Internet Traffic asks customers to identify themselves as part of new Google initiative.

One of the topics discussed extensively in the hallways at Webfest this year was changes Google is making to its parking program.

Although I don’t have all of the details, the bottom line is that Google is making an effort to better identify who is actually parking domains using its ad feed. This may involve steps to identify people across the various parking companies that use Google.

Today Internet Traffic customers saw what appears to be the first sign of these changes.

The company sent an email to customers asking them to agree to a couple terms and provide detailed contact information.

The terms are basic and are already in all parking companies’ terms: that you won’t click on ads on any of your domains and won’t provide incentives for others to click.

I’m not sure how this will be implemented across the different parking companies, but you can expect to see some of the results of these changes in the coming months. And my understanding is that there are other parts of this initiative that you won’t see.

Cutts recommends taking down a parking page about a month before launching a new site.

Google web spam czar Matt Cutts just published a video in which he asks himself a question (rather than taking it from the community): should I keep a domain name parked before I launch a web site?

In short, Cutts says no.

He works in a reference to eNom’s backpack girl and then goes on to explain that Google has a filter to try to keep parked domain names out of its search results.

This filter doesn’t immediately know when a domain changes from a parked page to a “real” web site, so he recommends putting up a placeholder page 3-4 weeks before launching a site.

That placeholder page can be something as simple as “coming soon” with a few lines of text — just make sure it’s not an ad-filled parking page.

Here’s the video:

ccTLDs, domain parking, and more make the top five list.

If August is over, why is it still 100 degrees in Austin? Sigh…

Here are the top 5 news stories from Domain Name Wire last month.

Oops, I entrusted my domain name to a tiny island nation! –
think about political and technical risks before setting up your web site on a country code domain name.

Wow: Craigslist loses Craigslists.com domain dispute – so this guy creates a list, and his name is supposedly Craig, and…it’s kind of a funny story.

Meet the woman who bought a domain name instead of a house – entrepreneur plunked down cash for Posse.com.

Sedo says domain parking continuing to decline, writes off EUR 57.1 million – increased competition is a key reason companies such as Sedo are seeing downward business pressure in domain parking.

Your domain names are worth less than you think – or, stop hating on other peoples’ domains and put your money where your mouth is.

Browser features change the way people navigate the web.

Last week I wrote about how Sedo’s domain name parking business continues to struggle.

The company cites a few reasons for the decline, including “advances made in browser technologies, which alters the circumstances surrounding monetization in the parking business”.

There’s no doubt that browsers are blurring the lines between typing in a domain name and a search. What that means for type-in traffic can be subject to debate.

I asked Sedo about what it is seeing from a direct navigation standpoint and why it thinks browser changes are affecting its business. Here’s what Sedo CEO Tobias Flaitz has to say about it:

In general, new browser technology and browsing trends are changing the way people navigate the web. For example, those of us who browse the web using Google Chrome see no differentiation between the URL bar and the search function. This means that more users are typing searches, and not domain names, directly into the URL bar. Auto-fill technologies and search algorithms are also improving rapidly, so browsers do not accept as many misspellings. Overall, this means that browsing often begins with a search instead of direct navigation, which inevitably affects type-in traffic to parked names. However, any web user who knows a site’s URL or is interested in purchasing a domain can still navigate to that domain name directly.

Lower than usual renewal rate blamed on search engine changes.

Verisign had its second best quarter ever for new domain name registrations last quarter, but its renewal rate was lower than usual.

The company cites two reasons. First, there were large promotions by domain registrars a year ago (apparently mostly from one large registrar) that led to an uptick in new registrations that came up for renewal last quarter.

Second, and more interesting, Verisign blames “search engine adjustments”.

…search engine adjustments made over the past several months affected the economics, which drove domain monetization rates in the first half of 2012. While monetization rates have increased for better performing sites, lower performing sites do not seem to be benefiting.

This is somewhat perplexing. The company clearly refers to domain name monetization in its call, but it seems that it’s talking more about auto generated or low quality web sites. Google did take efforts in recent months to kick parked domains out of its index. But the context of the call also seems to refer to web sites.

In other notable Verisign news, the company announced that it will start providing on its web site more frequent updates to the .net and .com domain name base.