Neustar pays $109 million for .CO Internet

Four years after relaunching the Colombian ccTLD .co as a global top-level domain, .CO Internet has been acquired by its long-time partner Neustar for $109 million.
The .co registry will become a wholly-owned subsidiary of Neustrar, which already runs .biz and .us, following the close of the deal.
.CO recorded revenue of $21 million in 2013, of which Neustar took $4 million as its back-end registry provider, according to Neustar.
The .co zone currently stands at about 1.6 million names, according to the companies. That seems to mean it added roughly 200,000 net new names in 2013, judging by its 2012 numbers.
The company relaunched .co in 2010, having jointly bid with Neustar for a Colombian government contract.
It was the last truly impressive TLD launch, with 200,000 registrations on day one and over 1 million in its first year.
While the space is still stuffed with speculators, unlike some other TLDs .co is also widely, visibly used by its intended audience — start-ups and entrepreneurs.
.CO is known primarily for its marketing acumen — some new gTLD registries could learn a thing or two — which Neustar CEO Lisa Hook raised as a selling point in today’s press release:

By combining .CO Internet’s innovative domain marketing capabilities with Neustar’s distribution network and technical resources, we will be able to broaden our registry services and the .co brand worldwide, while creating shareholder value.

Neustar expects the deal to close within a month.

Comment Tagged: .co, .co internet, acquisition, neustar

First ICANN gTLD auction slated for June 4

ICANN has published a preliminary schedule for its first new gTLD contention set auctions, which would see the first batch hit the block on June 4 this year.
The plan is now to sell off roughly 20 strings every month, with the last lot going under the hammer in March 2015, a full year from now.
Each contention set, of which there are 233, has been allocated to a batch, ordered by the applicants with the best position in the prioritization queue governing all aspects of the new gTLD program.
But each batch is filled with sets that have either already been resolved or which are currently “ineligible” for auction for one reason or another.
Ineligible contention sets are those that include an application that has, for example, an outstanding change request or a piece of unresolved Governmental Advisory Committee advice.
For example, the 12 applications for .app are scheduled for a July auction, but none of them are going anywhere until the GAC advice against the string goes away.
Naturally enough, ICANN says it’s a preliminary schedule that is subject to a lot of change.
Applicants in contention sets may nevertheless draw comfort from the fact that these auctions finally seem to have firm dates. The auctions were originally slated to start this month.

Comment Tagged: auctions, ICANN, new gTLDs

Community gTLD applicants flunk on “nexus”

The first four Community Priority Evaluation results are in, and all four applicants flunked by failing to prove a “nexus” between the new gTLD string and the community they purport to represent.
No applicant score more than 11 points of the 14 necessary to pass. A total of 16 points are available.
Winning a CPE automatically wins a contention set — all the other applicants for the same new gTLD must withdraw — so it’s a deliberately difficult test.
The scoring mechanism has been debated for years. Scoring 14 points unless the gTLD string exactly matches the name of your organization has always struck me as an almost impossible task.
The first four results appear to substantiate this view. Nobody scored more than 0 on the “nexus” requirement, for which 4 points are available.
The four CPE applicants were: Starting Dot (.immo), Taxi Pay (.taxi), Tennis Australia (.tennis) and the Canadian Real Estate Association (.mls). All four were told:

The string does not identify or match the name of the community, nor is it a well-known short-form or abbreviation of the community.

In some cases, the evaluation panel used evidence from the applicant’s own applicant to show that the string “over-reaches” the community the applicant purported to represent.

The application for .Taxi defines a core community of taxi companies and drivers, as well as peripheral industries and entities.
…
While the string identifies the name of the core community members (i.e. taxis), it does not match or identify the peripheral industries and entities that are included in the definition of the community

In other cases, the panel just used basic common sense. For example, Tennis Australia was told:

Tennis refers to the sport and the global community of people/groups associated with it, and therefore does not refer specifically to the Tennis Australia community.

