Domain Incubation Blog

Fusu, the world's first Domain Stock Exchange opens up to a wider audience; Announces strategic partnership with EuroDNS to solidify the road to launch and beyond.

January 26, 2008 -- $300,000 in only 100 days is the record achievement made by Fusu, the first Domain Stock Exchange platform. Incredibly high for a closed, invitation-only beta, the virtual amount was reached by a hundred key players in the Domain Industry that are already using the real-money version launched in November.

With 140 million domains registered today and a market value that could reach $4 billion by 2010, the need for a dedicated platform where domain names purchasers and investors could meet and trade was sorely unaddressed until late 2007, when Fusu was pre-launched by a team of Internet professional to address that very issue.

Because so few good names are still available, domains have become the real estate of the 21st century. More than 90,000 domain names are bought daily, with some achieving spectacular market values: Vodka.com sold for $3.5 million, Computer.com for $2.1 million.

As the market matures through the efforts of experienced investors and industry leaders, processes and standards have emerged that have facilitated the development of brokerages, auction platforms and leveraged financing instruments. Fusu's Domain Stock Exchange represents the natural evolution of this trend as it brings further transparency and reliability to the market.

As with a traditional Stock Exchange, Fusu allows its participants to get liquidity from their assets. On Fusu, holders of a premium domain (i.e Vodka.com) can devote a fraction of their domain to the market and immediately get money out of it without having to give up its control at any time. In return, stockholders in the domain name will get their share in future sales or advertising revenues generated by the domain name.

•    For example, one domain owner sold 45% of his $5,000-value domain on Fusu. He earned $2,250 in the first 24 hours after his Initial Domain Offering. In the trading that followed, the domain rose to a value of $6,200, a 24% gain.

Shareholders participate in the booming domain name industry, without having to spend hundreds of thousands on a single premium name. Just like on any other Stock Exchange, shares can then be traded between buyers.

•    Indeed, during the closed beta, the most successful trader on Fusu earned over $4,000 in real money, only by investing in shares.
•    Under the same circumstances, the most active trader bought or sold over 18,000 shares, resulting in a transaction volume of $36,594.90.

With today's launch of Fusu's Public Beta, everyone is now invited to buy and sell shares of premium domain names that are owned by a few well known and trusted domainers, to guarantee a safe and trustworthy Exchange during the Beta period.

To provide for a stable launch, today also marks the beginning of a partnership with EuroDNS SA, well-known registrar and a key player in the domain industry. "By bridging the gap between the traditional finance world and the innovative domainers' crowd, Fusu grants investors an unprecedented access to valuable properties while fueling a buoyant market" comments Xavier Buck, EuroDNS CEO. "Our company is proud to participate in a great venture that could become essential to domainers and Internet users worldwide."

Website: Fusu - The Domain Stock Exchange

Press Contact: Press Department
Company Name: Fusu - The Domain Stock Exchange
Phone: +421 220 86 20 40
Website: http://www.fusu.com

# posted by (hris : 1:14 PM  0 Comments Links to this post

Afilias Discourages "Domain Name Front Running"

DUBLIN, IRELAND - 14 January 2008 - Recent industry discussions have centered on a new phenomenon termed "Domain Name Front Running." This occurs when someone conducts a search for a domain name and, shortly thereafter, someone else using some form of insider information preemptively registers the name.

This action keeps domains out of the hands of those who were originally interested, and is enabled by the "Add Grace Period." The Add Grace Period allows registrars to delete a name within 5 days of its initial registration without financial impact, and was originally intended to correct errors or problems in the initial registration process.

Allegations have been made that "Front Runners" purchase search data from Internet Service Providers and/or registries in order to find names of interest.

"Afilias wishes to make it clear that it has never sold search data to any party and does not support the practice of front running in the top-level domains that it supports," said Ram Mohan, Chief Technology Officer & VP Business Operations at Afilias. "We welcome a public dialog on the merits of the Add Grace Period, and the implications for members of the domain name industry and consumers at large."

Anyone who suspects front running on Afilias supported domains names should contact Afilias Customer Support at support@afilias.info or +1.215.706.5710 or +1-866-dot-INFO.

