Will you be too sexy for .sexy?

Uniregistry is planning to implement strict sexiness restrictions in its forthcoming .sexy gTLD, according to a fake press release we’ve just received.
Uniregistry, the portfolio gTLD applicant run by domainer Frank Schilling, is the only applicant for .sexy.
The company lied in the press release:

Upon applying to register for a .sexy domain, registrants will be required to affirmatively answer the certified statement “Are you sexy, and do you know it?”
In an enhancement to existing mobile phone verification systems, registrants will be required to input a PIN sent to their mobile phone, and attach a picture of themselves to the reply message.
Any registrants deemed “too sexy for this TLD” will be provided with suitable alternative domains, such as .blackfriday, while those not qualifying as sexy enough will be directed to .help.

Uniregistry’s Amanda Fessenden will “personally inspect photos of every registrant and strictly enforce the ‘no mullets’ provision of the 100% sexy policy”, Uniregistry made up.

Parked domain pun wins “Funniest Joke” award

A bit of Friday afternoon nonsense for you…
British stand-up comedian Tim Vine this week won a LAFTA award for the “year’s funniest joke” that’s basically just a pun on a domain name.
This is the joke: “Conjunctivitis.com – that’s a site for sore eyes”
The domain is parked (of course) and seems to be owned by a Californian domainer listed in Whois as the Health Hero Network.
I’m guessing the domain is seeing a traffic spike today.
Here’s a video of Tim Vine being much, much funnier.

Drunk domain blogger gets mugged in Cartagena

ICANN people love defining things, and a few people at the meeting here in Cartagena have disputed whether this anecdote meets the strict definition of “mugging”.
Okay, I didn’t wind up with a knife in my ribs, they weren’t carrying firearms, and they didn’t get my wallet.
But they were going to beat me up (at the very least) if I didn’t give them what they wanted and it’s really just blind luck that I managed to blag my way out of it.
I often find that these kinds of stories are better related in first-person present tense.
So it’s 4am, and I’m blatantly flouting ICANN’s security advice by walking, rather than getting a taxi, back from .CO Internet’s rather nice afterparty to my considerably less-nice hotel.
But it’s only two or three short blocks, and I’m inside the walled city, so I reckon I’m safe.
Wrong.
Two thuggish-looking blokes quickly appear beside me and one of them starts mouthing off in unusually good English about how I owe him money for a coke deal I’m apparently somehow implicated in.
I’m not kidding.
I forget the details, but the gist of it is that I need to give them both an unspecified large amount of money for some drugs that I stole or something and that Bad Things will happen to my face if I refuse.
Unfortunately for the Escobar brothers, it turns out that at 4am, with half a bottle of Colombian fire-water in my belly, I’m invincible.
Or believe myself to be, anyway.
So I decide to play dumb, and just carry on walking. I figure I’ll pretend for as long as possible that I’m simple, or don’t speak English. My hotel is in sight by this point.
“Okay,” I say, confused look on my face, after he finishes his story.
“So you give us money?” he says.
“Okay,” I say, not giving him money.
“You give us money now.” he’s not asking this time.
“Okay,” I say. Walking a bit faster.
This goes on for two blocks. As dumb luck would have it, by the time he starts to loses his patience we’ve already reached my hotel.
Of course, at 4am, my two-star dive has its doors locked, and I have to ring the buzzer to get in.
Normally, the young girl on the desk buzzes me through two seconds later. Of course, normally I don’t show up in the dead of night accompanied by two burly Colombian guys yelling about drug money.
So she understandably doesn’t want to let me in.
Trying to buy time, and unsure whether this is a violent scam or a genuine case of mistaken identity, I tell the guy he can have his money in the morning. Just drop by, pick it up, no worries.
I buzz again, but she still doesn’t want to let me in.
“You give me money now.”
I usually carry a bunch of small-denomination bills in my pocket when I’m on unfamiliar turf, for precisely this kind of scenario, so I grab a wad of notes and stuff them into his hand.
“Okay, here’s your money.”
Buzz again. Still no response.
I’m trying not to notice that the money I’ve just given him amounts to about two US dollars, but he clearly has noticed and is quite angry.
I’m told I now owe him 57,000 pesos, which strikes me as unusually specific.
Fortunately, I never get to find out why he settled on that amount. The girl buzzes me through and, after a brief struggle, Scarface eats door.
End of anecdote.
To me, it sounds like a mugging. Drug guys threatened to beat me up and I gave them $2 – that fits the definition, right? It may be the lamest mugging in Colombian history, but it’s still a mugging.
Anyway, that’s my story and I’m sticking to it.
Next time, I’ll try to get stabbed or something.

It’s Friday, time for Rick Schwartz Apprentice

In case you haven’t guessed already, my “It’s Friday…” headlines mark an irregular series of tragically cliquey attempts to be humorous.
This week, 12 fictional TV shows related to the domain name business that could be super-duper awesome, if only somebody would make them.
Apologies in advance to those concerned.

