Sedo sold Guagua.com (several meanings possible) for $100,000. Other notable sales include risultati.it (Results in Italian) for 32,000 Euro (appx. $43,000) Gastronomie.com (gastronomy in German) for 35,000 Euro (appx. 47,500 USD) and Pepe.com for $45,000. According to Domain Name Wire, the domain name had been bought by Francois of Domaining.com on Bido for $15,000 just a few months ago and then was listed on Mocus where it was sold with the help of a Sedo broker.

See the full sales list and some translations after the jump.

Domain name Date Price Currency Translation



.COMs


guagua.com 2010-03-02 100,000 USD pepe.com 2010-03-05 45,000 EUR gastronomie.com 2010-03-02 35,000 EUR Gastronomy in German telemar.com 2010-03-05 12,000 EUR xtrader.com 2010-03-04 10,000 USD afx.com 2010-03-02 8,100 USD mallchina.com 2010-03-07 6,000 EUR buffalogroup.com 2010-03-03 5,432 USD cosmetiques.com 2010-03-03 5,150 USD Cosmetics in French okta.com 2010-03-07 5,100 USD bookmate.com 2010-03-08 5,000 EUR jpsports.com 2010-03-04 5,000 USD qualcos.com 2010-03-03 5,000 USD landingpagedesign.com 2010-03-05 5,000 GBP stayfair.com 2010-03-08 5,000 USD tridien.com 2010-03-04 5,000 USD clientstream.com 2010-03-04 4,985 USD zli.com 2010-03-03 4,500 USD poppunk.com 2010-03-01 4,100 USD jechange.com 2010-03-04 4,000 EUR shareprice.com 2010-03-03 4,000 USD freisein.com 2010-03-01 3,854 USD Being Free in German tracktec.com 2010-03-02 3,388 USD techi.com 2010-03-05 3,388 USD speedchat.com 2010-03-07 3,300 USD newsfromhome.com 2010-03-02 3,000 USD whatsstoppingyou.com 2010-03-03 3,000 USD rockaoke.com 2010-03-03 3,000 USD allotments.com 2010-03-03 3,000 USD totophoto.com 2010-03-03 3,000 USD mobiledistribution.com 2010-03-03 2,788 USD allsleep.com 2010-03-05 2,600 USD phimosis.com 2010-03-03 2,550 USD domainapps.com 2010-03-05 2,500 USD comparus.com 2010-03-08 2,500 EUR mailsuite.com 2010-03-03 2,500 USD mandaris.com 2010-03-03 2,500 USD stylejobs.com 2010-03-03 2,500 EUR tachan.com 2010-03-04 2,500 EUR summitbrokers.com 2010-03-02 2,500 USD yborcigars.com 2010-03-03 2,500 USD ditosama.com 2010-03-03 2,500 USD pureaqua.com 2010-03-05 2,500 USD vps247.com 2010-03-01 2,499 USD theroute.com 2010-03-02 2,488 USD finntours.com 2010-03-05 2,488 USD jobverse.com 2010-03-05 2,295 USD neuhoff.com 2010-03-05 2,250 EUR patentinsurance.com 2010-03-04 2,200 USD langzeitmieten.com 2010-03-02 2,142 EUR Long Term Rentals in German hiding.com 2010-03-03 2,055 USD inktree.com 2010-03-08 2,000 USD gameslaboratory.com 2010-03-02 2,000 USD fusee.com 2010-03-08 2,000 EUR casinotrac.com 2010-03-03 2,000 USD flatmatch.com 2010-03-05 2,000 USD koshki.com 2010-03-01 2,000 USD ocsports.com 2010-03-02 2,000 USD visionhunter.com 2010-03-03 2,000 USD