About Afilias

Afilias provides global registry services that leverage proven technology to deliver fast, reliable and secure service. Afilias' technology supports a wide range of applications, including Internet domain registries such as .INFO, .ORG, .aero, .mobi, .asia, and many country code domains. Afilias also provides services in the RFID market with its Afilias Discovery Service, which enables real-time lookup of event histories across RFID networks. Afilias maintains international headquarters in Dublin, Ireland, sales offices in London, England, sales and operational facilities in Toronto, administrative offices in the U.S. near Philadelphia, PA, and operational offices in New Delhi, India. For more information please visit www.afilias.info.

# posted by (hris : 5:39 PM  0 Comments Links to this post

Shared hosting service provider HostGator now offers 4,500 free Website templates to customers and resellers. The templates cover nearly 120 different types of businesses and make it easier for non-technical people to build attractive, effective Websites.

Houston, TX (PRWEB) December 20, 2007 -- Web hosting resellers who host their domains through HostGator now have an extra incentive to offer their customers: 4,500 Web templates to make it easy to create new Websites or revamp existing ones.

"These templates are free to any Website hosted by HostGator, whether on a shared or dedicated hosting plan, or through a hosting reseller," says HostGator founder and president Brent Oxley.

"We want to make hosting domains or building Websites as painless as possible, that's why we offer the free templates. We also offer free Site Builder, one of the easiest tools available for anybody wanting to custom build a Website, rather than use a template."

The free templates cover a broad range of page designs suitable for nearly 120 different types of small and medium-sized businesses - from accountants and auto dealers, to cleaning services, consultants, martial arts studios, toy stores, women's health clinics, and everything in between.

The wide variety of templates makes it easier for resellers to attract people and businesses who want websites, but don't have the knowledge or design abilities needed to create good looking Websites.

Although it's common for Web hosting companies to offer a variety of perks, including free or low cost Web tools, and even a limited number of templates, Oxley says the number of free templates HostGator has is far beyond the average: "I really don't know of any other large hosting company offering this many templates. We may be setting the trend here."

Applying the free templates couldn't be easier. The reseller or Webmaster simply browses through the templates, selects one or more to use and they automatically begin downloading to their computer. Hosting resellers and Webmasters are also welcome to modify and HostGator's templates, so long as their Websites remain hosted by HostGator.

As an added feature, resellers can actually mirror HostGator's templates pages to show to their customers. That makes accessing the templates easy, while maintaining control over who can accesss them.

"The only restriction," says Oxley, "is that the templates can't be sold or distributed for use on Websites not hosted by us."

To preview the templates:
templates.hostgator.com/

For more HostGator hosting information contact:
sales(at)hostgator.com
or visit hostgator.com
1-866-96-GATOR (1-866-964-2867)
HostGator.com
11251 Northwest Freeway, Suite 400
Houston, TX 77092
United States of America

About HostGator
Host Gator is a provider of shared, dedicated and reseller Web hosting services focused on the consumer and small business markets. Founded in 2002, Host Gator has become a leader in reseller hosting, helping over 15,000 businesses become Web hosting companies.

Press Contact: Brent Oxley
Company Name: HostGator
Phone: 1-866-964-2867
Website:  Hostgator.com

# posted by (hris : 10:35 PM  0 Comments Links to this post

Labels: domain scam, scams

# posted by (hris : 12:34 AM  0 Comments Links to this post

DomainTools.com: Vertical Search Engine For Domains

by Rob Garner , Wednesday, January 16, 2008
For the last seven years, there is one vertical search engine that I've used that often exceeds my use of Google and the other major engines.   DomainTools.com (formerly Whois Source), is a vertical search engine for domains, and contains a ton of useful data for search engine marketers, IT professionals, domainers, and marketers who are looking for a centralized search information around a particular domain, live Web site or existing company.   It is owned and operated by Jay Westerdal, who also produces the Domain Roundtable conference, and writes a widely-read  blog covering important issues in the domain and search worlds.

