Patents.com and Patents.net have a high bid of $350,000.

The domains patents.com and patents.net belonged to the law firm of Oppedahl & Larson LLP. But the firm has disolved and the domains are being auctioned together. The auction is not being handled by a domain broker but offers can be submitted through the patents.com web site. The current high offer is $350,000.

Patents.com receives considerable type-in traffic. It’s Overture+Ext score is 131 and the term “patent” receives nearly 50,000 searches per month through the Yahoo network. Companies often pay $5-$10 per click for this term as patent filing and litigation is a very lucrative business. Furthermore, Patents.com has a #4 ranking on Google when someone searches for “patents”. It trails only the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, Google patent search, and Wikipedia.

Given the growing business of intellectual property and the deep pockets of many players in this industry, I expect this domain to sell for 7 figures. The only thing holding this auction back is that it isn’t being handled by a neutral third party such as Sedo or Afternic.

Domain industry professionals attending both SedoPro forum and TRAFFIC will save $200 on NYC hotel.

The second annual SedoPro Partner Forum will be held at the Mohonk Mountain Resort in New Paltz, New York directly before the TRAFFIC New York City conference. The event kicks off June 17 and concludes June 19. Sedo is picking up most of the cost for the event, but attendees are required to pay $149 per night for accomodations. If you register by April 23 you will pay only $99 per night.

If you attend both the SedoPro event and the TRAFFIC conference in New York, you will receive a $200 credit toward your first night’s stay at the New York Grand Hyatt. The Hyatt is the official hotel for the TRAFFIC conference. TRAFFIC attendees receive a discounted rate of $350 per night, so this offer from Sedo reduces the cost to $150 for the first night.

Don’t bother looking for cheaper hotels in the area. I looked and didn’t find any decent hotels within walking distances for less than $300.

The SedoPro Partner Forum kicks off with a reception on Sunday, June 17. Monday morning begins with a relaxing resort activity including golf, hiking, spa, or tennis. Then the event gets down to business with presentations and networking events. Monday concludes with the SedoPro Gala. Tuesday is filled with more education sessions and forums. Sedo is providing transportation between Manhattan and the resort.

The schedule for TRAFFIC is not yet finalized.

Domain Name Wire interviews Graham MacRobie, CEO of CitizenHawk.

In the late 90s Graham MacRobie had internet fever and his own dot.com startup. He received an email one day from a company that believed it had rights to the domain name MacRobie was using for his startup. Later, that same person emailed to say they had gone ahead and registered a similar domain name, but with a hyphen.

Nothing ever came of that incident, but it has bothered MacRobie ever since. “How could they use our trademark?” he asked.

Fast forward to 2007. Domain names are hotter than ever as companies snap up type-in domains for PPC and affiliate program revenue. People are registering thousands of typo domains of major brands and earning a mint. MacRobie’s new startup, CitizenHawk, aims to help companies get control of typosquatting on their brands.

CitizenHawk’s TypoSquasher tool crawls the web in search of typos of a company’s brand name. Whenever it finds an infringing domain name TypoSquaher captures evidence including screenshots, whois information, and how the domain is being monetized. It then automates legal processes to get control of the domain, including sending cease & desist letters and contacting the company that helps monetize the domain (such as a domain parking company). Clients include 1-800-PetMeds (NASDAQ: PETS) and Overstock (NASDAQ: OSTK).

MacRobie gave me a test drive of CitizenHawks’ TypoSquasher last week and it was impressive. He showed examples of typo domains for Disney (NYSE: DIS) that have since been resolved. After logging into the hosted system, you see a number of typo domains. Next to each typo is the whois information for the owner, a screenshot of the domain, IP address, and workflow tools.

MacRobie showed me a few examples of how this comes in handy for trademark holders. For example, he displayed two Disney.com typos: one with public whois information and one with private whois information. Normally a trademark holder has to file a UDRP for each domain in this situation. But by matching IP addresses and the affiliate ID used on both of the domains, TypoSquasher determines that both domains are owned by the same person. This allows the trademark holder to file one UDRP for both domains. It also allows the trademark holder to contact the affiliate program that is helping to monetize the domains (e.g. LinkShare) to stop the flow of money to the typosquatter.

