Show makes fun of domains that sound different than they really are.

We’ve all seen domain names that have double meanings. Some people call them Slurls, and there are enough to fill a book. Think TherapistFinder.com and FredsHatBlocks.com.

I was catching up on 30 Rock tonight and was amused that the sitcom made fun of this.

The March 17 episode is a spoof of a reality show for Tracy Jordan’s wife. Jenna Maroney takes advantage of the cameras to try to promote her new web site Jennas-Side.com. Liz Lemon attempts to point out to her how the name sounds when said aloud. (This might qualify more for a radio test faux pas than a slurl.)

The show owns the jennas-side.com and jennaside.com (one s) domain names, which forward to a page on NBC.com. Someone else snapped up jenna-side.com after the show aired. Interestingly jennasside.com (two s’s) was registered last year. It is now expired.

Auto insurance web site and domain name sells for $440,000.

360 Quote LLC has purchased AutoInsurance.org (the domain name and web site) for $440,000.

360 Quote LLC is run by Joel Ohman, who also runs the DomainSuperstar site. The company has a number of lead generation web sites.

The deal was brokered by Media Options‘ Andrew Rosener.

AutoInsurance.org has an interesting traffic history according to Compete.com. Unique visitors in recent months have been below 10,000, but for many months before that the site received 10,000s of uniques each month. In one month Compete shows 250,000 uniques, but that’s clearly an anomaly.

The site is fairly bare bones right now, so I’ll be really curious to see where it goes and where the value is.

[Update: I just got off the phone with Joel, and he said he primarily valued the purchase on the domain. His company has a lot of experience with insurance web sites, and he's confident he can build traffic to the site and make a good return.]

The domain’s whois currently shows Domain Capital, indicating this purchase was financed.

Company that made a big .com domain purchase in 2010 launches a new product on .co in 2011.

Top10.com Media Ltd is no stranger to domain names. Last year the company forked over $1 million in cash and equity for the domain name Top10.com, which it uses for his communications service comparison engine.

When the company decided to launch a list creation and sharing site it chose the domain name Top10.co. I reached out to co-founder Tom Leathes to find out more about the company’s decision to use .co.

You’re known for your top10.com comparison site. Why branch out?

Top10.com is the UK’s leading comparison site for the communications industry. Top10.co is a really different business – it’s a global product to help people express their interests and find recommendations on any subject under the sun.

As the product evolved during the building phase, it became very clear that they’re different propositions, so we really needed to have them on different domains, allowing each to continue to breathe and grow.

When did you first think to use a .co domain for this?

We read about the .co opportunity early last year and made a note to take part in the land-rush to acquire Top10.co As soon as we decided to launch the new site on a different domain, using the .co was a unanimous choice.

Why not .me or something else?

Despite formerly being tied to Colombia, .co has never had a real legacy of usage and it’s also not suggestive of any particular service, product or sector (unlike say .tv, .mobi and .me). Most importantly, it’s not a regional domain and has no geographic ties to specific users around the world – which is very important for a worldwide product such as this. From an SEO perspective it also has all the global benefits of .com.

It’s also short – which we like – and it feels more suited to a brand than .me for example, which feels more like a personal site rather than a community product.

We also think the .co registry have done a great job in promoting the use of .co’s for innovative startups. It’s early days, but we think the work they’re doing will add a lot of value to the .co brand. Top10 is a new kind of product, and this is a new kind of domain that’s being marketed very well.

Does it create any confusion between your .co and .com?

We don’t think so. Top10 is a fairly generic term to have as a brand, so it’s not like having Nike.com and Nike.co for example. The products are also totally different, and we’re not inter-linking them in any way, so we’ve not had any confusion from users of either one.

The company launched Top10.co at the Launch conference last month in San Francisco. You can see its presentation here.

The incredible game of duping the USPTO to get single letter .com trademarks.

Did you know Amazon.com has a registered trademark for A.com?

It’s true. A company filed for a trademark on A.com back in 2005, and submitted evidence of its use in commerce by showing a screenshot of a-dotcom.com. The company later assigned the trademark to Amazon.com.

This got me thinking — how many other companies have registered for single letter .com with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office? I started compiling a list, then realized John Berryhill already did so in an excellent analysis a few years ago. (I had read his analysis a while back but forgot about it. Otherwise I wouldn’t have spent my time on it.) But I was most of the way through the list when I remembered this, so I completed it since John’s list is several years old.

