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Name.com “will carry as many TLDs as possible”

Kevin Murphy, January 7, 2013, Domain Registrars

Demand Media executive vice president Taryn Naidu said newly acquired registrar Name.com plans to carry as many TLDs as possible, but urged new gTLD applicants to start distribution talks with registrars as soon as possible.
“It’s going to be challenging to offer all of them,” Naidu told DI today. “We’re asking registries to come talk to Name.com early and often to make sure they get the shelf space.”
“They have to come with a plan, and make sure they’re ready to go to market,” he said.
Demand Media announced the acquisition of Name.com earlier today. The deal, for an undisclosed amount, will see the 30-strong Denver, Colorado-based company join number two registrar eNom in the Demand stable.
Name.com is almost 10 years old and has almost 1.5 million domains under management, the majority of them in gTLDs. eNom has over 12 million domains spread across scores of registrar accreditations.
Naidu said that the forthcoming new gTLD market was a major reason for the deal.
While eNom is primarily a channel player, Name.com is all about the customer-facing retail side of the registrar business.
Owning Name.com could give Demand Media a faster way to market the dozens of new gTLDs that it has itself applied for, as well as the 300 it has partnered with uber-applicant Donuts on.
Naidu declined to comment on details of the Donuts relationship, but I’d be quite surprised if a commitment to carry its TLDs is not part of the deal.
He also said he’s not too worried about alienating eNom’s existing reseller channel, pointing out that main retail rivals such as Go Daddy and Tucows also have extensive reseller networks.
“In many regards having access to a retail player like this will help us serve our resellers by better understanding their needs,” he said.

ICM offers free .xxx domains to porn stars

Kevin Murphy, February 22, 2012, Domain Registries

ICM Registry and Name.com have teamed up to give a free one-year .xxx domain name registration to 3,500 selected porn stars.
It’s part of ICM’s Adult Performer Program, which saw these performers’ names initially reserved.
According to ICM, Name.com has pre-paid for the first year’s registration, valid until February 3 next year, but participating individuals will of course be free to move to another registrar if they choose.
That works out to $210,000 in registry fees, if I’m understanding the deal correctly, which seems like a bit of a risk given the general hostility to .xxx from the mainstream porn industry.
Name.com charges $84.99 for .xxx domains.
The Adult Performer Program came in for a bit of criticism last year, when some actresses tried to defensively register their names not realizing they had been reserved.