Most domain name industry participants aren’t typosquatters and shouldn’t have a problem with CitizenHawk. But what if TypoSquaher starts to identify “false positives“, or domains it flags as trademarks that really aren’t? MacRobie says not to worry. “Our stance is that we have a very specific set of criteria…as to what constitutes a domain that ought to be looked at further,” says MacRobie. MacRobie says some of those criteria are: The name in question has to be a registered trademark in the U.S., it must be five characters or longer, the typo must be a single character away from the trademark or the name itself embedded in a longer string, and the site in question has to be doing something that is related to the trademark holder.

MacRobie continues, “It’s in our best interests for this process to be as automated and simple as possible. If we get into a gray area where domains in question are debatable, it’s not in our interests to [persue].”

TypoSquasher found a typo of DomainNameWire.com. DomainNameWireD.com is an automated domain name news site that uses “DomainNameWire” for its title and header. The registrant is hiding behind GoDaddy’s whois privacy service.

CitizenHawk is backed by Maveron, which is also a major backer of domain name holding company iREIT. iREIT was recently sued by Verizon (NYSE: VZ) for typosquatting. MacRobie suggests that iREIT is not a major typosquatter and that Verizon’s lawsuit was unfortunate. “My opinion is iREIT is not one of the bad guys,” says MacRobie. He says the percentage of domains they find that belong to iREIT are very low. However, MacRobie thinks companies such as iREIT are potential customers for TypoSquasher. TypoSquasher can help companies find typos in their portfolios before a company takes legal action. MacRobie points out that there are 1.8M registered and pending trademarks in the U.S., and it’s difficult for large domain portfolio holders to scan for all of them.

If only TypoSquasher was available when Marchex (NASDAQ: MCHX) bought the Ultimate Search domain portfolio. It could have avoided up to $24M in liabilities from the trademark domains included in that portfolio.

CitizenHawk’s solution addresses a major problem that is getting more press lately. The company is also taking a level headed approach to the problem. MacRobie points out that some lawyers are pushing companies to file $100,000 lawsuits for each infringing domain. TypoSquasher addresses the problem in a less expensive manner.

Above: TypoSquasher finds a Disney typo

The “unreported” domain name market dwarfs reported sales.

Each week Ron Jackson publishes the week’s highest reported domain name sales for the week at DNJournal.com. Jackson provides an invaluable service to the domain name community. But DNJournal’s reported sales are just the tip of the iceberg. Jackson is aware of a number of other domain sales but isn’t allowed to disclose them. Beyond even what he knows about, more domain sales occur that never get announced to the public. Many of these are purchased by large corporations or trade hands between people that would rather not announce it to the world.

I recently advised a good friend who was approached by a large company about her domain name. She registered the domain to use for her P.R. business about a year ago. This company wanted the domain, and she ultimately decided to sell it. Of course, selling the domain she used for her business involved some hassles, but she was able to settle on a nice 5-figure price. As a thank-you for my advice, she treated my wife and I to dinner at Jeffrey’s, an upscale Austin restaurant that George W. Bush frequented while he was governor. As we enjoyed our beef tenderloin and bottle of nice wine, I reflected on a couple things:

1. Many domains are selling each week that the general public doesn’t know about. In fact, I believe the number of unreported sales is greater than the reported sales.

2. My friend ‘accidentally’ stumbled upon a domain sale that’s bigger than many ‘full-time domainers’ have ever achieved.

Just a couple weeks ago I completed a five figure sale that no one will hear about. A few months ago another friend took me out for steak for helping him sell a domain for $6,000. Again, no one will ever read about that sale.

The message? The domain resale market is bigger than you think.

Friday is the deadline for submitting your responses to Domain Name Wire’s 2007 survey.

Domain Name Wire’s 2007 domain name survey is coming to a close. All submissions must be received by Friday, April 20. You may complete the survey here.

50 randomly selected respondents will receive a coupon for a free domain name at Dotster.

This year’s survey asks the domain name industry to rate service providers (including registrars, drop services, sales venues, etc) and to discuss the issues most important to the industry in the next year. If you have an opinion about who the best registrar is, how ICANN is performing, and what the biggest opportunities are, please complete the survey.

Survey results will be tabulated and made available at DomainNameWire.com.