VeriSign has released VERISIGN® DomainScore™ to the public.

The beta tool allows anyone to enter an unregistered domain name and get an idea of how much traffic the domain gets.

DomainScore uses NXD data — basically visit requests to non existent domain names — to calculate a score ranging from 1-10. The higher the score the higher the traffic to the domain. The score is for the last full week, the last 30 days, and last 60 days.

Based on my experience with similar data for pending delete domains, I think you’ll find the data most relevant for domains that haven’t just expired. This reduces the amount of dead link traffic included in the total and gives a better impression of type-in traffic.

VeriSign already offers this data to registrars, some of which in turn offer it to customers. Dynadot offers the data but with a day turnaround time. Some customers have apparently run millions of domains through Dynadot’s system. However, a number of large registrars have held this data close to their chest for their own use.

The public tool provides data instantly on up to 100 domain names.

VeriSign might need to put a CAPTCHA on it

Web adds more domain names in Q1.

April started with approximately 209.8 million domain names registered according to VeriSign’s latest Domain Name Industry Brief (pdf). That means the base of registered domain names grew by 4.5 million in the first quarter.

The company says there are a combined 108 million .com and .net domain names registered. I suspect we’ll see some huge PR as the base of .com domain names approaches 100 million.

VeriSign estimates there are 81.7 million country code domain names.

The .Com and .Net registration base is increasing at a faster clip than ccTLDs.

In terms of rankings, .uk moved up a spot to be the fourth largest TLD, surpassing .org. China’s .cn dropped from seventh to ninth as a continued result of higher registration prices and hefty registration restrictions.

Germany’s .de remains the biggest country code domain name.

Two domain name industry heavyweights spend more on government lobbying in 2010.

Both VeriSign and Go Daddy substantially increased their spending on U.S. government lobbying over the past year, data collected by Domain Name Wire show.

The numbers are based on public records filed with the U.S. Senate under the Lobbying Disclosure Act.

VeriSign spent $3.315 million on lobbying last year, up from $2.4 million in 2009. Go Daddy Group, which owns domain name registrar GoDaddy.com, spent $1.162 million in 2010. That’s up from $715,500 in 2009. Among the issues Go Daddy lobbied were piracy, privacy, and rogue internet pharmacies. Go Daddy has been a strong advocate of shutting down these pharmacies and suspended 150,000 domains related to rogue online pharmacies last year.

Most other domain name related companies either held lobbying expenditures steady or decreased them, as the chart in this post shows.

Non-domain companies also spent money lobbying the federal government about domain names. For example, Christian Coalition of America was at it again, lobbying the government to stop the .xxx domain name. (ICM Registry, which operates .xxx, just registered to start lobbying the government this year).

Company files two trademark applications.

It looks like VeriSign might be working on a new slogan for its business.

The company just filed two “intent to use” trademark applications for its domain name business:

Connecting the World Between the Dots and The World Is Connecting Between the Dots.

They’re both clever slogans and I’m guessing they haven’t chosen which one to go with.

Of course as a domain person I wonder which dots are being connected. When I think of a domain name I think of one dot. So between the dots? Still, I guess I “get” it with regards to the DNS.

The applications were filed May 13.

CFIT settles with VeriSign for $0.

Hopes by domainers that .com prices would fall thanks to an antitrust lawsuit have officially been dashed.

VeriSign just released a press release stating that Coalition for ICANN Transparency has agreed to drop a case against it.

The lawsuit attacked both VeriSign’s no-bid contract with ICANN that allowed it to raise prices 7% a year as well as its planned domain waitlisting service.

Although ultimately CFIT lost, I suspect their biggest concern was not the rising cost of dot coms but the waitlist service. CFIT was backed by Pool.com, which was one of the biggest domain backordering services when the case was originally filed. VeriSign’s proposed service would have effectively killed its business dropcatching .com domains.

VeriSign’s stock price has reacted strongly to developments in this case in the past. This announcement was released after the bell and the stock has not changed in after hours trading.

(via DomainIncite)