Latest news of the domain name industry

Recent Posts

Allstate dumps a dot-brand

Kevin Murphy, August 9, 2018, Domain Registries

American insurance giant Allstate has dumped one of its two dot-brand gTLDs.
The company, which had $38.5 billion revenue in 2017, has told ICANN it no longer wishes to run .goodhands, which is a partial match to its long-time “Are you in good hands?” advertising slogan.
Allstate still owns the contract to run .allstate, where it has a handful of domains that redirect to its primary .com site.
The company had also applied for the gTLDs .carinsurance and .autoinsurance, but withdrew both applications after the “closed generics” controversy in 2013.
.goodhands is the ninth dot-brand to self-terminate this year and the 37th since .doosan became the first back in September 2015.
Hundreds of other dot-brand gTLDs are still live, many of them in active use.

Today’s new gTLD updates: two withdrawals and two “Not Approved”

Kevin Murphy, July 4, 2013, Domain Registries

DotConnectAfrica and GCCIX WLL have become the first new gTLD applicants to have their applications — for .africa and .gcc respectively — officially flagged as “Not Approved” by ICANN.
Both were killed by Governmental Advisory Committee advice.
While GCC had passed its Initial Evaluation already, DCA’s IE results report (pdf), which were published last night, simply states: “Overall Initial Evaluation Summary: Incomplete”.
In both cases the decision to flunk the applications was taken a month ago by ICANN’s New gTLD Program Committee.
DCA filed a formal Reconsideration Request (pdf), challenging the decision in typically incomprehensible style, on June 19, threatening to take ICANN to an Independent Review Panel (ICANN’s very expensive court of appeals) if it does not overturn its decision.
Here’s a sample:

We have no intention of withdrawing our application against the backdrop that we rightly believe that the Board decision is injudicious, very wrong and injurious to our application and to our organizational aspirations. We are placing faith in the possibility that this particular communication will serve the purpose of causing the ICANN Board to have a rethink, and see the wisdom in allowing DCA Trust to continue to participate in the new gTLD Program without the necessity of going to an Independent Review Process (IRP) Panel to challenge the ICANN Board Decision which we presently disagree with in the most absolute terms.

The Board Governance Committee, which handles Reconsideration Requests, has a sturdy track record of denying them, so I think the chances of DCA’s being approved are roughly zero.
But if the company is nutty enough to try its hand at an IRP, which could quite easily set it back a few million dollars in legal fees, the story might not be over yet.
The GAC didn’t like DCA’s .africa bid because African governments back UniForum, DCA’s South Africa-based competitor for the string.
Had the application made it to Initial Evaluation — its processing number wasn’t up for a few weeks — it would have been flunked by the Geographic Names Panel due to its lack of support anyway.
GCC’s application for .gcc was also rejected by the GAC on geographic grounds. It stands for Gulf Cooperation Council, and the Persian/Arabian Gulf nations in question didn’t support the bid.
Also today, the American insurance company Allstate withdrew its applications for .carinsurance and .autoinsurance. Both were single-registrant “closed generics”, which ICANN has indicated might not be approved, also due to GAC advice.

Allstate cybersquatter gets away with it for a decade

Kevin Murphy, April 1, 2010, Domain Policy

Allstate Insurance Company, a US insurer with over $30 billion in revenues, has just won a UDRP claim over AllstateInsurance.com, almost 10 years after the domain was first registered.
The company has been using the Allstate trademark for almost 80 years, and is currently the second-largest insurance company in America.
AllstateInsurance.com, the exact match of its company name as well as a combination of its trademark and its primary line of business, was registered in November 2000.
It is currently registered to a Korean individual named Seung Bum; he fought the UDRP claim unsuccessfully.
After a brief period being used by an apparently genuine insurance firm, the domain has been parked with PPC ads for other insurance companies for the best part of the last decade.
The volume of type-in traffic over than period must have been substantial, and one can only speculate how much revenue was accumulated.
All of which begs the question: why on earth did Allstate wait 10 years to file a UDRP claim?
It seems that cybersquatting, at least in this case, pays.