My comments on expired domains.

As I wrote last week, ICANN is seeking feedback on the domain expiration process. Here’s the feedback I just submitted. The deadline for submitting feedback is September 10…

I believe most registrars do an effective job informing customers of upcoming expirations. For example, Go Daddy sends multiple expiration notices by email and even postal mail. Most registrars continue to send these expiration notices after a domain expires. GoDaddy also alerts people who call its support number if they have any expiring domains. Most major registrars follow similar procedures.

I have a few general concerns/observations that this Working Group should consider.

1. The number one reason people neglect to renew their domains is because they have incorrect contact information. When I view historical whois information for an expired domain, I typically find that it involves bogus or outdated contact information. I believe most registrars, and even ICANN, are doing enough to encourage people to use valid contact information. Those that use invalid information are likely doing so on purpose and don’t need to be protected for the purpose of expired domains.

2. The practice of changing DNS servers upon expiration is a Catch-22. On one hand, changing an expired domain’s DNS servers to a registrar landing page alerts a customer that their domain has expired. However, it also prevents them from receiving expiration notices via email if their whois contact address is something@expireddomain.com (because the mail servers have been changed).

3. Resellers may have an incentive to let domains expire since they can get a cut. It is normal practice for domain registrars to auction off expired domains and I have no problem with this. Most of these registrars still make best efforts to inform customers of renewal dates. I do have some concern with resellers, especially since some registrars compensate them with a portion of auction revenue.

4. Expiration dates are confusing. One complaint I receive from people who email me at Domain Name Wire claiming their registrar screwed them (and I get many such emails) is that it appeared the expiration date was a year away. They see the registry expiration date, which is usually automatically extended a year, and think this is their actual expiration date (as opposed to the registrar expiration date). Asking the typical domain registrant to understand the difference between registry and registrar expiration dates is asking too much. This working group should consider ways that registries can display this data without confusing customers.

Your step-by-step guide to transferring a domain name to GoDaddy.

A couple weeks ago I had to transfer a domain name to GoDaddy as part of sale. The buyer was supposed transfer the domain to his account at GoDaddy from mine at Moniker, but he through up his hands in frustration.

Given that the buyer is an IT manager at a technology company, I decided to take another look at GoDaddy’s transfer-in process. No wonder he was frustrated — the user interface and entire process is much more complicated than it should be. I ended up transferring the domain to my account at GoDaddy and then pushing it to his.

I just sold another domain this week that I need to transfer to someone at GoDaddy. Rather than go through this again and again, I decided to help everyone out and create a short, simple tutorial “10 longer and trickier than necessary steps to transfer a domain name to GoDaddy”.

OK, so I didn’t really call it that. But you get the idea. Hopefully GoDaddy will wise up and hire a user interface expert. Until then, here’s the tutorial.

Take 10 minutes to read Frank Schilling’s latest interview.

Paul Sloan’s latest interview of Frank Schilling has been posted at Sloan’s new “Playing the Angles” web site. Although the interview was posted last Friday, Sloan (and sidekick David Carter) sent out a message announcing the site launch today.

As always, Schilling exudes humbleness while espousing prophecy. That’s what makes Schilling different from a lot of horn tooters in the domain industry. Here are some of my favorite parts:

ANGLES: So what should people do?

FRANK: The name of the game right now is to keep your cash close. So if you’ve got cash and a good opportunity comes along, you can go for it. Look for distressed situations. But for now, save. There will come a time to spend, based on the prices that I’m seeing…

ANGLES: Have you been selling more names than you used to?

FRANK: Yes, we have actually. People come to us and try to buy names that have very little revenue or traffic but are useful for them. Where in the past, maybe we didn’t sit down and look at those offers at all, now we’ll consider.

And I’ve definitely seen a marked increase in people coming to me and saying, ‘Will you buy these names?’ And whereas before they were thoroughly crap, now they are a little bit better. But they’re still not great names…

ANGLES: What does the parked page model look like five years from now? Does it exist?

