.CO landrush auctions raise over $50k so far

The ongoing .co landrush auctions have fetched well over $50,000 in sales so far, according to stats released by the registry, .CO Internet, today.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, the biggest price tag among the 24 closed auctions is attached to a typo – 163.co went for $5,778. The .com equivalent is a Chinese portal with hundreds of millions of visitors.
The registry has not released any figures for adult-oriented domains, or any domains that look like they might have UDRP issues (why are these being sold?), so the list is far from complete.

163.co – $5,778
cityjobs.co – $4,600
dedicated.co – $3,600
airporttransfers.co – $3,200
christchurch.co – $3,100
boaterexam.co – $2,550
economist.co – $2,550
center.co – $2,150
globo.co – $2,050
exchangerates.co – $2,050
bonus.co – $2,000
customer.co – $1,550
abel.co – $1,470
communicate.co – $1,350
addiction.co – $1,300
elevator.co – $1,251
acid.co – $1,250
herbal.co – $1,201
duo.co – $1,161
cycles.co – $1,150
desi.co – $1,060
developers.co – $1,001
baker.co – $1,000
ace.co – $1,000

I’m told that the many of the “hotter” auctions are still open. Rules state that any new bid extends the auction by 24 hours. This could go on for a while yet.

Want thousands of free .jobs domains? Now’s your chance

Employ Media wants to hear from companies interested in registering .jobs domain names in bulk, at the start of its recently approved landrush process.
The company has set up a web site to handle expressions of interest of “high level business concepts on how these domain names could be developed either individually or in bulk”.
Before now, .jobs domains have been limited to the name of the company registering them. IBM, for example, uses ibm.jobs to bounce to its HR pages.
Employ Media applied to ICANN to liberalize the namespace, allowing the registration of the names of professions and places, and was successful over the objections of many existing jobs boards.
From the press release:

“We believe accepting EOI’s will facilitate dialog with potential RFP applicants. We’re particularly interested in hearing ideas comprising a bulk number of domains,” states Tom Embrescia, Chairman of Employ Media. “Up to now, we’ve only allowed company names such as www.Applebees.jobs and www.UnionPacific.jobs. Now we are looking for ideas for how companies can easily and uniformly distribute their jobs and related information to user-intuitive sites such as www.Chicago.jobs, www.sales.jobs, and www.restaurant.jobs.”

Right now, the company is only looking for 150-word outlines of business ideas. The RFP period will begin shortly after the EOI period closes on August 24 (less than two weeks from now).
Employ Media already has plans in place with the DirectEmployers Association to launch universe.jobs, a free jobs portal using thousands of premium .jobs domains as entry points.
It remains to be seen how concrete these plans are, although the two outfits have already run a “beta test” of the scheme, so I’m guessing they’re quite firm.
If you fancy your chances, the RFP site is RFP.jobs.
There are at least two filthy domain hacks I intend to apply for. All I need to do is think of a way I can pretend they benefit the global HR community, which is an unfortunate prerequisite.

Domainers get love, but no refunds for .co cybersquatters

.CO Internet has ramped up its anti-cybersquatter messaging, promising no refunds for trademark-infringing .co registrants, no matter how much they paid for their domains.
An “Open Letter to .co Domain Registrants”, published by the company yesterday, also contains a shout-out to domainers, which I think may be a first from a domain registry.
The letter points out, as I have previously, that .co is subject to the UDRP on the same terms as other TLDs including .com.

The outcome of a UDRP proceeding is binding, and no refunds will be given under any circumstances — regardless of how much money you may have paid to secure the domain; whether the domain was acquired directly via a domain registrar or through a domain auction venue; and whether you were unaware that you had infringed on someone else’s rights.

