Company says outbound transfers are up due to prior support of controversial bill.

Responding to inquiries from Domain Name Wire and other news outlets, domain name registrar GoDaddy.com has issued a statement about an increase in domain transfer activity due to the company’s prior support of Stop Online Privacy Act (SOPA):

“We have observed a spike in domain name transfers, which are running above normal rates and which we attribute to Go Daddy’s prior support for SOPA, which was reversed,” said Go Daddy CEO Warren Adelman. “Go Daddy opposes SOPA because the legislation has not fulfilled its basic requirement to build a consensus among stake-holders in the technology and Internet communities. Our company regrets the loss of any of our customers, who remain our highest priority, and we hope to repair those relationships and win back their business over time.”

Although the company has not disclosed actual outbound domain transfers due to its prior SOPA support, numbers floating around the web based on nameserver transfers are likely highly inaccurate.

The proposed “transfer day” for customers to move domain names away from the registrar was today. However, the boycott was proposed prior to the company changing its stance on SOPA.

Company wins domain name dispute, but it won’t do the company much good.

Apple has won a domain name dispute against what it alleges to be an outfit selling counterfeit Apple products. But it might have to continue chasing the perpetrators.

In May the company won a domain name dispute for apple-downloads.com and apple-oem.com. The company alleged at the time that both domain names were used to sell what were likely pirated our counterfeit copies of its software.

Fast forward to last week, and the company just won another case against what it thinks is the same perpetrator.

This time the company gets control of applebigdiscount.com, applesdiscount.com, applessales.com and applestorewell.com. The domains are registered to a variety of people, but Apple thinks they’re all the same — and the same group behind the domains it won earlier this year.

The problem for Apple is that some of these domain names were registered immediately after the decision in the first case was handed down. This means that the group behind the registrations is likely to just move on to other domains, and Apple will be forced to file more domain disputes.

It’s a classic game of whac-a-mole, unless Apple figures out the true identity of the registrants and is able to track them down in the courts.

Which end users put domain names under the Christmas tree this week? Here’s Domain Name Wire’s weekly list.

Before getting to this week’s end user domain sales report, I wanted to report an observation about Afternic. For those that argue that Afternic only sells its own domains, it appears 40% of the reported .com sales this week were sold on behalf of clients. That’s pretty darn high.

OK, on to the sales (all sales at Afternic unless otherwise noted)…

U.S. Department of Agriculture bought USDA.net for $6,000.

National Hot Rod Association (NHRA) bought WinterNationals.com for $250 for its race of the same name.

HR software giant Kronos bought Kronos.net from YummyNames for $4,877.

Ace Hardware bought SoulPaint.com for $1,595.

U.S. Travel Association bought TravelCoalition.com for $955.

Elliott Massie’s The MASIE Center bought LearningGlobally.com for $588.

Web hosting company pair Networks, which owns Pair.com, made an interesting acquisition. It bought PearCloud.com for $1,200 at Sedo. A typo of PairCloud.com? Maybe, but it doesn’t own PairCloud.com.

Natural Color Imaging, a photo lab, bought 1stopphoto.com for $580.

Athletic club Tilton Fitness bought ChangeYourLifeNow.com for $2,088.

Selwood Products shortened its domain name from SelwoodProducts.com to Selwood.com for EUR 3,479 via Sedo.

Tek Manufacturing, Inc bought TekUSA.com for $1,000.

Outdoor supply and clothing company Sierra Trading Post bought Derailed.com for $8,000.

Wealth management company Wealth Architects, LLC, based in Nevada, invested $2,540 in NevadaFinancial.com.

Work Force Network, Inc., “work place integrator”, bought WorkforceQuality.com for $821.

Online bank Everbank, known for its foreign currency options, bought FinanceServiceCenter.com for $788.

Consumer golf tradeshow North Coast Golf Shows, which owns NorthCoastGolfShows.com, putted for NJGolfShow.com for $975.

Google wins 37 of 50 typo domain names.

Google has won rights to 37 typo domain names of its YouTube brand, but it won’t be happy with the results.

That’s because the National Arbitration Forum panelist who decided the case also determined that the typosquatter could keep 13 infringing domain names, including youtubr.com and youtbue.com.

Google filed the case against the owner of 50 domain names that all forwarded to “survey” sites that mimicked YouTube. These sites earn money every time someone enters their contact information and/or completes offers.

So why did panelist Paul A. Dorf decide that the typosquatter could keep 13 of the 50 domain names? Because they were all registered prior to the filing of a YouTube trademark with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office on January 30, 2006.

According to Dorf:

All of these domain names have one thing in common: they were registered prior to Complainant’s trademark filings with the USPTO of January 30, 2006. The Panel finds that Complainant has not provided it with sufficient evidence of common law rights predating Respondent’s domain name registrations. Therefore, the Panel finds that it would be impossible for Respondent to have registered the above domain names in bad faith under Policy 4(a)(iii), where its domain name registrations predate Complainant’s rights in the mark

Either Google’s lawyers messed up here or Dorf did. The first use in commerce date on the trademark is
April 24, 2005, which predates the 13 additional domain registrations. It’s unclear from Dorf’s decision if Google explained this in its complaint.

Regardless, I’d argue Google got screwed here.

Ticket price increases $100 on January 1.

The price of admission to Oversee.net’s DOMAINfest conference next month increases on Sunday.

Tickets are currently $1,195 and the price increases to $1,295 Sunday.

DOMAINfest kicks off January 31, 2012 at the Fairmont Miramar Hotel & Bungalows in Santa Monica, California. Surprisingly, it appears there are still rooms available at the hotel, although it sells out every year for this event.

Admission includes three meals a day plus access to parties/networking events each night. This year’s parties include an opening night reception at Monsoon, a dinner networking party at Petersen Automotive Museum, and a closing night party and fundraiser at House of Blues.

Last year’s event attracted a crowd of 700 people.