mobiledollars.com 2010-03-04 2,000 USD g-tour.com 2010-03-08 2,000 EUR wattclub.com 2010-03-05 2,000 USD ccTLDs risultati.it 2010-03-03 32,000 EUR Results in Italian energieagentur.de 2010-03-08 21,500 EUR Energy Agency in German escortservice.de 2010-03-04 16,660 EUR transpower.nl 2010-03-05 15,500 EUR ioffer.co.uk 2010-03-05 11,500 USD jb.de 2010-03-01 9,500 EUR stelle.it 2010-03-05 8,000 EUR shirts.co.za 2010-03-05 8,000 USD 73.de 2010-03-03 7,500 EUR 87.de 2010-03-03 7,500 EUR call.at 2010-03-04 6,750 EUR drucker-toner.de 2010-03-03 6,500 EUR Printer Toner in German carworld.eu 2010-03-05 6,000 EUR designshop.ch 2010-03-08 6,000 EUR luxury.co.za 2010-03-05 6,000 USD tmb.de 2010-03-03 5,950 EUR healing.de 2010-03-05 5,950 EUR mamme.it 2010-03-05 5,900 USD xa.de 2010-03-02 5,700 EUR hurghada.ch 2010-03-03 5,000 EUR hausfinanzierung.de 2010-03-04 4,600 EUR Home Financing in German greencar.de 2010-03-05 4,000 EUR cyclette.it 2010-03-08 3,600 EUR Bike in Italian volksversicherung.de 2010-03-02 3,500 EUR “Population Insurance” in German extra.be 2010-03-05 3,000 EUR freienstein.de 2010-03-01 2,600 EUR staatsanleihen.de 2010-03-02 2,550 EUR government bonds in German bookwithme.co.uk 2010-03-05 2,500 GBP rückenprobleme.ch 2010-03-04 2,500 EUR Back Problems in German kabellos.de 2010-03-02 2,500 EUR diabetes-shop.de 2010-03-04 2,360 EUR dinnerfortwo.de 2010-03-04 2,350 EUR goodies.de 2010-03-03 2,223 EUR easysports.de 2010-03-08 2,222 EUR swx.de 2010-03-04 2,200 EUR xxl-print.de 2010-03-03 2,100 EUR unternehmen-zukunft.de 2010-03-02 2,083 EUR Future Enterprise in German schwibbogen.de 2010-03-05 2,083 EUR vivabingo.es 2010-03-03 2,000 EUR autoexport.eu 2010-03-02 2,000 EUR salvia.fr 2010-03-05 2,000 EUR badplatsen.se 2010-03-01 2,000 EUR staffshop.co.uk 2010-03-03 2,000 GBP edreams.com.au 2010-03-08 2,000 USD gaudin.fr 2010-03-03 2,000 EUR congress.co.uk 2010-03-03 1,900 GBP checkin.at 2010-03-02 1,800 EUR decorating.co.za 2010-03-08 1,800 USD alkoholproblem.de 2010-03-01 1,750 EUR Acohol Problem in German fotopuzzel.de 2010-03-04 1,650 EUR Photo Puzzle in German tgm.co.uk 2010-03-04 1,650 GBP evict.co.uk 2010-03-02 1,600 GBP zwi.de 2010-03-05 1,600 EUR dach-spezialist.de 2010-03-02 1,555 EUR Roofing Specialist in German viaggio.eu 2010-03-04 1,500 EUR wep.ch 2010-03-02 1,500 EUR leihfahrrad.de 2010-03-02 1,500 EUR Rental Bike in German eurostores.eu 2010-03-08 1,500 EUR stayalive.de 2010-03-04 1,452 EUR hooks.co.uk 2010-03-05 1,450 GBP tabak-pfeife.de 2010-03-02 1,312 EUR virtusa.co.uk 2010-03-04 1,250 USD onshop.de 2010-03-04 1,250 EUR hytteforum.no 2010-03-03 1,200 EUR webac.co.uk 2010-03-04 1,200 EUR geschaedigtenforum.de 2010-03-02 1,200 EUR Injured Party Forum in German ildolcetto.it 2010-03-08 