Controversy doesn’t have noticeable affect on domain registrar’s business.
Was Bob Parson’s elephant hunting video a stealth PR move?
Maybe a little bit, but given that he posted a similar video last year and nary an elephant lover noticed, I’m not sure how he could have predicted a different result this year.
But one thing’s for sure: it hasn’t had a significant negative impact on Go Daddy’s business.
I’m been tracking DailyChanges.com over the past week to see if there were any noticeable business effects. This is a loose way of looking at registrations as it tracks nameservers instead of domain registrations, but it’s still a good proxy.
Nothing unusual has happened. No massive outbound transfers.
I asked Go Daddy to confirm this and they confirmed that yep, there’s been no significant impact on business.
There has actually been one impact — Go Daddy’s Video.me site has served up over 700,000 plays of the video.
That the uproar hasn’t caused much damage doesn’t surprise me much. Despite mainstream media attention the typical Go Daddy customer has no idea about the elephant shooting. And most of them wouldn’t be outraged enough to figure out how to transfer a domain name.
This isn’t to say that Parsons would do everything the same again. After all, he belatedly edited his hunting expedition video to focus less on the invigorating hunt and more on helping villagers.
I think that this can’t be judged in a month’s time or less.
The move will be going on for months and maybe even more than a year as domain renewals come up.
I know I am planning on moving a couple thousand.
Are you at all familiar with:
Goodwill or Social Capital or Branding?
Parsons made a colossal error and the monumental effects will occur one minute at a time for decades!!!!!
Don’t try to whitewash this.
It takes time for people and businesses to move over their domain names to another registrar.
Many people will move their domain names over the course of the next year to other providers when their domains get near their expiration date.
I blogged about Bob Parsons here:
http://cleansheetsanddirtygirls.blogspot.com/2011/04/electrified-sword-fighting-chalkboard.html
Fox News said the exact same thing when advertisers began refusing to support Glenn Beck.
People, like elephants, have long memories and and as Claude suggests, the long-term damage to the Godaddy brand will be immense.
However, while it is a huge company, it could do with a dose of humility to counter the aggressive ad campaigns that really are a bit gross at times.
For what it’s worth, I can report that we got a lot of traction from coupon codes that we released at NameSilo poking fun at this issue. We have received higher than normal volume from people leaving GoDaddy since this issue first surfaced, and the coupons I mentioned above were our #1 and #2 most utilized ever.
Not sure how much this will impact GD in the long-term, but assuming other registrars have experienced similar results to us over the past few weeks, I would be shocked if the impact wasn’t statistically relevant.
If anyone has posted a still frame from the original Parson’s video, and received a threat letter from his copyright enforcement agent, please contact me.
A company called Bay TSP is averring “under penalty of perjury” that the use of such images for the purpose of commentary is copyright infringement not subject to fair use. They are wrong.
The threat letter is as follows. Don’t buy into the “this message is confidential” garbage. Nobody can send you an email and unilaterally impose conditions like that.
—-
>Dear Sir or Madam:
>
>BayTSP, Inc. (“BayTSP”) swears under penalty of perjury that Bob Parsons has authorized BayTSP to act as its non-exclusive agent for copyright infringement notification. BayTSP’s search of the protocol listed below has detected infringements of Bob Parsons’ copyright interests on your IP addresses as detailed in the below report.
>
>BayTSP has reasonable good faith belief that Bob Parsons, its agents, or the law does not authorize use of the material in the manner complained of in the below report. The information provided herein is accurate to the best of our knowledge. Therefore, this letter is an official notification to effect removal of the detected infringement listed in the below report. The Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works, the Universal Copyright Convention, as well as bilateral treaties with other countries allow for protection of client’s copyrighted work even beyond U.S. borders. The below documentation specifies the exact location of the infringement.
>
>We hereby request that you immediately remove or block access to the infringing material, as specified in the copyright laws, and insure the user refrains from using or sharing with others Bob Parsons materials in the future.
>Further, we believe that the entire Internet community benefits when these matters are resolved cooperatively. We urge you to take immediate action to stop this infringing activity. We appreciate your efforts toward this common goal.
>
>Please send us a prompt response indicating the actions you have taken to resolve this matter, making sure to reference the Notice ID number above in your response. mailto:bobparsons@copyright-compliance.com?
>
>Note: If your email program has inserted line breaks into the e-mail link above, you can copy and paste the entire link into your email program.
>
>Nothing in this letter shall serve as a waiver of any rights or remedies of Bob Parsons with respect to the alleged infringement, all of which are expressly reserved. Should you need to contact me, I may be reached at the below address.
>
>Regards,
>
>Osama Hussein, Esq.
>
>In-House Counsel
>
>BayTSP.com Inc. - as an Authorized Agent of Bob Parsons
>PO Box 1314 - Los Gatos, CA 95031
>Phone: 408-341-2305 fax: 408-341-2399
>bobparsons@copyright-compliance.com
>
>*pgp public key is available on the key server at http://pgp.mit.edu
>
>Note: The information transmitted in this Notice is intended only for the person or entity to which it is addressed and may contain confidential and/or privileged material. Any review, reproduction, retransmission, dissemination or other use of, or taking of any action in reliance upon, this information by persons or entities other than the intended recipient is prohibited. If you received this in error, please contact the sender and delete the material from all computers.
>
No effect? Maybe not that noticeable on a 1 billion dollar company. And I am sure Bob will be able to afford the hundreds of thousands of dollars he has spent to take advantage country that charges rich Americans to shoot elephants.
Also many people are moving domains as they come up for renewal. To say this had “NO” effect on GoDaddy is ridiculous.
And overall Bobs reputation is tarnished.
Keep taking up for Bob. Maybe we will start boycotting this site.
@ eric rice – how do I “keep taking up for Bob”?
Andew, I feel the same way, I have hit a few deer with my van in the past, as I going to get a Peta letter too? Just cause Peta, who itself kills animals, sends the guy a letter filled their hate, does not mean the guy did anything legally or morally wrong.