Starting Dot (.immo) and Taxi Pay (.taxi) both also scored 0 on the “Community Establishment” criteria where, again, 4 points were available.
In that part of the CPE, the applicants have to show that their community is clearly delineated, organized, and long-standing.
In both cases, the panel found that the communities were too eclectic, too disorganized and too young — neither existed before the new gTLD program kicked off in September 2007.
It’s not looking promising for any of the 14 CPE applicants listed by ICANN here. I’ll give $50 to a charity of the applicant’s choosing if any of them scores more than 14 points.

5 Comments Tagged: .immo, .mls, .taxi, .tennis, community priority evaluation, cpe, ICANN, new gTLDs, starting dot, taxi pay, tennis australia

Donuts plays the genericide card in showdown with Belgian government over .spa

Donuts has asked ICANN to approved its .spa new gTLD application over the objections of the Belgian government, saying the town of Spa no longer has exclusive rights to the string.
As we reported at the weekend, Spa is asking Donuts and rival applicant Asia Spa and Wellness Promotion Council for an up to 25% cut of profits from .spa, as well as the right to help manage the TLD at the registry’s expense.
ASWPC has agreed to these terms, but Donuts has not. It says it offered Spa extra protections for sensitive names, but does not want to hand over any managerial control or profit.
Yesterday, Donuts wrote to ICANN (pdf) to say that “spa” is now so generic that no interest would be served by ICANN enforcing the city’s demands. Here’s the meat of it:

While the City of Spa maintains a historical link to the word “spa”, that word long ago evolved as a globally recognized generic term by people who have never even heard of the city of its origin. The public interest served by making that term available to a global community of spa users far outweighs any risk of confusion with the city of the same name. And for those names that may cause confusion, Donuts has provided a rigorous series of additional protections and controls.
The City of Spa gave the word “spa” to the world many centuries ago, and the world has done a great deal with it. Just as attorneys for the City of Spa don’t fly around the world handing cease-­and-desist notices to resort operators and hot-­tub manufacturers, we do not believe it is appropriate for them to overrun ICANN procedure to try to exert control over how that term is used in the Internet’s global addressing system.

I’m going to raise my hand to say that I’d never heard of Spa before this particular controversy arose, and I expect that goes for most of the people reading this article. Donuts surely has a point.
But that’s not to say Spa doesn’t have a point too. There are plenty of governments that managed to squeeze concessions out of applicants for gTLDs matching place names in their territories, with little complaint from applicants; it’s just that the line was drawn at capital cities, something which Spa is not.
Donuts urges ICANN to give no weight to the Spa-ASWPC deal and to move both applications forward to the next stage of the process — contention resolution.
We may see some progress at the ICANN meeting in Singapore next week, when ICANN will surely press the Governmental Advisory Committee for further advice on this string.

4 Comments Tagged: .spa, aswpc, belgium, donuts, gac, ICANN, icann 49, singapore

TLD Registry sells 20k+ IDN gTLD names to Chinese gov

TLD Registry has sold 20,452 new gTLD domain names to the Chinese government as it prepares to launch .中文网 (“.chinesewebsite”) and .在线 (“.online”) tomorrow.
The deal, signed this week with the Service Development Center of the State Council Office for Public Sector Reform (SCOPSR) is for 10,226 names in each gTLD.
The domains include the Chinese-script names of every city in China with a population of over 200,000, as well as counties, municipalities and other regional names.
Strings that translate to things like “invest in [place name]” and “tourism [place name]” have also been registered to the government in both TLDs, according to the company.
It looks like this is the first significant anchor tenant deal we’ve seen in the new gTLD program.
Assuming China actually uses these names, it could be great publicity for the new registry’s gTLDs. The government has a policy of transitioning all of its services to fully IDN.IDN domains.
If not, it still means that both gTLDs stand to launch with over 10,000 names in each zone file on day one, even before regular registrants have had a chance to buy them.
The company is also set to auction a bunch of premium names in both namespaces on Friday simultaneously via Sedo and a live event at a private members’ club in Macau.
I’m posting this from Hong Kong airport, en route to the Macau event. As a matter of disclosure: TLD Registry is paying for my flights and accommodation.

