Pool.com offers $25k gTLD digital archery service

Domain name drop-catcher Pool.com hopes to make a quick buck out of ICANN’s new generic top-level domain application batching process.
The company has announced a Digital Archery Engine service, which it says could help new gTLD applicants get their applications near the top of the evaluation queue.
It’s based on Pool’s experience catching expiring names to auction, and ICANN’s controversial “digital archery” method of allocating applications into batches for processing.
Getting into the first batch of 500 applications is expected to knock at least five months off the wait time for new gTLD approval, delegation and launch. For many applicants, this time-to-market advantage is important.
But it’s not cheap. If Pool gets your application into the first batch it will set you back $25,000. If you’re in the top 50% of applications, the price tag is $10,000. Anything slower is free.

2 Comments Tagged: batching, digital archery, ICANN, new gTLDs, pool.com

Domain hijack leads to registrar shutdown threat

ICANN has threatened to terminate Chinese domain name registrar eName Technology after the domain 1111.com was allegedly hijacked.
According to ICANN’s notice of breach (pdf), eName has refused to hand over data documenting the transfer of 1111.com as required by the Registrar Accreditation Agreement.
ICANN claims that when it tried to get eName’s help investigating a hijacking complaint, the company did not return its calls or emails.
The registrar now has 15 days to provide the transfer records as called for by the Inter-Registrar Transfer Policy.
According to historical Whois records, 1111.com was transferred to eName between February 12 and 16 this year. After a complaint, ICANN started chasing eName for the data on February 28.
The domain appears to have been owned by at least four different parties and three different registrars – Network Solutions, then Joker, then eName – since the start of 2012.
It’s the second time that ICANN has sent a breach notice to a registrar over an alleged mishandling of a domain name hijacking, and the first time it’s actually named the domain in question.
In February, the organization threatened Turkish registrar Alantron with the suspension of its contract over the botched handling of pricewire.com.

5 Comments Tagged: 1111.com, compliance, ename, hijacking, ICANN, raa

TLDH wins .london contract, gets hacked

Top Level Domain Holdings has won the exclusive contract to apply to ICANN for the .london generic top-level domain, it has just been announced.
The deal was awarded by Dot London Domains, a subsidiary of official city PR agency London & Partners, to Minds + Machines Ltd, TLDH’s London-based subsidiary.
M+M will assist with the application and, assuming ICANN delegates .london, the registry infrastructure for at least seven years, with a three-year renewal option.
The application fees will be paid by L&P, according to TLDH chairman Peter Dengate Thrush.
The good news was soured slightly by an apparent hacking of TLDH’s web site by Viagra spammers this morning. According to the Google Cache, when the news broke, tldh.org looked like this:

TLDH is listed on London’s Alternative Investment Market.
It also has an office here, though its senior executives are based in the US and the company is registered in the tax haven of the British Virgin Islands.
I’d previously tagged .uk registry Nominet as the favorite to win the contract, but the company said today that it withdrew its bid last week.
APRIL 12 UPDATE
TLDH denies it got hacked yesterday. According to a spokesperson, there was an incident last August that may have been responsible for the Google Cache continuing to show Viagra spam for tldh.org yesterday.
From the explanation provided, it sounds like it was probably what’s sometimes known as a “conditional hack”, a difficult-to-detect attack whereby only the GoogleBot sees the spam SEO links.
The TLDH web site itself apparently never showed the links to visitors. Indeed, I only looked at the cache because tldh.org refused to load up for me yesterday morning.
The spokesperson maintained that the problem was sorted out last August and that TLDH has no idea why the Google Cache was showing the spam links in its cached page dated April 11, 2012.

1 Comment Tagged: .london, dot london domains, london & partners, m+m, Minds + Machines, tldh, top level domain holdings

Three-way legal fight over .eco breaks out

Planet.eco, an emergent .eco gTLD applicant with a trademark on “.eco” is suing two rival applicants for trademark infringement and cybersquatting in a California court.
The company sued DotEco (affiliated with Minds + Machines and Top Level Domain Holdings), along with CEO Fred Krueger, and Canada-based Big Room on March 2.
It’s looking for millions of dollars of damages and an injunction preventing both rival applicants from applying for .eco.
In late March, DotEco filed a counter-suit, alleging that Planet.eco’s .eco trademark was fraudulently obtained and that the company is trying to illegally stifle competition for the .eco gTLD.
That’s the short version. It’s a complex story with a great deal of history and more than a little bogus behavior.
DomainIncite PRO subscribers can read the full DI analysis, along with more PDFs than you could ever possibly need, here.
(Thanks to reader Tom Gilles for the tip)

7 Comments Tagged: .eco, big room, cybersquatting, doteco, ICANN, m+m, Minds + Machines, new gTLDs, planet.eco, tldh, top level domain holdings, trademarks

Google confirms new gTLD bids

Google will apply for several new generic top-level domains, according to a report in AdAge.
The company will apply for some dot-brands, and possibly some keywords, the report indicated.