Sponsored TLD Survivor
Stranded on a desert island, .mobi, .jobs, .asia and .tel must fight to stay alive against all the odds. Each week, viewers vote for which contestant they think should be acquired by Afilias.
South Park
Controversial animated series following the antics of a domain parking company that rejects Adsense links in favor of slandering celebrities and deliberately inciting religious violence.

Lawley & Order
Porn-themed police procedural.
DNSSEC and the City
Paul Vixie, Phillip Hallam-Baker and Ram Mohan star as a trio of independent, no-nonsense women trying to find love, fulfillment and stable DNS resolution in New York City.

Bertrand De La Chappelle’s Show
Racially charged stand-up comedy from everybody’s favorite French GAC rep.
America’s Next Top-Level Domain
In which the 300-page DAG is thrown out in favor of a single sassiness-based criterion.

Rick Schwartz Apprentice
Surreal adaptation of the original, in which the self-styled Domain King imparts utterly unintelligible advice to teams of confused domainers, firing one per week with the catchphrase “You’re pigeon shit!”.
UDRP Panelist Judy
Judge Judy takes a break from her important judicial work in order to oversee UDRP complaints in which the winner is decided purely on the basis of which party can shout the loudest and has the most outrageous mullet.
Domaining With The Stars
Teams of top domainers and D-list celebrities compete to see who can make the biggest profit on a domain sale. This week, Elliot Silver patiently explains the finer points of drop-catching ccTLDs to a sobbing Danny Bonaduce.
Rod the Bounty Hunter
Beckstrom and his team pin down a bail-jumping crack dealer at a seedy El Paso motel.
The .XXX Factor
Same as the original, but goes on for six years.

The Daily Show with Jim Fleming
The perennial commentator and theorist takes a sideways look at today’s domain name news, whether you want him to or not.

Next week: domain-themed movies.
In the meantime, I want to see your TV show ideas in the comments please. If golf can have its own channel, I’m sure we can fill a schedule too.

It’s Friday, time for the world’s first domain name industry cryptic crossword

I love cryptic crosswords.
Not the boring, brain-dead variety you get in the American press, I’m talking about the proper UK-style wordplay-based brain-teasers.
So I’ve written one. A small one. Focused on the domain name industry.
All the answers are the names of people, companies, things, concepts related to the business and politics of domain names. Any domain nerd should easily be able to recognize the answers (though not necessary work out the clues).
Click the image (made with puzzle-maker.com) to see it full size.

ACROSS
1. To kick a household pet down the field. They do it in Spain. (7)
8. Messed up dose is secondary concern. (4)
9. Registrar to scratch a computer screen. (10)
11. Lucky if it lands on you? Rick Schwartz ain’t buying it. (6, 4)
13. Captain Car Kid crazily drives really, really fast. (6, 7)
14. A bastard of a registrar gripe site. (7)
15. The Most Important Person On The Internet. (4, 4)
DOWN
2. Scout about the west for a Canuck registrar. (6)
3. Te Kanawa’s first on a Greek island, and first in most ICANN comment periods. (7)
4. Odd tests rot, oddly, a breast-based marketing copycat. (7, 4)
5. May be done by the leader of a race or a registrar with insider information. (5, 7)
6. RFC editor to mail the Spanish. (6)
7. A short haircut. Then, in postscript, burning down a building for kicks. Having a mid-life crisis. (3, 7)
10. Making endlessly confused, up-in-the-air error. A cause for concern two years ago. (8, 3)
12. Registry sounds like the rear end of a young horse. (7)

Did I mention there’s a prize? Yes. The first person to email me with all the right answers. I’ll give them a lovely prize. I’ll think of something. Probably a free ad spot or something.
Feel free to speculate about the answers in the comments.
I’ll post the answers in the comments after we have a winner, or after a week, whichever is sooner.

It’s Friday, time for some Paul Kane Facts

After all the coverage of DNSSEC in the mainstream media this week, we all now know that Paul Kane is the most important person on the internet, but there’s so much more to know about the man.
Here are some Paul Kane Facts

Paul Kane is actually short for Paull Kane. He was first called “Paul” when he was eight, and the nickname stuck.
Paul Kane didn’t choose to live in Bath, Bath chose him.
Paul Kane’s company, CommunityDNS, is headquartered in a yurt. Quite a large one.
Paul Kane comes from a long line of Kanes. His father was a Kane, his grandfather was a Kane, and so on, for at least a hundred years.
Paul Kane often refers to his globe-trotting lifestyle as “walking the good Earth”.
Paul Kane has been happily married to the actress Lalla Ward since 1992, and yet the two have never met!
Paul Kane lives in a house once owned by a young Sherlock Holmes.
Paul Kane has two dogs, named Mandela and Gandhi.
Paul Kane once shaved off his beard for a disreputable charity, and it refused to grow back!
Paul Kane’s favorite color is “performance”.

Obviously, that’s just a small sample of all the Paul Kane Facts currently at my disposal.
Now it’s over to you. Have you met the great man? Why not leave your own Paul Kane Fact in the comments below?