2 Comments Tagged: .中文网, .在线, idns, new gTLDs, tld registry

Weirdest new gTLD launch yet? .wed launches with a single registrar

The new gTLD .wed went into sunrise yesterday with the strangest pricing model yet and a stringent Registry-Registrar Agreement that seems to have scared off all but one registrar.
Atgron is positioning .wed as a space for marrying couples to celebrate their weddings, but only temporarily.
It seemingly has little interest in domain investors or ongoing customer relationships beyond one or two years.
If you register a second-level .wed domain, you can have it for $150 a year for the first two years, according to the Atgron web site. After that, the price rockets to $30,000 a year.
Registrars, resellers and wedding-oriented businesses are allowed to opt out of the third-year spike on their own .wed names if they join Atgron’s reseller program and sell at least 10 a year.
Unlike Vox Populi, which is actively marketing .sucks domains at $25,000 as a reasonable value proposition, Atgron jacks the price up as a deterrent to registrants holding on to names too long. It says:

.WED domain names are sold to couples for one or two years to celebrate their wedding. The domain names then become available to another couple… Mary and John can have MaryandJohn.WED and then YES the next Mary and John can have MaryandJohn.WED a year or two later and so on and so on.

That alone would be enough to put off most registrars, which value the recurring revenue from ongoing annual renewals, but I gather that the .wed RRA contains even more Draconian requirements.
Incredulous registrars tell me that Atgron wants them to create an entirely new web site to market .wed domains — they’re not allowed to sell the names via their existing storefronts.
The only registrar to bite so far is EnCirca, known historically for promoting obscure gTLDs such as .pro and .travel, which is selling .wed via a new standalone site at encirca.wed.
I also gather that Atgron won’t let registrars opt out of selling its third-level .wed domains, which are expected to go for about $50 a year with no third-year spike.
That didn’t work well for .name — registrars hated its three-level structure, forcing the registry to ultimately go two-level — and I don’t think it’s going to work for .wed either.
Registrars also tell me that Atgron wants to ban them from charging a fee for Whois privacy on .wed domains. They can offer privacy, but only if it’s free to the registrant.
With privacy a relatively high-margin value-add for registrars, it’s hardly surprising that they would balk at having this up-sell taken away from them.
As weird as this all sounds, it is of course an example of the kind of innovative business models that the new gTLD program was designed to create. Mission accomplished on that count.
Another thing the program was designed to create is competition, something Atgron will soon encounter when Minds + Machines arrives with .wedding and eats .wed’s lunch. In my view.
The .wed launch period is also quite unusual.
Atgron is running a landrush period concurrently with its 30-day sunrise period.
Even if you don’t own a trademark, you can apply for a .wed domain today. You’ll get a refund if your name is registered by a trademark owner during sunrise, and names won’t go live until April 20.
The registry has extended the 90-day Trademark Claims period to cover the sunrise period too, so it appears to be in compliance with ICANN rights protection rules on that count.
It’s a 30-day sunrise, so it’s first-come, first served if you’re a trademark owner.
As for sunrise pricing, the third-year spike appears to apply too.
Atgron documentation does say there’s going to be an option to purchase a 10-year trademark block for a one-time fee, but I couldn’t find any way to do this on the EnCirca.wed web site today.

11 Comments Tagged: .wed, atgron, encirca, landrush, sunrise

Registrars screwing up new gTLD launches?

Some of the largest domain name registrars are failing to support new gTLDs properly, leading to would-be registrants being told unregistered names are unavailable.
The .menu gTLD went into general availability yesterday, gathering some 1,649 registrations in its first half day.
It’s not a great start for the new gTLD by any stretch, but how much of it has to do with the channel?
I tested out searches for available names at some of the biggest registrars and got widely different results, apparently because they don’t all properly support tiered pricing.
Market leader Go Daddy even refuses to sell available names.
The .menu gTLD is being operated by a What Box? subsidiary, the inappropriately named Wedding TLD2.
The company has selected at least three pricing tiers as far as I can tell — $25 is the baseline registry fee, but many unreserved “premium” names are priced by the registry at $50 and $65 a year.
For my test, I used noodleshop.menu, which seems to carry the $65 fee. Whois records show it as unregistered and it’s not showing up in today’s .menu zone file. It’s available.
This pricing seems to be accurately reflected at registrars including Name.com and 101domain.
Name.com, for example, says that the name is available and offers to sell it to me for $81.25.