“We plan to apply for Google’s trademarked TLDs, as well as a handful of new ones,” the spokeswoman said in an emailed statement.

AdAge speculates that .google and .youtube would be among the applications, which seems like a fair assumption.
The revelation comes despite the fact that Google engineers recently stated that there would be no guaranteed search engine optimization benefits from owning a gTLD.
However, I wouldn’t be surprised if keywords representing some of Google’s services, such as .search and .blog, are also among its targets.
The total cost to Google is likely to run into millions in ICANN application fees alone.
It will also be interesting to see which registry provider — if any — Google has selected to run its back-end.
Google is one of the few companies out there that could scratch-build its own registry infrastructure without breaking a sweat.
The AdAge report also quotes Facebook and Pepsi executives saying they will not apply.

Comment Tagged: facebook, google, ICANN, new gTLDs, pepsi, youtube

States will object to .inc, .llc gTLDs

American secretaries of state will object to new gTLD applications for .inc, .corp, .llc and .llp unless they are restricted, the National Association of Secretaries of State has told ICANN.
In a March 30 letter, NASS president Beth Chapman wrote:

While we have concerns about the use of these extensions, if ICANN considers approving these extensions, our members respectfully request that they be approved with restrictions that would attempt to protect legitimate businesses and consumers from confusion or fraud.
…
The members of NASS believe these extension identifiers (.INC, .LLC, .CORP, .LLP) should only be extended to entities that are also legally and appropriately registered with the Secretaries of State, or the equivalent state agency. The entity purchasing a new domain name should be the same entity registered with a Secretary of State or equivalent state agency.

The sentiment was a repeat of views expressed in a March 20 letter from Jeffrey Bullock, secretary of state of corporation-friendly Delaware.
Bullock said that Delaware “would object to the granting of such strings without restrictions”.
Neither letter acknowledges that the corporate suffixes Inc, Corp and LLP are also used elsewhere in the world.
Both letters refer to DOT Registry, a start-up with plans to apply to ICANN for .inc, .corp and .llc.
DOT Registry plans to put restrictions in place to ensure only registered companies can register domains, Bullock wrote.
I’m not familiar with DOT Registry’s plans, but in general I’m not keen on this type of gTLD string. They strike me as pointless, more likely to create defensive registration revenue than any benefit.

8 Comments Tagged: .corp, .inc, .llc, .llp, ICANN, nass, new gTLDs

First .blog new gTLD applicant revealed

Colombian domain name registrar My.co has become the first company to reveal that it will apply to ICANN for the .blog generic top-level domain.
Manager Gerardo Aristizabal told DI today that the application will be made through a company called Primer Nivel (“First Level” in Spanish).
My.co (officially Central Comercializadora de Internet) is the main partner in the bid. Other unspecified investors are also on board.
Qinetics, the Malaysian registry services provider that does business as RegistryASP, has been contracted to run the registry back-end.
My.co already uses Qinetics for its .co registrar gateway, which provides .co registration services to 20 other registrars, according to Aristizabal.
UK-based CommunityDNS has signed up to provide the DNS, while NCC Group has been named data escrow provider, he added.
“We believe .blog will provide a great address for establishing blogs online, and will become the Internet space for freedom of speech and information,” Aristizabal said.
It goes without saying that .blog will be a heavily contested – I would say probably the most heavily contested – gTLD.
Whenever anyone asks me what gTLD string I think stands the best chance of success, I always point to .blog.
It’s a no-brainer.
Media analysts NM Incite (great name) tracked 181 million blogs in 2011, up by about 25 million from 2010. A gTLD that could grab just 1% of that business would still be a nice little earner.
Not only is there an enormous potential market, but .blog doesn’t (as far as I know) have any of the legal baggage that will scare away potential applicants for strings such as .web or .music.
If .blog goes to auction, expect it to fetch eight figures.

6 Comments Tagged: .blog, central comercializadora de internet, communitydns, ICANN, my.co, ncc, new gTLDs, primer nivel, qinetics, registryasp

Verisign Hashlinks – a bid to keep domains sexy?

