Feature lets you create a “store”.

SnapNames rolled out a bunch of new features last week consisting mostly of search improvements. One of those improvements allows sellers who list domain names for sale on the site to directly link to their personal “store”.

Basically you add your domains to SnapNames and then include your so-called names source in a URL. You can then promote this link in your signature on message boards, in e-mails to friends, etc. For example, here’s a link to my store on SnapNames with about 100 domains I added at $99. I added them with the “buy it now” feature rather than an auction.

https://www.snapnames.com/store/seller.action?ns=9285

Unfortunately, it doesn’t seem that your “names source” code is easily available inside your SnapNames account, so you’ll need to e-mail support to get the code. [Update: send an e-mail to portfoliosales@snapnames.com with the subject line “Name Source.” Include your SnapNames user name in the body of the mail.]

Being able to promote your own list of domains is a nice enhancement, especially because the site is flooded with seller names. SnapNames made it easier to list domains for sale in January when it created an interface between Moniker and SnapNames. Although it was a good improvement over the old, manual way of adding domains, it resulted in a flood of domains on the system, making it harder to attract attention for your names.

Online domain marketplace gets major enhancements.

A new look and new promotion levels have arrived on domain name aftermarket Afternic.

Over the weekend Afternic changed the site design and added many features. One of the biggest changes is a new promotion level called “Premium”. It includes all of the features of “Expanded Promotion”, plus Premium level domains are included in the search results of major domain resellers. Premium level promotion also shows your domain names on Network Solutions. Afternic claims it receives over 35 million searches each month through its domain resellers.

Interestingly, Premium promotion costs the same as Expanded: 20% of the sales price with a minimum of $120.

You’ll notice a number of other features, such as improvements to the seller dashboard. For example, there’s a pie chart of which TLDs your domains are.

It appears there are a few bugs to work out. Of my 1,000 plus domains listed on Afternic, the only ones currently showing up in my account and on search results are the ones I’ve added in the past couple weeks. But I’m sure this is just a database migration issue that should be fixed soon. [Update: Apparently the domains were removed from my account due to a miscommunication, not because of a database problem. It had to do with Afternic's recent verification exercise.]

If you don’t list your domains on Afternic already, this upgrade should be enough to push you over the edge. Afternic and its parent company NameMedia do better than any other aftermarket in promoting domains to end users.

Company gets out of one deal, assigns other deal to joint venture.

Live Current Media (OTC.bb) is slowly working to distance itself from its long term cricket agreements, potentially reducing its liabilities.

In its latest 10-Q, the company reported that it has terminated its agreement with Board of Control for Cricket in India (“BCCI”), which called for the company to pay $3M per year for 10 years. The company still has a memorandum of understanding with DLF Indian Premier League (“IPL”), which was for $2M a year. However, it has assigned that IPL memorandum to Global Cricket Venture, of which a Live Current subsidiary owns 50.05%. It appears that Live Current may still be liable for some of the money owed to IPL, but there may be some technicalities that let it off the hook:

In conjunction with our execution of the Memoranda, we signed an agreement (the “Venture Agreement”) with Netlinkblue, the owner of the live streaming and mobile rights to the BCCI and IPL cricket matches. Under the Venture Agreement, we and Netlinkblue agreed to create a new company into which we would transfer our rights under the Memoranda and Netlinkblue would transfer the rights it acquired to live stream the matches. As contemplated by the Venture Agreement, a company was incorporated in Singapore on June 10, 2008 and named Global Cricket Venture Pte. Ltd. (“Global Cricket Venture”). Our wholly-owned subsidiary, LCM Cricket Ventures, currently owns 50.05% of the shares of Global Cricket Venture. Pursuant to the Venture Agreement, once we and Netlinkblue each transfer the rights we received from the BCCI and the IPL into Global Cricket Venture, certain rights and obligations will arise, including the obligation that each of us provides funding to Global Cricket Venture…To our knowledge, Netlinkblue has not transferred the rights it received from the BCCI and the IPL to Global Cricket Venture, therefore, as of March 31, 2009, we do not believe that we have an obligation to provide funding to Global Cricket Venture…

So if Live Current gets out of these deals and stops earning revenue from them, what’s left? Not much, but perhaps it could eventually return to profitability.

The 10-Q also confirms Domain Name Wire’s earlier story that it sold Vietnam.com for $400,000. The 10-k doesn’t directly say this, but says a domain was sold after Q1 ended for $400,000, and it was a geo domain name.

Parava alleged to have kept renewal fees instead of paying them to VeriSign.

What’s a warning sign that your domain name registrar is about to leave you in a lurch? You pay it to renew your domain many years in advance, but it only renews it for one year at a time. Apparently a lot of Parava customers have experienced that.

This week Tucows (Hover.com) took over the domain names that were at Parava, which was de-accredited by ICANN. It didn’t take long for people to notice that their domains had different expiration dates than they expected. On Hover.com’s web site, the company wrote:

We have received reports that Parava was accepting money for renewals and not forwarding those fees to the registry or renewing the domain. It is alleged that they would then update their whois to make it appear that the domain name had been in fact renewed.

When your domain name was transferred to Tucows and your account was created with Hover, we synchronized your expiration date in Hover with the data on file with the registry. It is possible that your name may be set to expire before you think it will because of an unpaid renewal. To prevent this, please sign in to your Hover account and provide us with updated billing information so that we can renew your name automatically for you prior to its expiration.

It turns out that over a year ago Jamie Zoch of DotWeekly reported this problem on a post at DNForum.

If you charged multiple years of registration on a credit card, you may be able to get that reversed by the credit card company. If you want to complain to Parava, good luck getting in touch with them. But here’s a bit of information to get you started:

Franchise Tax certificate at Texas Comptroller stating Parava owner name and address

And here’s the address on ICANN’s termination letter to Parava:

Mr. Patricio Valdes
Parava Networks, Inc. dba 10-Domains.com
1800 Bering Dr., Suite 420
Houston, TX 77057
United States

If you Google either of these addresses you might be able to track down Mr. Valdes — or someone who knows him.

Former employee alleges company ignored complaints about harassment.

A former GoDaddy employee has sued the company in U.S. District Court, alleging it discriminated against her after she complained of sexual harassment.

In the lawsuit, Rachel Pearson alleges that a co-worker engaged in “many offensive, hostile, and threatening acts” such as staring at her and touching her inappropriately. She claims that GoDaddy did not respond properly to her allegations, failed to promote her despite being a top salesperson, and later initiated the process to terminating her. She is suing for back pay, compensation for past and future pecuniary losses, and emotional pain and suffering.

The Go Daddy Group General Counsel & Corporate Secretary Christine Jones denied the allegations in a statement provided to Domain Name Wire:

There is no truth to Ms. Pearson’s allegations.

She was not subjected to sexual harassment or retaliation during her employment at Go Daddy.

Go Daddy takes all complaints of employee misconduct seriously. We thoroughly investigated Ms. Pearson’s allegations and could not substantiate them. Ms. Pearson has also already pursued these allegations through the EEOC, who also investigated her claims, and did not find any unlawful harassment or retaliation.

Go Daddy intends to vigorously defend this Complaint.