Likewise, 101domain reports its availability and a price of $97.49. There’s even a little medal icon next to the name to illustrate the fact that it’s at a premium price.

So far so good. However, other registrars fare less well.
Go Daddy and Register.com, which are both accredited .menu registrars, don’t seem to recognize the higher-tier names at all.
Go Daddy reports the name is unavailable.

And so does Register.com.

For every .menu name that carried a premium price at Name.com, Go Daddy was reporting it as unavailable.
With Go Daddy owning almost half of the new gTLD market, you can see why its failure to recognize a significant portion of a new gTLD’s available nice-looking names might impact day-one volumes.
The experience at 1&1, which has pumped millions into marketing new gTLD pre-registrations, was also weird.
At 1&1, I was offered noodleshop.menu at the sale price of $29.99 for the first year and $49.99 thereafter, which for some reason I was told was a $240 saving.

Both the sale price and the regular price appear to be below the wholesale cost. Either 1&1 is committed to take a $15 loss on each top-tier .menu name forever, or it’s pricing its names incorrectly.
A reader informed me this morning that when he tried to buy a .menu premium at 1&1 today he was presented with a message saying he would be contacted within 24 hours about the name.
He said his credit card was billed for the $29.99, but the name (Whois records seem to confirm) remains unregistered.
I’d test this out myself but frankly I don’t want to risk my money. When I tried to register the same name as the reader on 1&1 today I was told it was still available.
If I were a new gTLD registry I’d be very worried about this state of affairs. Without registrars, there’s no sales, but some registrars appear to be unprepared, at least in the case of .menu.

16 Comments Tagged: .menu, 1&1, 101domain, general availability, go daddy, ICANN, new gTLDs, premium names, register.com, what box

Full TMCH database published by registry?

DotBerlin seems to have published the full list of trademarks and other strings protected by the Trademark Clearinghouse.
The list, published openly on nic.berlin as the .berlin new gTLD went through its sunrise period, contains 49,989 .berlin domain names that the registry says are protected.
Neither the TMCH nor DotBerlin have yet responded to a request for comment, so I can’t be 100% certain it’s the TMCH list, but it certainly appears to be. You can judge for yourself here (pdf).
UPDATE: DotBerlin told DI that it is “not the full list but part of a registry-reserved names list” that was published “accidentally” and has now been removed from its web site.
The DotBerlin web site calls the list “MarkenSchutzEngel-Domains” which I believe translates to something like “Trademark Guardian Angel Domains”.
While the TMCH says it has 26,802 listed marks, the document published by DotBerlin seems to also include thousands of strings that are protected under the “Trademark +50” rule.
That allows companies that have won UDRP complaints to have those domains’ second-level strings added to their TMCH records. I see plenty of UDRP’d domains on this list.
The list also seems to include hundreds, possibly thousands, of variant strings that put hyphens between different words. For example, Santander appears to have registered:

a-bank-for-your-ideas
a-bank-for-yourideas
a-bank-foryour-ideas
a-bank-foryourideas
a-bankfor-your-ideas
a-bankfor-yourideas
a-bankforyour-ideas
a-bankforyourideas

I spotted dozens of examples of this, which is permitted under ICANN’s TMCH rules.
There are 2,462 internationalized domain names on the list.
I gather that the full TMCH list today is over 50,000 strings, a little larger than the DotBerlin document.
I took the liberty of comparing the list to a dictionary of 110,000 English words and found 1,941 matches. Strings such as “fish”, “vision”, “open”, “jump” and “mothers” are all protected.
A listing in the TMCH means you get the right to buy a domain matching your mark during new gTLD sunrise periods. Anyone else trying to register a matching name will also generate a Trademark Claims notice.
According to some registries I’ve spoken to today, the TMCH forbids the publication of the full database under the contract that all new gTLD registries must sign.
I’ve no idea whether the publication of a list of .berlin names means that DotBerlin broke its contract.
While the TMCH rules were being developed, trademark owners were adamant that the full database should not be published and should not be easily reverse engineered.
They were worried that to publish the list would reveal their trademark enforcement strategies, which may leave them open to abuse.
(Hat tip to Bart Mortelmans of bNamed.net for the link.)

