Cloud, tech, and tv are popular topics in domain names.

LeanDomainSearch has just published a list of the 10,000 most popular topics found in .com domain names.

The site used research from its list of top prefixes and suffixes for domain names to figure out which topics show up most often in domain names.

Here’s how the site describes the methodology:

So how do you do it? Several weeks ago I published a list of the 5,000 Most Frequently Used Domain Name Prefixes and Suffixes. If you know what a domain name’s prefix or suffix is, you can also tell what the topic is. For example, if you look for all the domains that end with hub you’ll get a list including github and carhub. Since we know the suffix is hub, we can tell that the topics are git and car. Figuring out the most popular topics then is a matter of figuring out all of the domain names that start with a given prefix or end with a given suffix, determining the topic, and then adding up the results to see which occur the most frequently.

It’s an interesting approach. Here’s what LeanDomainSearch came up with for the top 20 topics:

1. web
2. net
3. art
4. tech
5. cloud
6. shop
7. home
8. media
9. world
10. pro
11. design
12. mobile
13. life
14. city
15. tv
16. blog
17. travel
19. online
20. it

These results are somewhat surprising to me. Of course, it’s hard to figure out the true meaning of a domain name, and this approach doesn’t capture all topics. But I’m surprised to see terms like “cloud” so high up on this list even using the methodology.

I’m also curious how many of these are applied for as new top level domains.

What do you think?

What do you think?

Texas now allows you to order a dot on personalized license plates. It only works on some of the designs, though. This is technically just a six character license plate since the dot doesn’t really count. But if you have a three letter .com to promote, why not?

Here are some other Texas license plates designs for domain investors:

Texas occasionally makes seven character domains available, so you could potentially snag “Domains” as well.

Unfortunately, this one is taken:

…but, Texas has license plates called “T Plates” that have a T at the beginning in the design. Technically the license plate below is “TDOTCOM”, but it looks like DotCom to me.

Alas, that one is taken too.

Here’s one that might work for any domainer who has been on the receiving end of a UDRP:

Just don’t blame me if your car gets keyed.

You could take it a step further with this one:

You can design your own Texas license plate at the (properly named) MyPlates.com.

Overstock.com pleads for single letter .com domains in VeriSign contract renewal.

For many years Overstock.com has had an obsession. An obsession with getting the domain name O.com.

As you may know, there are only three one letter .com domains ever registered: q.com, x.com, and z.com. These were registered (and grandfathered) prior to a restriction on one character .com domains being put in place.

Since then, Overstock.com has done everything possible to angle itself for getting o.com whenever it becomes available.

Its latest action is to urge ICANN to make one letter .com domains part of VeriSign’s renewal of the .com contract with ICANN.

One thing’s a good bet: if ICANN ever allows single letter .com domains then Overstock.com will pay whatever it takes and sue whomever it has to in order to get the o.com domain name.

Back in 2005, Overstock.com started beating the drum to release single letter .coms. Here’s how domain attorney John Berryhill tells it in a 2008 article:

The subject of allocating single character domain names has captured the attention of the ICANN community to varying degrees from time to time, primarily depending on the interested efforts of Overstock.com and its advocates. For example, just prior to the December 2005 ICANN meeting in Vancouver, a press release was circulated, and its authors managed to pimp their claim that ICANN was weighing the release of single character domain names to a variety of media outlets (e.g. ICANN weighs single-letter Web addresses USA Today, November 28, 2005). During the 2005 Vancouver meeting, one of the more interesting exhibit tables was run by Overstock.com, for the purpose of distributing baseball caps embroidered with the letter “O”, apparently for the purpose of impressing on the minds of the ICANN community that Overstock.com claims a pre-eminent interest in the letter “O” – and apparently oblivious to the fact that Oakley has longstanding rights in the mark “O” for sportswear. Hence, while rumors spread that Oprah was coming to visit ICANN, the presence of blatant trademark infringement at an ICANN meeting by a member of the Business Constituency was, at least, entertaining.

Overstock.com has always argued that single letter domains should respect “prior use”. Of course, a domain like o.com can’t have any prior use. But that hasn’t stopped the company; it has registered trademarks for o.com. In fact, someone has at least attempted to trademark every single letter .com that could exist. (This is similar to all the companies trying to trademark non-existent top level domains.)

Overstock.com’s obsession with o.com is widely seen as its reason for pursuing other single letter domain names such as o.biz and o.info. It helps the company establish more rights to o.com (at least that will be its argument). It even went so far as to rebrand to o.co, only to pull back.

VeriSign floated an idea of offering single letter .net domain names back in 2010, but later withdrew its request.

One of the tricky parts for VeriSign is the windfall offering single letter .com domains would create. Who should get this money? A lot of people in the internet community would argue it’s certainly not VeriSign that should pocket the money.

VeriSign likely doesn’t want to bring up the single letter issue as it renews the contract. It doesn’t want to do anything to upset the apple cart. The .com monopoly is good enough for it.

So while others debate whether new IP protections should be included in the .com contract or challenge VeriSign’s .com price hikes, Overstock.com continues to focus on a mission. A mission it’s been working on for at least 7 years.

.Co founder explains his opinion on domainers and cybersquatters.

There was a bit of a blogstorm earlier today about the video of Juan Deigo Calle and Loic Le Meur, founder of the LeWeb conference announcing LeWeb was changing its domain to LeWeb.co.

There are two people in the video, and both have differing viewpoints on some issues. But because this wasn’t an interview on Fox, they weren’t debating.

I still don’t see the big uproar over what Calle said. He basically said they don’t want every .co domain to be purchased by domain investors (let alone a cybersquatters), because then .co wouldn’t take off. (See .eu.)

But some people have viewed the video differently than I did.

On the other hand, I’m not a fan of Le Meur’s handling of LeWeb.com. As I wrote about earlier this year, he tried to grab the domain LeWeb.com through a UDRP. LeWeb.com was registered before his business started. That’s not cool.

Calle has responded to the allegations that he’s anti-domainer by pointing out he’s a domainer himself. He doesn’t want cybersquatters on .co. He goes even further by saying he doesn’t want “mass speculators”. That’s smart, whether or not you want to hear it.

(Oh, and by the way…when you get outside the domain bubble, you will find that most people hate us. Le Meur’s attitude, even though it’s wrong, is typical.)

Who actually owns this domain?

A World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) panel has ordered the domain name Pepper.com.au be transferred to Pepper Australia Pty Ltd, a home loan company.

The case was filed under .au Dispute Resolution Policy, which is different from the standard UDRP. Compared to UDRP, the .au policy is more lax on proving rights in a mark. It also requires only bad faith registration or use, not bad faith registration and use.

That said, how the panel came to its conclusion in this case is really strange. Basically, the respondent in the case Massive Networks Pty Ltd, deregistered as a company in 2010. The panel thus rules that it can’t have any rights or legitimate interests in the domain:

It cannot therefore hold property such as the registration of a domain name. The Panel concludes that it cannot have or claim any rights or legitimate interests in the disputed domain name.

Then the panel states that the respondent in the case did not register or use the domain in bad faith. Nevertheless, someone is now using it in bad faith, the panelist decides:

However the current use of the disputed domain name cannot be use by the Respondent, which no longer exists. It must therefore be use by an unidentified person or company. The website to which the disputed domain names resolves directs a visitor to travel agency offers and products and appears to have no connection to the Respondent or anyone connected to it.

In that case isn’t the respondent in the case not who it should be?

Seems like perverted justice to me.