$2,400	Looks like a Turkish TV station
Victorian Dolls.com	$2,400	Generic Search Term
Guarded.com	$2,350	Brandable
Gcaa.com	$2,350	Aviation Authority or Angler’s Association
Endometrial Ablation.com	$2,338	Womb lining is destroyed surgical procedure
Fadein.com	$2,250	Generic Fade In / Fade Out
Nwsa.com	$2,050	Good acronym
Anatoli.com	$2,049	First name
Sunshine Girl.com	$2,038	Sunshine girls have become an iconic part of Canadian newspaper history
Colonoscopy.net	$2,038	Colonoscopy is the minimally invasive endoscopic examination of the large colon
International Escorts.com	$2,025	Generic Adult Search Keywords
Nladr.net	$1,960	National Laboratory for Advanced Data Research
Rubber Pants.com	$1,950	Search Term to buy
Black Trap.com	$1,938	Title of an Episode of Sonic X or a Brandable Generic
Ventadeterrenos.com	$1,865	Something in Spanish
Acute Sinusitis.com	$1,865	Acute sinusitis is defined as disease lasting less than one month
Kildeer.com	$1,850	City of Kildeer, Illinois
Xn–289a88v.com	$1,850	“Accounting” in Korean
Dealership.org	$1,827	Brandable!
Hhc.net	$1,800	Short acronym
Thewoods.com	$1,700	Are you lost in The Woods?
Gum Infection.com	$1,700	Research Keywords when looking for a Cure
Live Up.com	$1,700	Brandable Generic
Meinung.com	$1,662	Opinion in German
Hokkabaz.com	$1,656	Name of Movie on Google Video (59 Mins)
Wind Pump.com	$1,650	Future Brand $$$$
Phpi.com	$1,650	Looks like PHP?
On Hand.com	$1,600	Expression
Fire Bender.com	$1,594	Firebender is a collective term for an order of people in the fictional universe of the Nickelodeon animated television series The Last Airbender
Bio Live.com	$1,550	Generic Brandable
Drl.net	$1,550
Anitech.com	$1,500
Hbcc.com	$1,400
ww Girls Gone Wild.com	$1,400	Typo on Girls Gone Wild
Call Solutions.com	$1,383	Good Generic
Victoryhouse.com	$1,350
Sex Toom.com	$1,350
M Ticket.com	$1,300
Piano Club.com	$1,300
Xn–zb0b8a995fh3f.com	$1,300	“Tour bus” in Korean
Orange House.com	$1,250
Toyota Used Cars.com	$1,250
Rubber Bullets.com	$1,250
Absex.net	$1,250
Dataone.net	$1,250
Jewish Bookstore.com	$1,250
All African.com	$1,225
Constancia.com	$1,161
Protitutas.com	$1,160
Syo.net	$1,151
Plasma World.com	$1,150
Gadget Man.com	$1,149
Hentai Kitties.com	$1,105
Call To.com	$1,100
Xn–oy2b27ci0lftb9zw.com	$1,100	“Elevator” in Korean
Vbxml.com	$1,075
Interneted.com	$1,052
Sektor Haber.com	$1,050
Hotel Napa Valley.com	$1,050
Xn–oo5b23v.com	$1,050	“Yong Pyong” [city] in Korean
Ins Jobs.com	$1,024
Free XXX Trailers.com	$1,024
Lotto Zahlen.net	$1,013
Bigmoment.com	$1,002
Xeng.com	$1,000
Private Chats.com	$1,000

Microsoft Surface Computers are the neatest thing I have seen in at least a year. It blows me away that a surface can be so interactive – I was watching the demos at Surface.com and it truly is amazing. The table top surface can sense when you put something down on it and then display graphics and stats next to it. For example, you put a drink on the surface computer and it sends a ripple effect across the whole surface. Or you could display a visual photo album and drag and drop with your fingers, that is another example they show which had multiple people doing it at the same time. Surface Computers are going to be awesome for games! Cardboard Board Games are Dead, Microsoft Surface just killed them.

