Domain Name News: May 20 Week in Review

DomainSherpaMay 20, 2011 | Updated: December 9, 2015 2

Domain Name Week in Review Every Friday, DomainSherpa.com provides you with a hand-selected, editorially based review of the week. In this summary, you will find the latest articles and videos produced by DomainSherpa staff and contributors. You will also find links to the best news articles in the domain name industry — so you don’t have to spend your time searching for news or reading something that was not worth your time.

This Week’s Articles in Review

Next Week’s Sneak Peek

This Week’s News in Review

Domainadvisors Completes Record Breaking Domain Sale With 33.com – 20-May-11
Domain broker reports record two digit domain name. DomainAdvisors, a division of PPX International, just announced a record sales price for a two digit domain name. The group brokered the sale of 33.com for $358,000.
Eric Schmidt Compares U.S., British Domain Name Blocking Efforts to Chinese Censorship – 19-May-11
Speaking in London, Google’s Eric Schmidt compared U.K. and U.S. efforts to block domains of file-sharing sites to the actions of China’s government, which routinely censors all forms of media. He may have a point. In a speech Wednesday, Google’s Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt clearly said that efforts by the United States and Britain to block Internet access to file-sharing websites would endanger freedom of speech and be a disastrous step toward the censored Internet in China, reports the Guardian. The comments came during the keynote at Google’s‚ Big Tent conference in London.
Go Daddy Has Donated $4.2 Million to Charity Already This Year – 19-May-11
Domain registrar tops last year’s donations, and it’s only May. Through just five months of 2011, domain name registrar Go Daddy has already donated more to charity than it did all of last year. Go Daddy’s philanthropic organization Go Daddy Cares has donated $4.2 million to charity so far this year, compared to $3.4 million all of last year.
.nu Domain Achieves Top Ranking for Robust Anti-phishing Practices – 18-May-11
WorldNames, Inc., the global manager of the .NU Top Level Domain (TLD), received top ranking for effective anti-phishing take-down practices in April.
Premium Domain Names and Web Sites Available at Domainfest Barcelona Auction … – 18-May-11
Moniker and SnapNames, both Oversee.net companies, released the preliminary auction catalog and opened pre-bidding for the DOMAINfest Barcelona live auction on June 8. Airports.com, AutoRacing.com, Bolt.com, Data.com, Fares.com, HorseRacing.com, Houses.co.uk, Languages.com…
Amazon Buys The A.Co, Z.Co, K.Co And Cloud.Co – 17-May-11
Following in Twitter (T.co) and Overstock’s (O.co’s) footsteps, Amazon has picked up the domains A.Co, Z.Co, K.Co and interestingly enough Cloud.co in a deal made with Colombia-based domain registry .Co.
Sedo Sued for $10 Million for Failing to Enforce Women.com Transaction with NBC Universal – 17-May-11
DONE! Ventures has added domain name broker Sedo to its lawsuit over a failed transaction for Women.com. DONE! sued NBC Universal last year after it alleged the media giant failed to follow through with a transaction to sell Women.com and Women.net for $1 million. According to the suit, NBC Universal’s CEO at the time Jeff Zucker vetoed the deal after it had been agreed to. Sedo broker Jeff Gabriel managed the deal.
Done Ventures Sues Sedo Over Women.com, Women.net – 17-May-11
Manhattan Beach-based DONE! Ventures, the Internet marketing and publishing firm headed by Ben Padnos, has sued domain name broker Sedo, over the firm’s role in a mishandled sale of the domain names Women.com and Women.net.
Are Investors or Individuals Driving .co Registrations? – 17-May-11
Data shows that bulk of domain registrations are not from domainers. Are domain investors or individual site owners and end users driving most of the .co domain registrations? I just got some data from the .co registry that suggests it’s the latter.
Oversee.net Gets Updated Domain Parking Patent – 17-May-11
Company granted continuation patent for parked domain optimization. Today Oversee.net, parent company of domain parking company DomainSponsor, was granted U.S. patent #7,945,662 for Internet domain keyword optimization (pdf). This patent was a continuation of previously granted patent #7,281,042 filed in 2004.
Saunders Caught Registering Domain Name of Corcoran Broker – 17-May-11
Is all fair in love and domain name registrations? So says Saunders Real Estate, who was just discovered to be the owner of SusanBreitenbach.com, which happens to be the name of one of Corcoran’s top Hamptons brokers.
Cost of .xxx Domain Name Registration Announced in New Report – 17-May-11
New dot xxx domain names will cost between $75 (¬£46.18) and $650 (¬£400.21) when they are launched in the near future, according to a new report.
Virnetx Granted New Patent for Secure Communications Using Secure Domain Names – 16-May-11
VirnetX Holding Corporation (NYSE Amex: VHC), an Internet security software and technology company, today announced that, on May 17, 2011, it has been granted U.S. Patent No. 7,945,654, Agile Network Protocol for Secure Communications Using Secure Domain Names, by the United States Patent and Trademark Office.
Frank Schilling Switches to Google Feed, Begins Offering Parking Services – 16-May-11
Driven by the pinch of lower PPC revenues on a Yahoo!/Bing feed, it appears Frank Schilling’s NAMedia has recently switched to a Google feed. The company has also removed their social application originally launched as Note.com, then rebranded as Chatr and now finally Postboard.
Mrs Jello Gets a Win for Geo Domain Owners – 16-May-11
Domainer wins case over geographic domain name brought by petroleum company. What do you do when the name of a place has also been incorporated into a business name? This was the issue in a recent UDRP case involving a Brazilian petroleum company and the domainer commonly known as Mrs Jello.
Up to $650 for a .xxx Domain – or to Keep Your Name Off One – 16-May-11
Pornographers and brand owners can expect to pay between $75 and $650 to register .xxx domain names, newly published registrar pricing schemes have revealed. Trademark owners concerned about having their brands associated with online pornography may be hit especially hard by the forthcoming domain launch, according to reports in the trademark press.
Google Acquires Chromebook.com and Chromebooks.com Domain Names – 15-May-11
When company acquired domains is unknown; neither domain resolves yet. It appears that Google has purchased the domain names ChromeBook.com and ChromeBooks.comm but for some reason they aren’t using the domains yet for their recently-announced product. On May 15 both domain names’ whois records switched to DNStination, Inc.
Google Secures .me Domain for Revolutionary Web Project – 15-May-11
The .ME Registry announced today that it assigned a premium domain name to Google for a web project called Ro.Me. The latest in a long list of innova
Nairobi Set to Host Internet Conference to Discuss dot.xxx – 15-May-11
The forum will discuss the licensing of the controversial pornographic domain name (dot.xxx) and growing use of social websites to create anarchy, writes Fredrick Obura. Intellectual property rights, security, and Internet stability and control are key issues set to dominate the sixth annual Internet Governance Forum set for Nairobi in September.
Marketing Bonanza Awaits As Organisations Set to Get Approval to Register Brands as Domains – 14-May-11
ON June 20, the governing body for internet domain names, ICANN, is expected to approve the final rules to allow organisations to register their brands as internet domains.
GoDaddy Opens Up Registration Path Sales to Outside Registrants – 14-May-11
This week Domain Name Wire discussed Godaddy auction domains appearing within the registration path. This change had actually occurred months ago, but since
ICANN Successfully Tiptoes Through Political Minefield with New TLD Applicant Guidebook by Krista Papac – 13-May-11
ICANN released its sixth version of the draft Applicant Guidebook for the new Top-Level Domain (TLD) program in April following three years of debate surrounding the rules and procedures that will outline how potential applicants will apply to own their own piece of Internet real estate. Overall, the response has been positive.