FRANK: Absolutely. There will always be a buyer of that traffic. It works. It converts to sales. Advertisers are happy with it at the end of the day. But if we continue in a bi-polar Google-Yahoo world and payoffs diminish, you’ll see a disruptive force come along and take some of that revenue away.

Let’s say Google tomorrow said we’re cutting our payouts in half and Yahoo does the same, for whatever reason. Now, if you’ve got a portfolio that has a lot of value – say 100,000 visitors a day – and someone’s getting paid $1,000 or $2,000 in revenue. That’s too low…

I don’t want to post too much of the interview here. But it’s a must read and a great start to Playing the Angles. Read the rest here.

Case is too hot for arbitration.

Video equipment company HotCam, Ltd. has been found guilty of reverse domain name hijacking in an arbitration case over the domain name Hotcam.com.

HotCam, Ltd. filed the case with National Arbitration Forum, citing the company’s Great Britain trademark as grounds for transfer. The company filed for the trademark in 2000 and claimed to have been founded in London in 1998, but didn’t provide a specific date or any proof of its founding date. The respondent, RNIS Telecommunication Inc., registered the domain in April 1998.

Even after RNIS pointed out this deficiency in its response, HotCam Ltd. pushed on and tried to change the topic. In finding reverse domain name hijacking, the arbitrator wrote:

Complainant knew or should have known, based upon the facts known to it when it filed the Complaint in this proceeding, that it could not prove bad faith registration. Upon being called on this point in the Response, Complainant shifted to an alternative and obviously unsound argument for bad faith, one that it knew (or should have known) could not prevail. The Panel considers these circumstances sufficient to support a finding that the Complaint was brought in bad faith, in an attempt at reverse domain name hijacking.

HotCam, Ltd. was represented by Arthur R. Lehman, L.L.C.

NameMedia has stronger-than-usual sales week.

NameMedia continues to show its sales prowess, turning in over $800,000 in sales over the past week. This is especially impressive when you consider that the sales chart isn’t top heavy — the top sale was $15,000.

NameMedia sells domain names through BuyDomains and Afternic.

Here are the company’s stats for the past week:

.Com sales: $719,743
.Com domains sold: 435
Median .com sale price: $1,210

Non-.com sales: $86,174
Non-.com sales: 72
Median non-.com sale price: $1,000

Here are the top sales for the week:

.COM
thejob.com $15,000.00
plaisir.com $12,000.00
botes.com $10,000.00
apprentissage.com $9,200.00
securityprofessional.com $8,900.00
springline.com $8,500.00
norvege.com $8,000.00
musclesupplements.com $7,000.00
zapme.com $6,888.00
entretien.com $6,500.00
kaer.com $6,000.00
mouche.com $5,700.00
organicpotatoes.com $5,588.00
securedcheckout.com $5,400.00
doyougetit.com $5,250.00
openroom.com $5,000.00
architecturaldrafting.com $4,688.00
cityvoice.com $4,500.00
saint-nectaire.com $4,188.00
emailcampaigns.com $3,888.00
productshot.com $3,850.01
dutrade.com $3,850.00
eagleinc.com $3,650.00
cityofsantacruz.com $3,500.00
TENNISMATCH.com $3,500.00
autoboys.com $3,409.13
docteurs.com $3,400.00
organiclettuce.com $3,388.00
staffalert.com $3,388.00
crmsuite.com $3,300.00
theoccasion.com $3,300.00
cvpt.com $3,200.00
eyeofgod.com $3,188.00
driedapples.com $3,188.00
hotspottravel.com $3,188.00
humantragedy.com $3,188.00
onlinecheckout.com $3,188.00
goldsupport.com $3,188.00

Other
inflatableboat.net $3,388.00
stockprices.net $3,200.00
mobit.net $2,800.00
threatened.org $2,588.00
collectorscorner.net $2,081.00
bewerbungen.net $2,073.00
gravy.net $2,001.00
digipost.net $1,988.00
amerique.net $1,900.00
truste.net $1,888.00
mypop.org $1,888.00
smlaw.net $1,888.00
skincareproducts.de $1,800.00