1,200 EUR hunde-futter.de 2010-03-04 1,200 EUR Dog Food in German trachtenmode.eu 2010-03-04 1,200 EUR Costume Fashion in German rugs.ws 2010-03-05 1,200 USD inews.co.uk 2010-03-02 1,200 GBP möbel-kempf.de 2010-03-02 1,100 EUR Furniture Kempf in German powernap.de 2010-03-02 1,100 EUR schichtdicke.de 2010-03-05 1,050 EUR Coat Thickness in German xyros.de 2010-03-08 1,050 EUR alternate.pl 2010-03-08 1,040 USD blue-ray.de 2010-03-04 1,000 EUR passaggi.it 2010-03-08 1,000 EUR medinfo.ch 2010-03-03 1,000 EUR gesundheit-aktiv.de 2010-03-04 1,000 EUR Health – Activ in German topviaggi.it 2010-03-05 1,000 GBP newyork-hotels.de 2010-03-02 1,000 EUR inspe.de 2010-03-02 1,000 EUR esense.de 2010-03-05 1,000 EUR jjc.eu 2010-03-04 1,000 USD religion.eu 2010-03-04 999 EUR maldini.de 2010-03-08 950 EUR highrollercasino.co.uk 2010-03-03 950 EUR mediamonitoring.de 2010-03-04 950 EUR übersetzer.eu 2010-03-01 900 EUR Translator in German friendfinder.it 2010-03-08 900 EUR infection.ch 2010-03-03 900 EUR emobility.ch 2010-03-02 875 EUR zürich.eu 2010-03-03 850 EUR Zurich in German dampfdusche.eu 2010-03-02 850 EUR Steam Shower in German enterprises.ws 2010-03-02 850 USD übersetzungen.eu 2010-03-01 827 EUR Translations in German sks.at 2010-03-03 800 EUR de-brief.de 2010-03-05 800 EUR unidata.de 2010-03-05 775 EUR klangkoerper.de 2010-03-02 750 EUR Orchester in German webagency.nl 2010-03-04 750 EUR metalldichtungen.de 2010-03-03 750 EUR Metal Gasket in German kleinfeldtore.de 2010-03-04 700 EUR adventuretravel.tv 2010-03-02 700 USD webimmo.fr 2010-03-05 700 EUR Other sys.net 2010-03-08 12,500 USD open.org 2010-03-03 6,200 USD analytics.info 2010-03-02 5,000 USD docs.net 2010-03-01 5,000 USD al3aab.net 2010-03-03 4,000 USD billigfliegen.net 2010-03-03 3,500 EUR Fly Cheap in German probefahrt.org 2010-03-02 3,500 EUR telefon.info 2010-03-04 3,050 EUR Telephone in German wvtv.org 2010-03-02 2,300 USD adultdatingsites.org 2010-03-03 2,300 USD luminaires.org 2010-03-01 1,800 USD relatos.org 2010-03-05 1,750 EUR feel.net 2010-03-03 1,750 USD surgeon.pro 2010-03-05 1,750 USD surgery.pro 2010-03-04 1,750 USD bookstores.org 2010-03-03 1,500 USD thecombine.org 2010-03-05 1,500 USD videoporno.org 2010-03-05 1,400 USD careeraptitudetest.net 2010-03-01 1,300 USD englishtown.net 2010-03-03 1,275 USD 950.net 2010-03-01 1,250 USD enaplus.net 2010-03-05 1,100 EUR fgt.org 2010-03-02 1,100 USD thek.net 2010-03-03 1,046 USD amarket.net 2010-03-01 1,041 USD rideaux.net 2010-03-04 1,000 EUR reinigung.org 2010-03-03 1,000 EUR Dry-Cleaner in German vijay.org 2010-03-02 900 USD autoverhuur.info 2010-03-04 800 EUR Car Rental in Dutch firstmedical.org 2010-03-01 795 USD cutterbuck.info 2010-03-04 790 USD grattage.org 2010-03-08 700 EUR