Verisign has quietly announced a new URL shortening service with an interesting spin.
Domain Hashlinks, which The Domains noticed earlier today, is an effort to bring short vanity URLs, with all the associated benefits, to companies’ existing domain names.
A Hashlink looks like this: example.com#hashlink
Notice the absence of a slash.
Hashlinks, which will compete against services such as X.co and Bit.ly, will allow companies to “remain faithful to your brand”, Verisign says.
The service, which is aimed at marketing departments, will have the usual metrics-tracking baggage that we’ve come to expect from URL shorteners.
It can also be plugged into Google Analytics, according to Verisign.
This is not a “registry service” in the sense that it’s running off of the .com registry. That kind of thing requires ICANN approval, but it’s not what Verisign is doing.
It seems that Domain Hashlinks is actually going to be Javascript-driven, meaning it will work regardless of which TLD your site uses. You don’t need to be Verisign to offer this kind of service.
But will anyone use it?
I had to spend a few minutes reading through the service’s web site to convince myself that it wasn’t simply an April Fools’ Day joke I’d missed.
The choice of stock muzak in the pitch vid seems to be comically evocative of “Smells Like Teen Spirit”, which screams motifs of youth and change… if you’re in your late 30s or early 40s.

But then I got it.
I can see how Domain Hashlinks would appeal to marketing folks. At least, I can see why Verisign would think it would appeal to marketing folks.
There’s a worry in the domain name industry, which goes right to the top at Verisign, that domain names are becoming less relevant as social media navigation becomes more popular.
You’re now just as likely to see a Twitter hashtag on your TV screen as a domain name.
Domain Hashlinks are a blatant attempt to buy into that buzz and keep domain names relevant in marketing.
I haven’t seen the Javascript yet – it hasn’t been released – but as far as I can tell there’s absolutely no reason the same functionality couldn’t be achieved with the humble slash.
I think Verisign is using the # symbol quite simply because it’s far sexier, as punctuation goes, than /.
The concept is either utter genius (think Justin Bieber planking with a LOLcat) or hopelessly embarrassing (think Verisign veep Pat Kane moshing to Nirvana at a wedding reception).
But that’s for the kids to decide.

7 Comments Tagged: domain hashlinks, verisign

YouPorn’s .xxx settlement talks extended

YouPorn owner Manwin, .xxx manager ICM Registry and ICANN have asked a California court for a few more weeks to settle Manwin’s antitrust lawsuit.
According to a court filing yesterday, the three want to extend ICANN and ICM’s window to respond to Manwin’s complaint extended from April 17. The submission reads:

The parties’ settlement discussions have not yet finished. In order to complete those discussions, the parties stipulate to extend, by an additional about three weeks until May 8, 2012, the deadline for Defendants to respond to Plaintiffs’ First Amended Complaint.

By May 8 the world is going to know whether ICM and/or Manwin have applied to ICANN for other adult-oriented gTLDs (.sex, .porn, etc), which could change the picture considerably.
Manwin sued ICANN and ICM in November, alleging that they colluded on .xxx to deliver “monopolistic conduct, price gouging, and anti-competitive and unfair practices”.
ICM and ICANN have denied the allegations.

2 Comments Tagged: antitrust, icm registry, manwin, xxx, youporn

NAF loses UDRP market share again

If UDRP forum shopping is a real phenomenon, the market share statistics don’t bear it out.
The National Arbitration Forum today announced a sequential decrease in the number of cybersquatting cases it handled in 2011, widening the gap between itself and the World Intellectual Property Organization for at least the second year in a row.
NAF said it handled 2,082 complaints last year, down 4% from 2010. That’s over the same period WIPO saw a 2.5% increase to 2,764 cases.
NAF is occasionally accused of being the more complainant-friendly of the two major UDRP dispute resolution providers, which some say encourages “forum shopping”.
While that may or may not be true in certain fringe cases, it’s certainly not helping NAF win a flood of business. WIPO is still handling more cases, and growing its share while NAF’s shrinks.
As Mike Berkens observed over on The Domains, NAF’s press release attempted a bit of lame spinning, comparing 2011 to 2009 in order to lead with an 18% increase stat.
The release also includes the following quote from director of internet and IP services Kristine Dorrain, which seems to be designed to subtly address the “complainant-friendly” allegations.

Our experience tells us parties, particularly domain name registrants, prefer the National Arbitration Forum because documents are easily accessible in our online portal. Complaint or Response filing is accomplished in just a couple of minutes.

It’s a somewhat irrelevant statement, given that it’s the complainant who gets to choose the venue.
One of NAF’s 2011 highlights was being picked as exclusive provider of Rapid Evaluation Service cases by .xxx manager ICM Registry. It processed 10 RES complaints in 2011.
RES cases, as well as 73 .us cases, were counted in its headline statistics.

8 Comments Tagged: cybersquatting, ICANN, naf, udrp, wipo