14 Comments Tagged: dotberlin, new gTLDs, tmch, trademark clearinghouse

Verisign stock punished after US move from root control

Verisign’s share price is down around 8% in early trading today, after analysts speculated that the US government’s planned move away from control of the DNS root put .com at risk.
The analyst firm Cowan & Co cut its rating on VRSN and reportedly told investors:

With less US control and without knowledge of what entity or entities will ultimately have power, we believe there is increased risk that VRSN may not be able to renew its .com and .net contracts in their current form.

It’s complete nonsense, of course.
The US announced on Friday it’s intention to step away from the trilateral agreements that govern control of the root between itself, ICANN and Verisign. But that deal has no dollar value to anyone.
What’s not affected, as ICANN CEO Fadi Chehade laboriously explained during his press conference Friday, are the contracts under which Verisign operates .com and .net.
The .com contract, through which Verisign derives most of its revenue, is slightly different to regular gTLD contracts in that the US has the right to veto terms if they’re considered anti-competitive.
The current contract, which runs through 2018, was originally going to retain Verisign’s right to increase its prices in most years, but it was vetoed by the US, freezing Verisign’s registry fee.
So not only has the US not said it will step away from .com oversight, but if it did it would be excellent news for Verisign, which would only have to strong-arm ICANN into letting it raise prices again.
Renewal of the .com and .net contracts shouldn’t be an issue either. The main rationale for putting .com up for rebid was to improve competition, but the new gTLD program is supposed to be doing that.
If new gTLDs, as a whole, are considered successful, I can’t see Verisign ever losing .com.
Verisign issued a statement before the markets opened today, saying:

The announcement by NTIA on Friday, March 14, 2014, does not affect Verisign’s operation of the .com and .net registries. The announcement does not impact Verisign’s .com or .net domain name business nor impact its .com or .net revenue or those agreements, which have presumptive rights of renewal.

2 Comments Tagged: commerce, iana, ICANN, ntia, root zone, verisign

Panel doesn’t consider TLD in the first-ever new gTLD UDRP case

The first new gTLD domain name has been lost to a UDRP complaint.
The famous German bike maker Canyon Bicycles won canyon.bike from a registrant who said he’d bought the name — and others — in order to protect the company from cybersquatters.
The panelist in the case, WIPO’s Andrew Lothian, declined to consider the fact that the TLD was related to Canyon’s business in making his decision. Finding confusing similarity, he wrote:

The Panel finds that, given the advent of multiple new gTLD domain names, panels may determine that it is appropriate to include consideration of the top-level suffix of a domain name for the purpose of the assessment of identity or similarity in a given case, and indeed that there is nothing in the wording of the Policy that would preclude such an approach. However, the Panel considers that it is not necessary to do so in the present case.

Canyon had argued that the fact that it’s a .bike domain reinforced the similarity between the domain and the mark, but it’s longstanding WIPO policy that the TLD is irrelevant when determining confusing similarity.
The domain was registered under Whois privacy but, when it was lifted, Canyon looked the registrant up on social media and discovered he was very familiar with the world of bikes.
The registrant told WIPO that he’s registered Canyon’s mark “with the best of intentions”.
Apparently, he’s registered more than one famous brand in a new gTLD in the belief that the existence of the program was not wildly known, in order to transfer the domains to the mark holders.
He claimed “that many companies have been content with his actions” according to the decision.
But the fact that he’d asked for money from Canyon was — of course — enough for Lothan to find bad faith.
He also chose to use the fact that the registrant had made no attempt to remove the default Go Daddy parking page — which the registrar monetizes with PPC — as further evidence of bad faith.
The domain is to be transferred.

6 Comments Tagged: .bike, canyon.bike, cybersquatting, trademarks, udrp, wipo