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As reported by Mashable Retweet.com Sold for $250,000 on the Flippa.com market place. After receiving bids by 34 bidders up to $202,000, a new bidder joined the auction and bought the site domain for its listed BIN (buy it now) price of $250,000. The identity of the buyer has yet to be revealed.

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SocialDomainers.com, a new social network for Social Domainers has just been launched by Tony Kanakaris, a Long Island, New York based domainer. The network was set up in order to help local domainers meet and connect. For today’s launch, the site is giving away an Apple iPad for the 1,000th member to sign up for the site, which has been running in a private beta for a while.

[Update] Tony just told DNN that two more lucky members who sign up before April 1st, 2010 will also have the chance to win an iPad.

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Following the course of other TLDs, such as .DE, Nominet has posted a document for their members and registrars proposing the release of single and double character domain names in the third level of the .UK domain (under co.uk, .org.uk, .me.uk and .net.uk). The release would exclude some domains that have been registered before the establishing of Nominet as the registry operator in 1996. According to the consultation, Nominet is considering releasing the domains in two phases: A first round for trademark holders, followed by a Dutch Auction (starting with a high price being reduced until a buyer is found, similar to the release of second level .MX domains).

The corresponding consultation runs for three months, from 8 March 2010 until 8 June 2010.  To provide your feedback, you can either complete the online survey or email your answers to shortdomains@nominet.org.uk.

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National Public Radio now count themselves as having the tiniest shortened URL for use on Twitter and other social media sites. The organization announced their new domain N.PR yesterday on their blog. The company had been using Stumble Upon’s  Su.pr url shortener on most of their Twitter accounts. NPR will continue using npr.org as their main site address and begin shortening all their URLs in-house with the n.pr domain.

From the blog

I know what you are thinking… Isn’t npr.org short enough? Normally, yes, but Twitter only allows messages to contain 140 characters. Shorter URLs are better since they give users more room to add their own thoughts in a tweet. So when we had the opportunity to acquire n.pr – .pr is the top-level domain for Puerto Rico – we couldn’t pass it up.

With tweets limited to 140 characters, using the shortest possible URL to link in to your site seems to be gaining popularity.  For example, Facebook recently created FB.me , Google has Goo.gl and there are even services like Yourls that help you set up your own URL shortening service.

Having a single letter domain in a top level ccTLD like this does make NPR stand out. I imagine more large content sites, news organizations and publications will be look at this option in the future.

Update : While others in the comments below have mentioned other 4 character URLs that match NP.R as having the shortest URL,  my co-editor pointed out a story we covered in December about .TO which is claiming to be the shortest URL-shortener available.  The only problem with their service is browser requirements which make the url in to http://to./yff ,  adding http:// and putting the period after the extension and don’t work with some browsers.  Comments in the previous post also point out that www.to and .to are separate entities, which means a mistype could end you up at a different site altogether.  Talk about confusing !  I’d stick with the short URLs that seem to work across all browsers

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After organizing the largest event for the Domain Industry with their recent DomainFEST Global in Santa Monica, Oversee.net’s DomainSponsor unit has now announced the dates and location for their European event. DOMAINfest Europe will be held from October 6-7th in Prague in the Czech Republic at the InterContinental Hotel. The addition of the European event clearly underlines the company’s commitment of establishing a presence in Europe after opening an office in Frankfurt, Germany late last year. The event will also feature a live domain auction. Agenda and speaker details will be announced in June.

With this event the domain industry will be even busier in September/October than with DomainFest and TRAFFIC in January 2010:

• Sept 2-3: Domainvermarkter Forum in Munich, Germany
• Sept 23-24: DomainConvergence in Montreal, Canada
• Oct 6-7: DOMAINfest Europe, Prague, Czech Republic
• Oct 11-15: DNCruise, Miami, Key West, Cozumel
• Oct 17-20: Targeted T.R.A.F.F.I.C., Miami South Beach, Florida

For a full list of events of relevance to the domain industry, visit the Domain Name Industry Event Calendar, DNCalendar.com. Please let us know if we’re missing an event.

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The .ME registry has partnered with NameJet yet again to offer up another batch of .ME domains at auction. This time it’s personal . . . as in personal names.  The list of 300 domains includes some of the most popular first and last names such as Adam.Me,  Michelle.Me, OConnor.Me, and Smith.Me

The full list of names to be auctioned can be found at www.PersonalNames.Me . The official press release can be seen after the jump.

Podgorica, Montenegro – Mar 2, 2010- The .ME Registry and NameJet announced the Internet’s largest online auction of personal names today. If you’ve ever wanted your own name as a domain, now is your chance! More than 300 personal names and surnames with a .ME extension are up for auction, starting April 5, 2010.

“We’ve had phenomenal success working with NameJet in the past. Their online auction platform is a perfect venue for this upcoming auction of personal names — the biggest online auction event the .ME Registry has ever held,” stated Predrag Lesic, Executive Director of the .ME Registry. “The popularity of social media makes this an opportune time to create a personal presence online and, as we’ve told the world from the start, dot-ME is as personal as it gets. Dot-ME is all about YOU!”