But now down to business! Let’s talk domain names. Microsoft registered Surface.com to complete its Surface branding Strategy. But we need to back up to January 29th of this year to see how their team attempted to pull this off. A corporate proxy service at Register.com registered Surface Computing.com, Surface Computers.com and Surface Computer.com. We know this is Microsoft’s proxy. I have to say it is a brilliant brand and people will have no choice but to use the word surface computer to describe any product like this. I suspect Microsoft left a lot of names on the table though. Ouch. I have subscribed to a Mark Alert on the word “Surface”. I will get to see all the clever people that rushed out to buy Surface names. And there were plenty, here are just a few names that I just checked, and all of them were registered hours before me! Cheap Surface.com, Computer Surface.com, Surface Board Game.com, Surface Board Games.com, Surface Game.com, Surface Games.com, Surface Skin.com, Surface Widget.com. The rush is on. Microsoft should have turned their Brand Launch over to our firm. We have historic records of previous rushes and know what names will be pounced on.

I have to give Microsoft Credit, at least they got major names like “Surface.com” and “Surface Computer.com”. But they missed domains like Microsoft Surface.com. How could they do that? There are so many names they left on the Table Surface.

I was checking Green Lake Massage’s website. They are a small Seattle based company. Great domain name for a firm that gives messages to name itself after the city it is in and the thing it does. [City] [Occupation]. However when looking at there website and their whois record I am shocked at how disorganized everything is. First off their SEO Score was only 52%. They are using only images on the site except for the footer and the title tag! This means that all the copy on the site is invisible to search engines and for people searching for those keywords.

All the graphic links on the page load a javascript image with even more words hidden inside of graphics. This violates so many rules about how to SEO a site. It is a good example site because it breaks so many rules. Surprisingly it ranks #1 in Google for its own name, I would have thought it would be out ranked by a competitor.

This is what the website looks like to GoogleBot:

When I check the whois of the domain name. Green Lake Massage.com I see that the Registrant is “Just Us, Inc.” and not the clinic itself. Bad news for them, they don’t even own their own domain name. Yikes! If a company is not listed as the Registrant, sorry they are out of luck.

My top hints for this site:

1. Don’t put paragraphs of text inside images.
2. Fire your Webmaster.
3. Transfer their domain into their own name.
4. Make multiple pages and don’t use javascript.
5. Add more content and describe what your company does.

Small business owners tend to focus on the details of their business inside their shops, but don’t realize their online presents is a bigger part of their success or lack there of. Customers look up phone numbers, maps, and information about companies online. Most people I know prefer to learn the information about a company on their website rather then playing 20 questions on the phone with the secretary.

Registrant:
Just Us, Inc.
6823 Oswego Place, NE
Seattle, WA 98115
US

Domain Name: GREENLAKEMASSAGE.COM

Administrative Contact:
Watson, Dorothy
Green Lake Massage
6823 Oswego Pl NE Suite 1
Seattle, WA 98115
US
206-527-9709

Technical Contact:
Qwest Internet Solutions
600 Stinson Blvd.
Minneapolis, MN 55413
US
800-672-8520 fax: 123 123 1234

Record expires on 25-Mar-2008.
Record created on 25-Mar-1999.

Domain servers in listed order:

AUTHNS1.MPLS.QWEST.NET 63.231.205.1
AUTHNS3.STTL.QWEST.NET 206.81.192.11

GoDaddy.com has officaly announced that it will take over the entire portfolio of more than 850,000 generic top-level domain (gTLD) names held by RegisterFly. ICANN understands that GoDaddy.com and the gTLD registries holding RegisterFly names have worked out the mechanics for restoring, renewing, and redeeming names intending that no names will be inadvertently dropped. According to the terms of the transfer agreement, RegisterFly domain names and the data underlying the available proxy service will also be transferred. People with domain names registered with RegisterFly can contact GoDaddy.com at 480-366-3500 with any questions about the transfer. GoDaddy.com also has a question and answer sheet available at http://www.godaddy.com/welcomeregisterfly

Last week we suspected this deal was going to happen and we were the first to break the news before it was officially announced. The GoDaddy.com agreement is a direct and automatic transfer to a competent and experienced customer service oriented organization. This is a commercial arrangement and the bulk transfer process that ICANN was administering has been discontinued.

Within the next few days, RegisterFly customers should be receiving an email from GoDaddy regarding how to log in to their accounts, as well as manage their domains.

Our big question is, when will RegisterFly shutdown its website? When will it stop taking money and delivering no goods. I can’t believe the Attorney General has not done something. Kevin Medina openly accepts money for services that never delivers.

Stratton Sclavos stepped down from his positions as CEO of VeriSign for undisclosed reasons. The company then named William Roper Jr. as president and chief executive and Edward Mueller as Chairman of the board. Mr. Roper had served as the board’s lead independent director and has been a board member since November 2003. Mr. Roper most recently served as executive vice president of Science Applications International Corp., a diversified technology services company. Mr. Mueller has been a director since March 2005 and was former head of specialty retailer Williams-Sonoma.