John discovered that many of these applications were filed shortly after news got out that ICANN might distribute single letter .com domains, which were previously restricted. (Three .com’s were assigned before this restriction: q.com, x.com, and z.com.)

What I confirmed is an incredible game of trying to dupe the USPTO in an effort to get priority if single letter .com’s are ever allocated. In addition to small players, companies ranging from Major League Baseball to Overstock.com are all in the game. Here’s a summary of each letter of the alphabet.

a.com (registered) assigned to Amazon.com.

b.com (registered) NSDB Pty Ltd Austrailia filed an intent to use and then said it was using it in commerce as of 2010. They own Bangk.com, although nothing has ever been done with it. Proof of use of b.com? A password protected page on Bangk.com that shows “b.com”

c.com (denied) Several applications (including one by 4g service provider Clear) but all are dead.

d.com (registered) Joseph Carlucci, an individual, for online retail store. Specimen of use in commerce is an Amazon affiliate store…that obviously doesn’t exist (at least not at D.com).

e.com (canceled) registered in 1998 but canceled. Another applicant, The Everybody Network, filed in 2010 and the mark was published for opposition in January 2011.

f.com (registered) Proof it was used in commerce? A screenshot of fdotcom.com.

g.com (registered) Registered to G-dotcom LLC in 2006 for one field of use and GQXZP2, LLC in 2009 for another field of use. GQXZP2, LLC’s proof of use in commerce is a graphic on Overstock.com, that reads “G.com – Great Products and Great Prices”

h.com (applied – intent to use) applicant Major League Baseball’s MLB Advanced Media, L.P. I have no idea what their interest is in the domain.

i.com – (registered) registered by GQXZP2, LLC, the same company that has a g.com trademark. Shows another specimen from Overstock.com that reads “I.com For Everything You Need”.

j.com – (registered) Lost Reality Studios, Inc. Specimen is a page from “Online Times” that says J.com on it.

k.com (registered) Gregory Freeman (not the same guy at Domain Capital). Originally an intent to use application, he then submitted multiple specimens of use for each class of goods or services. These range from an online storefront that doesn’t mention k.com to a screenshot of discount-tickets.mobi and used-car-loans-online parked pages that don’t mention k.com. Then there’s a screenshot of “insurance-dept.com” that just shows “k.com” on the browser window.

l.com (registered) The Original Cast Lighting, Inc. and Lost Reality Studios, Inc, the same company that has j.com. Lost Reality Studios showed another print out from “Online Times” with L.com on it.

m.com (registered) by M-dotcom LLC – use in commerce was web page m-dotcom.com (seems to be same group behind one of the g.com registrations)

n.com – 6 dead registration filings

o.com – (registered) four registered by Overstock.com

p.com (registered) by P.COM, INC and assigned to THIRTY ONE SARL SOCIETE A RESPONSABILITE LIMITEE (SARL). Proof of use was a printout from p-com.us

q.com 5 dead applications

r.com (registered) Jeffrey Alan Ripley. His specimen was a printed brochure that said “r.com” on it and a business card with “r.com”. A second trademark was originally filed by another group that showed trademark-register.com/r/ with “Welcome to R.com. We look forward to assisting you with your trademark needs.” as proof of use. This second one was later assigned to Ripley.

s.com (registered) registered by S.com, Inc. and transferred to a UK company.

t.com (6 registered) registered to Deutsche Telekom, owner of T-Mobile (for a little while more)

u.com (registered) registered to U. Inc., who submitted a page from colleges.com that said “Welcome to U.com, The Online home of U. Magazine.”

v.com 4 dead applications

w.com (registered) W-dotcom LLC specimen was page from wdot-com.com

x.com (abandoned) PayPal, which actually owns the domain

y.com (pending) Yahoo, published for opposition in December 2010

z.com 3 dead applications

Court-appointed receiver finally set to auction off domain names.

The long saga of John Zuccarini’s domain names might be winding to a close.

On April 8, 2011, court-appointed receiver Michael Blacksburg will auction off dozens of domain names to satisfy a cybersquatting judgment against Zuccarini. Zuccarini also owes the IRS significant taxes.

Most of the domain names are typos and might be problematic to buyers. For example, 50cen.com and 50sent.com could be a problem with rapper 50 Cent depending on how they’re used. Some of the typos are generic but it could still be a challenge to hold on to them as a “new registrant” in a UDRP or court action (e.g. astology.com.)

You can see a complete list of the domain names here (pdf).

At one point last year Rick Latona planned to auction the domains off at a TRAFFIC conference, but that plan was canceled.