Here’s a glimpse at some of the many popular names available in this auction:

Andrew.Me
Adam.Me
Brian.Me
Daniel.Me
Douglas.Me
Eric.Me
Jack.Me
James.Me
Jason.Me
John.Me
Kevin.Me
Lindsey.Me
Maria.Me
Paul.Me
Peters.Me
Scott.Me
Shawn.Me
Steve.Me
Ryan.Me
William.Me

For the full list of available first names and surnames, go to www.PersonalNames.Me.

“This is the first time in the history of domains that more than 300 premium personal names have gone to auction at the same time. It’s so rare to gain control of your very own name with any domain extension. Imagine having it with a dot-ME – the ultimate personal domain,” said Steve Brown, General Manager of NameJet.

“Dot-ME is the ideal personal Web site domain,” noted Lesic. “Imagine the power of being the ONLY person in the world to own your first name or last name through dot-ME, even though millions of others have the very same name.”

.ME is proving to be extraordinarily popular for so many reasons. More than 350,000 .ME domains have been registered in the two years since the domain extension’s launch and a number are used for online call-to-action and catch phrase branding by businesses worldwide. One noteworthy example is Facebook, which is using FB.Me as its URL shortener.
For other examples and articles about the many clever uses of .ME, visit ExploreTheWorldOf.Me.

To learn more about the .ME Registry, developing a .ME business idea through non-auction allocation of a .ME domain, or to find out how to register a .ME domain, go to www.Domain.Me.

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John Zuccarini is back in the news fighting against the collection of a judgment by DS Holdings . DSH has been assigned a judgment by Office Depot from 2000 and is seeking to collect by seizing domain names.  Zuccarini was found guilty of cybersquatting on Office Depot’s trademark with the domain officdepot.com.  In the discovery process DSH has found that Zucarrini owns 248 domains and is seeking to levy these domains and sell them at auction to collect on the judgment.

In 2007, the US District Court for the Northern District of California ruled that Zuccarini’s domain names constituted personal property located in California—the site of the domain name registry—and were subject to seizure to satisfy the judgment against Zuccarini.  DSH moved to have a receivership assist in executing the judgment in the Northern District of California.

The Court’s most recent decision clarifies that domains, as intangible property, are located in the Northern District based on the location of Verisign, the registry for the .com domain names. They stated in the decision “we conclude under California law that domain names are located where the registry is located for the purpose of asserting quasi in rem jurisdiction. Although the question is not directly before us, we add that we see no reason why for that purpose domain names are not also located where the relevant registrar is located.”

In case you are new to this whole “domain name thing”,  John Zuccarini was arrested and jailed in 2003 for violating the Truth in Domain Names Act.  Zuccarini had thousands of domain names which were typos of major brands, many of these led the user to adult websites and “mousetrapped” the user into viewing hundreds of sites.  The law makes it a federal crime for “whoever knowingly uses a misleading domain name on the Internet with the intent to deceive a person into viewing material constituting obscenity” and “whoever knowingly uses a misleading domain name on the Internet with the intent to deceive a minor into viewing material that is harmful to minors on the Internet”.  Zuccarini was released in 2005.

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Congratulations go out to DNN’s good friends Joe Higgins and Jessica Besseling who are now proud parents. Joe and Jessica have been long-time employees with Oversee.net (Jessica also worked with DDC.com).

According to Joe “Baby Gia was born in Luxembourg City, Luxembourg on Thursday, February 25th weighing in at a healthy 3.320 kilos (7.2 lbs) and measured 53 cm (21″). Jessica and baby are doing great.”

Joe and Jessica recently moved to Luxembourg to set up Oversee’s new European offices. Good luck to you both and to baby Gia !

The French registrar Gandi.net is giving away 55,000 Domain Names in celebration of the ICANN accredited company’s 10th birthday. The amount of promo codes given away will increase from day to day up to a total of 55,000. The longer a registrant has been with the company the more promotional codes they will receive. The coupon codes can be used by the registrant themselves or passed on to someone else. The special event is supported by a number of registrar partners and applies to the following TLDs: .be, .com, .eu, .fr, .info, .me, .mobi, .net, .tel and .uk. More information can be found on the anniversary website.

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DomainConsultant’s Mike Fiol has contacted us to with the news that the company’s site has recently been relaunched in the form of a blog. The company is most known for their work assisting with the auctions held by DomainTools on the Aftermarket.com platform.