The company also said it postponed its 2007 analyst meeting, previously set for June 6, to a later date.

VeriSign refused to comment on what prompted Scavlos to resign. Mr. Roper, the CEO cautioned “you shouldn’t read into this any other matters that relate to capital structure or those type of things”.

VeriSign said a probe into the company’s stock options practices uncovered “no intentional wrongdoing,” according to a statement in the Wall Street Journal.

Just to give and update. We will be launching the sign-up process for Domain Roundtable on Tuesday. We want to thank Demand Media, they have stepped up and donated free eNom resellers accounts along with $100 in credit for the first 100 people that sign-up.

You can’t sign up now, so go enjoy the extended holiday weekend!

We will be busy preparing for the Show and will talk to you next week.

If you would like to sponsor or speak please email us at 2007info [at] domainroundtable.com.

George Eastman’s revolutionized film and cameras in the 1800’s. The Eastman Company was able to take a leading position in a photography industry of more than fifty competitors by selling his patented “point and push” technology. Everyone was competing for the consumers’ pocketbook, but Eastman just had better and simpler products that everyone preferred. His slogan was, “You press the button, we do the rest”.

What Eastman also did was invent a new word, “Kodak”. By branding his product under a trademarked name, everyone knew what a Kodak was. Those five letters captured everything people learned about his product and allowed them to say it in one breath. Eastman was a fan of short, simple words for Trademarks. It was easy to say and easy to spell, so it allowed for people spread his idea virally. Eastman built a lot of Brand Loyality in that word.

Everything was going great for Kodak until they bumped up into the digital age. The Kodak’s technology sucks when you compare it to the digital stuff we have now. Ask any consumer if they want the old “Point and Push” stuff or the new digital “Point and Click” cameras and people overwhelmingly respond by saying, “Digital”. But all is not lost for Kodak. Their technology is crap but they still have their name – their famous brand. Now, this is where I compare Kodak to Domain Names. Watch closely!

Kodak can suck as much as they want. They have a brand which is estimated to be the seventh most famous brand in the world and worth $4.4 Billion. Billion with a “B”. To take advantage of their brand, all they need to do it slap their “Kodak” name on a generic digital camera made by any number of Chinese factories and it is instantly able to sell for a lot more. A Brand’s mental traffic is the same as a generic domain’s physical traffic. Generic domains will be able to slap their name on APIs and white labeled products and it will create instant profit for the domain owner and the other company.

Parking pages on Generic domains are crap, we all know it. But the key to the real value in this equation is in the name. Everybody who owns a Generic Domain name gets an infinite amount of Re-Do’s. Keep playing with the backend (Yahoo/Google). Parking pages in 2007 may be crap. But parking pages in 2020 may be full blown portals that keep visitors coming back. Only one person can control the name, and if you do, you may be selling yourself short if you ask for only a few years revenue.

Eastman Co. can sell the “Kodak” brand and trademark to Sony for $4.4 Billion. How much can you sell a Cameras.com or DigitalCameras.com for? Recently it was about $1 Million. Hmmm, I think $1 Million looks dirt cheap.

It appears Google is duking it out with eBay on many fronts. Google Checkout vs eBay’s paypal and now Google Talk will take on eBay’s Skype for the right to be the worlds most used Internet Phone Software. We all know the secret sauce to Google Talk would be outbound calling. Skype took over a lot of market share in the US last year when they made Skype Free for the rest of 2006.

Could our mock-up to the left be what Google looks like in the future?

If Google enters the VoIP-to-Phone market, we expect them to lower their price to free as well. Microsoft is famous for entering a market and also lowering the price to free. Microsoft started by including free software with the OS,  but in recent years we have seen Google use the same strategy. Picasa, KeyHole, and other software that Google bought was the best of its kind and sold for a lot of money. Google bought these companies and shut down the revenue – giving the software away for free.

Members of the Google Blogoscoped forums found the image to the right along with some basic information on the new Google Talk application from an internal Google apps resources overview [which has now been taken down].

We have to question why Google isn’t protecting their Google trademark. Domain names like Free Google Phone.com has been taken since 2005. Does Google only fight for domain names after the product launches? Google Phone.com has been registered by someone else since 2002!

Google may be brillant at creating new services and taking market share, but they are doing a bad job at protecting their domain names. Google can duke it out with eBay and Microsoft, but they fail to fight cybesquatters.