There’s similar text on the front page of COauctions.com, where the registry is currently auctioning off contested landrush applications.
Is this just a matter of legal ass-covering? Or are there some gray-area domains in the landrush auction?
Despite all the promotional work the registry performed in the run-up to general availability, there are still plenty of people who seemed to believe .co represented new, lawless territory.
The letter ends with the statement that “.CO Internet is committed to protecting the rights of brand owners, domain investors, and end users.”
Domainers getting some love in the same breath as brand owners is not something you hear every day, particularly from registries.

.CO landrush auctions kick off today

.CO Internet has today started auctioning off domain names that had multiple applicants during the .co landrush earlier this summer.
According to the company, over 2,500 names will be auctioned over the next four weeks. The top three most-contested names were Slots.co, Insure.co and Denver.co.

Other notable .CO domain names up for auction include Mexi.co, America.co, Betting.co, Vitamins.co, UsedCars.co, Happy.co, Ebook.co and Jackpot.co.

Registrants who applied for one of the contested domains need to sign up at www.COauctions.co.
There have been almost 410,000 .co registrations since the Colombian country-code domain was opened up to international registrants last month.
So far, the biggest seller has been o.co, sold to Overstock for $350,000.
Given that slots.com sold for $5.5 million, it seems likely that slots.co could fetch something in five figures or beyond.

The .CO launch, by the numbers

The .co top-level domain is now live and open for general registrations, following a well-planned and self-evidently successful launch period.
The TLD is the country-code for Colombia, but it’s being sold as a generic alternative to .com by .CO Internet.
Here’s the story of the launch, explained with numbers:

27,000 – approximate number of active .com.co registrations made before the start of 2010, under the previous, much more restrictive regime (source).
5,000 – roughly how many of these .com.co registrants chose to participate in sunrise grandfathering, which would allow them to grab the equivalent .co domain before anybody else (source).
100 – number of brands on .CO Internet’s Specially Protected Marks List. These 100 companies, selected by Deloitte, had their brands placed on a registry-reserved list during the launch period.
83 – brands on the SPML who had chosen to register their .co names by the time the sunrise closed (source). Companies on the SPML who continue to decline their domain will see their brand released back into the pool.
10 – registrars initially approved to take .co registrations. Many more companies are selling the domains, but they’re all acting as resellers for these 10. More registrars will be approved in future.
225 to 335 – price in US dollars of a sunrise registration for trademark holders (source).
11,000 – approximate number of sunrise registrations
1,500 – approximate number of rejected sunrise applications (source)
27,905 – applications made during the landrush (source)
451 – landrush applicants applying for 10 or more domains
2,523 – domains receiving more than one landrush application. These domains will now be offered at auction. (source)
133 – number of countries where landrush applicants resided
350– Fortune 500 companies that have registered their trademarks under .co as of today
81,000 – the price in US dollars of the first .co domain to be auctioned, the single-letter e.co. The domain sold on Sedo to Bookmarks.com on June 10 (source)
350,000 – price in US dollars of the biggest seller to date, the single-letter o.co. The domain was sold to Overstock.com, directly by the registry, earlier this week. (source)
91,613 – registrations in the first 12 minutes of general availability, which started at 6pm UTC yesterday. (source)
216,159 – currently active registrations as of 10am UTC today, 16 hours into general availability (source)
? – number of .co domains still active July 22, 2011.

Have I missed anything? Let me know in the comments and I’ll add your data to the list.

.CO landrushers will be able to apply for trademark rejects

The landrush for .co domains will be extended by three days, to give people a chance to apply for strings that were rejected during the sunrise period, according to a registrar.
Key-Systems posted the news to its Facebook page earlier, but the .CO web site has yet to be updated with the same info.
The registrar said that the landrush, in which registrants apply for premium, non-trademarked strings, will now end on Friday, July 16 at 1600 UTC.
It also raised the prospect of a mini-spike in landrush applications in the last few days of the period.
Key-Systems said that domains covered by invalid sunrise applications – claimed trademarks which were rejected for one reason or another – will come up for grabs on July 12.
The list of such names, which could disclose the kind of bogus trademark claims made by those trying to game the system, will make very interesting reading. It’s due to be published July 10.