The company has also launched a new domain marketplace, meant for premium domains with little market exposure under the name “One of a Kind“. The domain name OneOfAKind.com sold at the Silent Moniker/SnapNames auction for the Targeted TRAFFIC Conference in New York for $26,000 and was the top sale of the auction.

The latest tool launched by DomainConsultant is DNFame.com, a domain name analytics aggregator with the goal to provide as many relevant statistics for a given domain name as possible. Fiol stated that “This is a tool we built for ourselves that we decided to release to the public.  I don’t know of another public tool that has the number of data points that we do.  If we’re missing something, we’d love to hear other domainers suggestions .”

Disclaimer: Domain Name News Editor Adam Strong is a consultant for DomainConsultant.com.

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As of this writing, the RollingStone.com website has become a Network Solutions domain parking page.  Gawker Media first pointed out that the music industry website was no longer active.

I know what you are thinking, the domain expired and NSI took it over.  WRONGO!  The domain doesn’t expire until September 2011.

The company refers to the problem as a “glitch” .  A pretty good size glitch given that according to Compete.com the site averages over 1 million monthly unique visitors.  This seems like a pretty large mistake  for a well-known publishing company to make on their own, so we’re left wondering who dropped the ball here.

Mashable is also covering the story and a commenter pointed out that the domain may be experiencing issues with their DNS provider or Akamai.

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Verisign, the registry provider for .com and .net, has released their domain industry brief today. The report can be found in PDF format here.

Some of the highlights of the report include:

-  At the end of 2009 there were 192 million domain name registrations across all TLDs, an increase of nearly 15 million since the end of 2008.

- An eight percent increase in new registrations from the third quarter 2009.

- At the close of 2009 there were 78.6 million ccTLD domain name registrations, an increase of nearly 7.5 million since the close of 2008.

- The Chinese ccTLD .cn regained it’s position as the most registered ccTLDs  but .uk notably was had the most growth with an 11% increase in registrations

- .com and .net grew to 96.7 million domain name registrations at the end of 2009. This represents an increase of 7% over the last quarter in 2008.

Lastly, Verisign looked at renewal rates .  The rate of renewals at the end of 2009 was 71%.

In analyzing renewals Verisign points out that 88% of the .com and .net domains are resolving to a site.  While 24% of that number represents “Onepage” sites including parked domains, under construction and brochure-ware sites.

If my math is correct that means there are roughly 23,184,000 “Onepage” domains.
How many of those do you think are being parked  : )

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I found an interesting  product today while searching for some domain news articles.  It’s Domain, the men’s fragrance by Mary Kay.

Mary Kay describes the fragrance :  “Wrap him in the scent of hearth and home with Domain® Cologne Spray. He’s a breath of fresh air and so is this blend of lavender and oak moss.”

Nothing says “Domain” like lavender and oak moss, eh?

Maybe we can offer a rewrite and remix with DNN’s version : “Wrap him in the scent of the sea breeze of a beach side bungalow and the musky air of a grotto with Domain Cologne Spray. He’s a breath of fresh .com registrations and so is this blend of whiskey and Cuban cigar aromas.”

Could this be the perfect gift for your domainer husband/boyfriend ? Unfortunately, Domain cologne is not available at the domain Cologne.com    : )

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In the ongoing drama that is Sex.com another major twist in the story has occurred. Sex.com has now been listed at Maltz Autctions as an asset to be sold at a foreclosure auction.  Elliot Silver scooped the legal documents listing the domain name, the loan agents, as well as the investors involved.

The domain name was sold in January 2006 for a rumored $14 million to a group of previously private investors. It was rumored at the time that Internet RealEstate and former BuyDomains owner Michael Mann were involved.  The rumors obviously can be confirmed by this filing.

Sex.com is already a popular domain by nature of the subject matter. The 2006 sale gave it the highest domain sale bragging rights.  It’s the one domain that has been the focus of two books, one by Kieren McCarthy and one by lawyer Charles Carreon.  It’s been stolen and returned and then sold and now it’s gone in to foreclosure.  If it’s popular subject matter didn’t make this name interesting, surely the history and ongoing story behind Sex.com makes it one of the most popular domain names ever.

