Anyone else Sick and Tired of the Domain Name Business?
Posted by: James Lewitzke in Business, Miscellaneous Internet, RantsI know I am. I personally find it frustrating every time I am conducting a name search only to discover that it’s usually been registered by a domain squatter of some kind.
Or are you getting annoyed with pertaining to all the scams and suckers that exist? And those that surf the web looking for the next Get-Rich-Quick Scheme?
I think something should be done about it, but what action should be taken, exactly, I don’t know.
My First Example
As I was searching for a good name for a site that I wanted to write top ten lists around (until finally settling on toptenlisted.com), I stumbled across topten.com, I thought this would be the perfect name for my new website. It’s not being used by anyone, and I find out it’s already taken!
So naturally, I was kind of peeved, but figured someone already conceived the concept of developing top ten lists (this is a whole other matter which I don’t want to ramble to much in this post). And I wanted to figure out what the competition was up to, even if I didn’t think I had any at the time (I was naive, and didn’t do much searching). While visiting the domain, I expected to find a flourishing website with tons of great content, only to discover there’s just a wasted page. That’s right…. all that was there was a search box, a couple of “community links”, and a few random keyword links at the bottom of the page, and I was thinking, “WTF, what is this?”
As my blood pressure rose even more, I decided to do some research into this “registrar”. I find out it is owned by some company known as Mark Monitor Inc.
I don’t know who “Mark Monitor” is, but they are a perfect example of what I hate about the domain business. They gobble up good, memorable domain names and just sit on them waiting for someone with enough cash to pony up, and come by and pay the costs of their heavy fee.
This was about a year ago….
Fast Forward to More Recently, Business is Insane
This domain “cybersquatting” business is huge. A few months ago after reading stories like: “Vodka.com sells for 3 Million” or “Business and ancestry.com acquired for roughly 300 Million a piece“, I’m thinking to myself “Geez, how can people or companies be paying so much for just a .com name?”.
Only the wealthy have access to these dictionary, one-word, top-level domains, and if that doesn’t make you angry, I don’t know what else does.
Crazy Offers
Another thing that bugs me about the domain industry is the people involved in the business and the ludicrous dealings they make.
Take PageRank for example. Some people think you can sell a PR3 Domain, or a Domain with good rankings, so I had to explain to them that this is not possible.
Then there’s also single webpage scams to consider. Some “marketing gurus” purchase entire domains like illmakeyourichthroughafffiliatemarketing.com just to sell their scammy $20 eBook. They’ll claim something along the lines like “Buy my book and I’ll make you rich!”. Here’s a newsflash: THE ONLY PEOPLE GETTING RICH ARE THE ONES SELLING THE EBOOKS. Do you honestly think if they knew how to make money online easily, they’d be giving out their secrets for cheap amounts of cash?!?!
The Leftovers…
There aren’t many good, short domains left, in my opinion. If you want something brief and unique, it’ll have to be something like sda48fs5ud.com. Yeah, just a bunch of random letters and numbers thrown together, not very appealing nor memorable.
Anybody looking to start their own website won’t have that many options within the domain field, unless your willing to fork out the extra cash to pay for a reasonable name, but most aren’t (or can’t afford to).
What Should be Done about this?
I consider myself LUCKY to have been able to register lightningshock before anyone else (whether it’s a domain company, a one person cybersquatter, or just a competing website developer) had the opportunity to snatch it up (although I wouldn’t feel half as bad if it was the final choice).
I say if you’re going to purchase and sit on a domain for awhile, you should at least put it to use and build a website around it, you know, something pertaining to the domain name.
Or else, I wouldn’t mind seeing a law or two passed and enforced against this travesty of an industry. If nothing is done about it, who knows I might decide to take a complete 180 and start registering spiffy domain names of my own, and see how they like it.
Yep, I feel much the same way.
Last January there was an uproar about how, when you do a domain name search at the Network Solutions site, they register the domain themselves for 5 days and then try to charge you $35 for it.
Network solutions Using Questionable Domain Tactics
Network Solutions Steals Domain Ideas Confirmed
Network Solutions is Getting Better
I don’t know what Network Solutions does currently, or if they finally cleaned up their act, but after hearing about the above, I don’t think I’ll ever trust Network Solutions.
It seems one thing that made their unscrupulous practices possible was the five-day grace period for companies like Network Solutions to register a domain without paying any fees.
I read something somewhere which claimed that there are companies which take advantage of the grace period by just re-registering a domain every five days, thereby avoiding ever having to pay fees on the domain, which I guess is so common it even has a name, “domain kiting”. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Domain_kiting
According to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Domain_tasting : “In January 2008, ICANN announced that the exemption on transaction costs (US$ 0.25) during the five-day grace period would be abandoned, which would effectively make the practice of domain tasting not viable.”
I haven’t found out yet if ICANN has actually implemented that yet, though. If they haven’t already, I think they ought to just get rid of the grace period entirely - I think it would probably solve a lot of problems.
If that meant domain registration companies like Network Solutions could no longer accept credit cards due to the risk of credit card fraud, I don’t really see a problem with that - it might help make the credit card companies take responsibility for their own rampant problems with fraud. There are other ways besides credit cards to instantaneously take payments over the internet - PayPal, for one.
I say, let the credit card companies suffer the consequences of their own incompetence - maybe then they’ll be motivated to improve themselves to better serve their customers, such as by implementing more effective anti-fraud measures.
I enjoy your blog.
Best wishes,
Apollia
Thanks for the comments (and bookmark), Apollia
I’ve heard of the Network Solutions Fiascoes a little bit, but have never been directly involved with them, as I’ve always just registered them through a straightforward provider (Godaddy). I wasn’t going to pay 35 bucks or more just for a domain name when the content was going to be the primary focus of my website.
I also agree with you about suffering for your own incompetence. By getting rid of that grace period, as you said, domain companies won’t be able to tell how marketable it is, thus the actual practice of domain squatting will be severely diminished, as they won’t be able to tell as effectively.
Hopefully ICANN will do something about this
(if they haven’t already).