Looks like the payment went through for Social.com.

Social.com, which Ron Jackson says is under contract to sell at $2.6 million, has an updated whois.

As of today, the whois record at Network Solutions says the owner is New Yorker Kevin Bingo. However, the whois record is not complete with an address nor does it have a valid phone number.

Furthermore, it appears this is the buyer’s broker for the domain name, not the buyer.

Kevin Bingo’s twitter account looks like it links to DomainsCable, a domain name broker. [Update: I received a message from Kevin Bingo saying he used to be with DomainsCable but is now independent.]

In a June 6 tweet, Kevin Bingo tweeted a message to Social.com owner Scott Carter:

@scott_carter Can you DM me your email? My client is interested in Social.com but these organizations wouldn’t participate in an auction

This transfer indicates that the payment has been made for the domain name.

Cahn adds allegations and drops one claim.

Moniker founder Monte Cahn has filed an amended lawsuit against Oversee.net, which purchased Moniker in 2007 from Seevast.

Cahn sued Oversee claiming that he was not properly paid under a $13 million incentive plan. Oversee has asked for most of the case to be dismissed on the grounds that it’s a simple contract dispute.

[Update: Moniker has released the following statement to DNW: "This is a legal matter that is now in the hands of the courts. Oversee has asked the court to dismiss most of the lawsuit’s claims as the suit is nothing more than an alleged breach of contract case."]

The updated complaint (pdf) has some noticeable omissions from the original, including deleting the claim that Oversee agreed to buy Moniker for $35 million as well as Cahn’s pay information.

It also omits the statement “Through his work with Moniker, Cahn became a highly respected figure in the domain industry.”

The complaint focuses on how Kupietzky allegedly promised that Moniker would get adequate marketing and public relations assistance from Oversee and that operations would be integrated “so that there was a seamless integration of software and a uniform way to respond to intellectual property disputes, litigation, audit and survey responses and complaints from customers.” Kupietzky also allegedly promised cross-selling potential between Oversee subsidiaries.

Cahn also claims that Oversee.net founder and CEO at the time Lawrence Ng told him that Moniker was understaffed pre-merger and its employees were overworked, and that Oversee would provide Moniker with more resources.

He claims these never came to fruition:

Defendants formed the intent, and actively concealed and misrepresented the true fact that they intended to fully subjugate Moniker and Cahn, taking for themselves the full benefit of Moniker’s great public reputation and industry value at the time of merger while simultaneously jettisoning and reducing Cahn’s staff, influence and ability to properly manage and lead Moniker.

Other new allegations in the amended suit include:

-Oversee restricted transactions for adult domain names which comprised a “substantial portion” of Moniker’s business before the merger

-Cahn was promised he’d report to Ng as CEO, whom he had a good relationship with. But Ng knew before the merger he’d be stepping down as CEO.

-Ng and Kupietzky purposely delayed implementing infrastructure and technology integration so Moniker couldn’t fully monitor, account for and measure its own performance levels.

-”Oversee stalled and ultimately did not obtain a California escrow license for Moniker so that it could legally perform its auctions in California, the state in which Oversee was based. This adversely affected Moniker’s ability to earn revenue through its live domain auctions.”

Cahn says that these changes led to customer dissatisfaction and customers started moving domains away from Moniker.

Despite Oversee.net’s pending motion to dismiss most of the claims in the case, the amended complaint drops only one: breach of fiduciary duty.

Champagne.co becomes first .co domain name case won by respondent.

A complainant has finally lost a UDRP case for a .co domain name.

Comite Interprofessionnel du vin de Champagne has lost the case it brought for the domain name Champagne.co.

The decision text hasn’t been posted yet, but this is the first time a complainant has lost a .co complaint at World Intellectual Property Forum since .co was liberalized last year. I’m not sure about National Arbitration Forum since it doesn’t break out cases by top level domain.

The complainant owns Champagne.com, which is forwards to Champagne.fr (unless you don’t type in www, in which case it goes to an Apache test page).

A saving grace for the domain owner may be that the domain didn’t resolve, so it didn’t point to ad links for Champagne (the drink). However, the whois stated the organization was “DotCo Investments”. My guess is this case hinges on Champagne being a location or geo domain.

Update: WIPO has posted the decision, and it’s more interesting than I thought. It seems that the panel questioned the complainant’s rights to the “champagne” mark. The respondent admitted he registered the domain name for the alcohol connotation, but said he didn’t think it was a trademark. The complainant tried to withdraw the case at the last minute, but the panelist declined. Ultimately, he ruled the complainant failed to show the domain is confusingly similar to a mark in which it has rights.

Rook Media opens its doors to more domain owners.

Rook Media is coming out from behind the shadows.

The new domain parking service has been in a closed beta with very large domainers since February. But as of today, it’s open to the public.

The company is backed by a number of former senior managers from Name Drive who left when the company was acquired.

Co-founder Ash Rahimi explained to Domain Name Wire who their ideal client is:

Our aim is to make the experience at RookMedia.net the closest thing possible to having a direct relationship with one of the big advertising providers. That means very accurate per domain statistics and a focus on increasing and optimizing traffic quality. If you want to point your domains and just collect a check in the mail every month, that is fine. But we cater better to portfolio owners that wish to build and improve their holdings in a data-driven fashion. We work together with our partners, and we hope it’s a more satisfying experience than “here are your stats, here is your check, rinse and repeat.”

In a press release, the company says it wants to bring more transparency to domain name parking:

As portfolio owners ourselves, we understand the frustrations bred by the “black box” culture of other monetization providers. We therefore work hard at RookMedia.net to deliver the most accurate domain stats in the market. No estimates, no games, no excuses. Accuracy and transparency are vital in helping our partners build out their portfolios.

HR Director says no problem with turnover at ICANN.

Perhaps responding to questions about some high profile departures lately, ICANN Director of Human Resources Steve Antonoff just released an analysis (pdf) of turnover at the non-profit.

His bottom line: turnover is less than the typical high tech company and has mostly to do with factors outside of ICANN.

In the financial year ending June 2010 the company had 8.73% turnover with 10 departures. Antonoff compares this to the U.S. high tech industry average reported by the United States Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) of 25.8%. (Show me a high tech company with that sort of turnover in their professional ranks and I’ll show you a sinking ship.)

For the first 11 months of the current fiscal year turnover is 11.38% with 14 departures.

For fiscal year 2010 more of the departures were from involuntary departures (i.e. firing) whereas 2011 has seen more voluntary departures than involuntary.

Why have so many people left during the current financial year, just as ICANN gets ready to embark on a massive expansion with new TLDs?

Antonoff writes:

Exit interviews confirmed that these departures were not due to issues at ICANN, but generally were motivated by external opportunities, family issues, and retirement. None of the staff members who left voluntarily over the two years indicated in their exit interviews dissatisfaction with management or with ICANN in general. Many continue to actively support ICANN and its management team.

That his statement directly refutes people leaving for dissatisfaction with management or ICANN suggests that there are concerns of exactly this sort of issue. Exit interviews are OK, but not great at getting to the bottom of departures. At the end of the day, most people don’t want to burn bridges.

What would be more interesting is if an outside group came in an performed anonymous evaluations. You know, like “The Bobs“.

It would also be interesting to see if people who have offices overlooking the bay have lower turnover than those facing inland.