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As reported earlier on TechCrunch , National A1 Advertising has sold the domain Poker.org for $1 million to poker company PokerCompany.com . The transaction is cited as the highest recorded .org sale price.  PokerCompany.com runs a portfolio of other non-.com domains including Craps.net, BlackJack.org and RakeBack.org .

This is a great sale and shows the value of a category killer keyword domain may be in it’s ability to rank well in a category, not just in it’s extension. DNN predicts that there’ll be a resurgence in speculation in alternate extensions like .net and .org  and that the domain blogs and forums will be buzzing on this story for awhile.

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IDG’s PCWorld just published an article by Jared Newman about 15 Internet Annoyances and how to fix them. Of course the author thinks that parked domains are one of them, even if they may actually get the user to where they want to go. So Newman recommends all domains that involve framed parking on the Oversee.net owned Information.com domain:

13. This Web Site is Bogus

Sometimes when you mistype a URL or click an old, abandoned link, you’ll come upon these junky Web sites filled with useless links, a search bar that returns who-knows-what and a deliciously ironic slogan, “What you need, when you need it.” This is the work of cybersquatters, who occupy Web sites in hopes that you’ll click on those links and make them some money.

The Fix: Firefox users can once again use BlockSite to turn one major cybersquatter’s Web sites into blank pages–just add “*.information.com” to your restricted list. This will foil one major cybersquatter whos sites always refer back to that domain, but unfortunately the same trick doesn’t work in Internet Explorer’s list of restricted sites. No matter what browser you’re in, never give squatters the satisfaction of clicking on anything.

Of course the article also calls anyone who would re-register and park a previously registered and expired domain a cybersquatter, forgetting that the term implies an actual infringement on someones trademark. Maybe we should add journalists who do not do proper research to the list? I guess I could post that as a comment on his article, but then again, that would require registration on the site, which also is one of the annoyances he lists.

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TechDirt covered a unique twist in domain name disputes last week.  Pet Holdings, Inc, the company behind wildly popular websites such as Icanhascheezburger.com, FailBlog.org and Failbooking.com, sued the owner of the domain name FailBook.com because the owner framed PHI’s FailBooking.com site on his FailBook.com domain and put a for sale banner on the top of the page.

Failbook.com owner Cristian Castillo claims that he made a mistake framing the Failbooking.com content but was using it to demonstrate what the domain could be used for while attempting to sell it. Based on statistics sent to us by Castillo the domain seems to be generating around 10,000 unique visitors a day. Castillo is still offering the domain name for sale for $50,000.

As a result of  the domain owners actions of framing the content of Failbooking.com, Pet Holdings is claiming cybersquatting, trademark infringement, copyright infringement, unfair competition, and breach of contract.  Castillo clearly has the better domain and one that predates FailBooking.com by 3 years, a domain that PHI likely covets but is unwilling to pay $50,000 to acquire.

It’s unclear why PHI sued first and didn’t file a UDRP or simply send Castillo a cease and desist to stop his actions.  Posts on TechDirt and the current Failbook site indicate Castillo believes that suing and not sending a cease and desist was over the top.   We wonder why they didn’t just go with a UDRP instead. Based on several recent bad UDRP decisions, DNN believes Castillo might be lucky that PHI didn’t go that route.  Actions like this seem to be readily pinned as bad faith in a UDRP proceeding, so he’d have lost the domain.  As far as we know, PHI still has the option to file a UDRP.

Techdirt makes the argument that PHI shouldn’t be bothered and that in fact Failbooking.com benefited from the traffic from the Failbook.com framing of their site, but others clearly don’t see it the same pointing out that the action could confuse users in to thinking one site was the other.  The legal battle seems to have continued in the comments section with both sides making additional arguments. Arm-chairing techies also seem to be chiming in on the issue. Debate centers over whether Castillo’s actions were or were not harming PHI and if the actions were more of a defrauding on potential buyers of the domain.

The case is ongoing and will be interesting to follow and see where this leads.  PHI has offered a settlement which calls for Castillo to pay PHI around $8,000, but it doesn’t appear that he is going to accept that any time soon.

(c) 2009 DomainNameNews.com

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According to a report issued by ICANN yesterday, the upcoming ICANN meeting in Nairobi in March has received a message regarding a direct threat against the conference venue, the Kenyan International Conference Center (KICC). ICANN had canceled a planned meeting in Nairobi last year due to security concerns, but had recently confirmed their commitment to holding holding the 37th ICANN meeting in Kenya.

