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Domain Tasting will die in 2008
January 29th, 2008 by 
Jay Westerdal
The ICANN board just passed the following motion to end Domain Tasting, “THEREFORE, the Board resolves to encourage ICANN’s budgetary process to include fees for all domains added, including domains added during the AGP, and encourages community discussion involved in developing the ICANN budget, subject to both Board approval and registrar approval of this fee.”
It did not directly deal a death blow to tasting, but it was a definitive motion that will kill it this year. This policy is expected to go into effect when the new budget is approved, and that process typically happens in the summer.
http://www.icann.org/minutes/prelim-report-23jan08.htm
It seems all the heat on Domain Tasting in the last few weeks is causing everyone to take action, from Google to the ICANN Board. I applaud the decision to kill the abusive process of millions of free domain names, but I would caution the original use of the Add Grace Period (AGP) is still needed. The AGP was originally designed for very legitimate reasons: erasing domains purchased with a spelling error or for testing the registry computer system.
When the ICANN staff implements the new policy, there are specific things they should allow. Each registrar should have a testing limit of drops in the AGP, possibly 10,000 per month or 3% of all adds, whichever is greater.
One way to keep domain registration prices low is to not increase the domain registration costs for registrars. Bad credit cards are one of the reasons the AGP is needed. Registrars are severely affected when they purchase a domain from Verisign for $6+ and that purchase turns out to be from a stolen credit card. If the average margin on a domain is $1.00, it will take six legitimate registrations to pay for that one fraudulent domain purchase. Keeping costs low for registrars is a good thing. Domain Tasting should end, but registrars still need some use of the free AGP. The board made the motion to include the following language:
Whereas, it is the Board’s view that abuses of the AGP should speedily be halted, while the positive benefits of the AGP to consumers should be retained; Whereas, the positive benefits of the AGP may include, among other things,avoiding fraud and monitoring, testing and development of registrars’ provisioning, production and/or merchant gateway systems;
I am extremely happy Domain Tasting will end. I do feel a bit sad, though, since I coined the term Domain Tasting and now the phrase will be only used historically.
Posted in Domain Tasting, ICANN |
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A confidential informant says Google will stop monetizing all domains if they are less then five days old. This potential new policy change by Google could stop all Domain Tasting in its tracks. The Add Grace Period (AGP) is a time period when registrars can delete a domain at no cost, but in this time frame a registrant could register millions of these temporary domains and place Google Adsense for Domains on them. The result is the ability to produce millions of temporary websites that literally generate millions of dollars in income per week for Google. It was disclosed in court that one of Google’s partners was generating as much as 3 million dollars a month from the practice, and that was after Google’s revenue share. 
I am confirming that Network Solutions steals domain ideas when people check domain availability on the Network Solutions website. They seem to have started the practice of stealing domain ideas on December 16th 2007 according to our Domain History database but I was just made aware of this practice today. I am appalled at the concept of taking people’s domain ideas and registering it before the consumer has the ability to manually register the domain.
Three Florida Registrars were named in a lawsuit by Dell on November 16th; all this is just coming to the surface now. Those three registrars are BelgiumDomains, CapitolDomains, and DomainDoorman. They also have a few sister companies such as Netrian Ventures and 
When a domain is about to delete at most registrars they will switch the DNS over to the registrar’s name server. If the domain is getting good traffic then the registrar may renew the domain for themselves or they may just monetize the domain while it is in the deleting queue. However when a domain has never had DNS before and this switch over triggers an event in our database saying that it is a new domain. It is actually sort of amusing. The first time we see the domain is right before it deletes. It has exist for 3 years but we are just now seeing it. The owner even paid the renewal fee last year. The likelihood that the domain has traffic is actually very low. Thanks to registrars trying to make money off of expiring customers they are helping expose the longest of the long tail. We never would have known about this domain or the fact that it had existed for three years without this broadcast event.
I love investigating Domain Spying! I saw a case last night, and I think I need to publicly report what I am seeing so people know what is going on. I see these cases all week long. I am going to blank out any sensitive data from his email because he still wants to buy this domain and most likely will get it if he waits out the Domain Taster.
ICANN’s Security and Stability Advisory Committee (SSAC ) has issued an 
Domain Tasting has been going on for years however Ross Rader of Tucows recently raised the point that Domain Tasting may not even be allowed under section 3.74 of the Registrar Accreditation Agreement. ICANN has a poor history of enforcement on certain section and clauses. ICANN picks its battles careful, there are just too many provisions and rules to enforce. Mr. Rader has formally asked ICANN staff if they have ever enforced the provision that states, “3.7.4 Registrar shall not activate any Registered Name unless and until it is satisfied that it has received a reasonable assurance of payment of its registration fee.” An answer by ICANN Staff is expected sometime this month and it could lead to enforcement of the clause.
I am not a fan of Domain Tasting, but the Coalition Against Domain Name Abuse (CADNA) has released a new report that aims to frighten and shock everyone. They cite that over 1 Million kited sites bring in $100-125 million in annual revenue for criminals and profiteers. Kiting is when an organization serially Domain Tastes for an extended period of time. They pick up, they let go, they pick up, they let go; all on the same domain name. CADNA’s claim is a bit overboard. I am not sure how they will convince people of their point if they make up facts and put them in press releases. The reason people Domain Taste is to find domains that generate more revenue then the registration cost. The wholesale cost is $6.20 so any name generating more then that would be a name they should keep. The claim would put the average revenue at $10.00 to $12.50 per kiting year. The revenue can’t be higher then $62 Million. So immediately they are off by a factor of two. I would estimate the revenue at between $5 Million to $20 Million a year. We also have