The ICANN board decided in their meeting on February 4th to move the decision on whether to go ahead with the Expressions of Interest (EOI) concept for new TLDs to the Nairobi meeting.

According to insider sources some companies, such as the Australian registry, LogicBoxes, GoDaddy and Neuleve/Neustar have announced that they will not be sending staff to the event.

Kieren McCarthy thinks these challenges may be a blessing in disguise helping to increase the ability for remote participation. In a letter addressed to the Chairman and the President & CEO of ICANN, GoDaddy proposed holding a connected parallel event should ICANN decide to go ahead with the meeting in Nairobi.

CEO Rod Beckstrom earns $750,000 annual base salary plus bonus

As a not-for profit Organization, ICANN always had to file and publish some information of how they spent their money. However those filings are hard to read and some cases some of the information has been removed. It appears ICANN president & CEO Rod Beckstrom is trying hard to bring a new openness to ICANN. Today he published a document on twitter showing the compensation for ICANN’s top employees. The non-profit models its compensation based on For-Profit companies and “has had major blunders, yet to my knowledge no staff were ever held accountable through termination or pay reductions” according to an article by George Kirikos published on CircleID. Kirikos also points out that the highest paid UN employee earns an annual salary of US$201,000 (“Under Secretary General”) even when taking into account the ITU employees.

But not only salaries at ICANN are costing the domain industry and registrants a fortune. Many of the recently de-accredited registrars owed ICANN large amounts of money. And yet ICANN decided to wait and not require an earlier payment of the fees. Most likely this money will never be seen by ICANN now, and thus the rest of the community will have to pay for it.

The board has recently decided to release $1.5 million from the existing budget contingency in order to cover operating expenses for the 2010 budget. In addition the board “requests the CEO and his designated staff to closely monitor expenditures and forecasts for FY10“.

See the details for ICANN top staff compensation after the jump.

President and Chief Executive Officer

Rod Beckstrom was appointed ICANN’s President and Chief Executive Officer, as well as a member of the Board of Directors, effective 1 July 2009. ICANN and Beckstrom entered in to a three year employment agreement effective 1 July 2009. Under the terms of the agreement Beckstrom is paid a base salary of US$750,000 per year, additional at risk compensation of up to US$195,000 per year, and coverage under vacation, health and welfare plans including medical, dental, vision, life insurance and a 401(k) retirement plan as ICANN makes available to its staff.

Chief Operating Officer

Mr. Doug Brent was appointed as Chief Operating Officer on 13 December 2006. Brent’s compensation consists of a base salary of US$270,000 per year, a housing allowance of $24,000 per year which is tax neutralized, additional at risk compensation of up to 48 percent of base pay each year, and standard coverage under vacation, health and welfare plans including medical, dental, vision, life insurance and a 401(k) retirement plan as ICANN makes available to its staff.

General Counsel and Secretary

Mr. John Jeffrey was appointed as General Counsel and Secretary on 2 September 2003. Jeffrey’s compensation consists of a base salary of US$230,000 per year, additional at risk compensation of up to 30 percent of base pay per year, and standard coverage under vacation, health and welfare plans including medical, dental, vision, life insurance and a 401(k) retirement plan as ICANN makes available to its staff.

Senior Vice President, Services

Mr. Kurt Pritz was appointed as Vice President, Business Operations on 2 September 2003. Pritz was appointed Senior Vice President, Services on 13 December 2006. Pritz’ compensation consists of a base salary of US$245,000 per year, additional at risk compensation of up to 30 percent of base pay per year, and standard coverage under vacation, health and welfare plans including medical, dental, vision, life insurance and a 401(k) retirement plan as ICANN makes available to its staff.

Chief Financial Officer

Mr. Kevin Wilson was appointed as Chief Financial Officer on 26 June 2007. Wilson’s compensation consists of a base salary of $170,000 per year, additional at risk compensation of up to 20 percent of base pay per year, and standard coverage under vacation, health and welfare plans including medical, dental, vision, life insurance and a 401(k) retirement plan as ICANN makes available to its staff.

ICANN Compensation Practices (PDF)

[Thanks to Rod Beckstrom, George Kirikos]

(c) 2009 DomainNameNews.com

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