Among the engine's features, it includes:

-          Historic whois data: View current whois data, or search previous domain registrants from about six to seven years ago.  This feature is sort of like archive.org for whois data.

-          Number of DMOZ listings:  Westerdal runs a version of the DMOZ directory at DomainTools.com, and he pulls this data into the domain whois record.

-          Number of Yahoo listings:  Yahoo! directory listings are also pulled into the whois record.

-          Reverse IP: Shows all the domains hosted on a particular server.

-          Server type:  A quick shot of the server type is also provided at the domain level.

-          Bulk whois look-ups against multiple Top Level Domains (TLDs): With a basic subscription, you can view up to 600 domains at one time (100 names times six TLDs), including .com, .net, .org, .us, .info, and .us

-          Domain status: A bulk search shows whether a domain is currently available (never registered), available (previously registered), registered with active Web site, registered with no Web site, registered and parked or redirected, on hold, on hold in redemption period, or on hold pending delete. 

-          Wikipedia cross reference:  Shows the number of times a domain is referenced in Wikipedia.

-          IP address and location:  Shows IP address and geographic location data.

-          Domain suggestion tool: If you are looking for ideas for available names around a particular keyword, you never know what you might find.

-          Screen shots of names taken with existing Web sites: A screen cap is provided for individual whois record pages, and in the bulk whois feature, you can mouse over "active Web site" icons to view a small pop up image of the site.

-          Compete and Alexa rank: If you use this data, it is available as well.

-          Domains for sale feature:  DomainTools.com also features a link to domains on the secondary market that are available through Sedo or AfterNIC.

-          All of the other basic whois info: Name servers, registrar, original registration creation date, expiration date, name, address, admin, tech and billing contacts are all there.

There is also a backlink feature, but the link counts are extremely low, and it would be nice if this data was pulled in from Site Explorer.  The specific criteria used to calculate the SEO score is uncertain, though the text cache mockup of a page can be very helpful in quickly determining if a site is fundamentally text-friendly, or not.

The most controversial feature at DomainTools.com is the Registrant Search function, which will provide a list of all domains owned by a particular entity.  This is a fee-based search report that will provide a list of domains currently registered, regardless of where the domains are hosted.  It has caused many domain registrants and portfolio owners to begin using proxy services for shielding Whois data from the public view.

One thing I would really like to see from DomainTools.com is an opt-out feature for domain registrants, so that they would have more control in the way their data is shown.  The major search engines all obey robots.txt, and if DomainTools.com would adopt a similar opt-out or disallow approach to their data, it would still remain useful, but also be considerate of domain registrants concerns, especially as DomainTools.com continues to rise as a unique and powerful source of data.  If you are into the daily grind of researching Web sites and domains on a regular basis, then DomainTools.com is an indispensible vertical search engine you need to check out.

See what others are saying on the Search Insider blog.

Rob Garner is strategy director for interactive marketing and search agency iCrossing and writes for Great Finds, the iCrossing blog. He is president-elect of the Dallas/Fort Worth Search Engine Marketing Association, and also serves on the board of the Dallas/Fort Worth Interactive Marketing Association. 
 
Search Insider for Wednesday, January 16, 2008:
http://blogs.mediapost.com/search_insider/?p=701

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# posted by (hris : 5:02 PM  0 Comments Links to this post

Domain name resale specialist John Khu shows the 'average Joe' the ins and outs of dominating the virtual real estate (VRE) market via his new Expired Domain Secret eBook.

Singapore (PRWEB) December 11, 2007 -- Everybody is after the proverbial 'golden niche' when it comes to online businesses. And for the past three years, the expired domain names market has been this niche.

In 2005, sales of 5,851 domain names generated almost US$29 million. In 2006, sales surpassed the US$100 million mark. To date, there have already been six expired domains bought for over US$1 million each (one of them was sold for almost US$10 million!). And these statistics cover just the public domain name aftermarket. Private sales of expired domains are said to be bring in higher figures.

John Khu knows about these numbers very well. After all, he has been successfully dabbling into the expired domain name list market since 2002. This success has prompted him to author a new eBook: Expired Domain Secret (EDS).

"I knew the expired domain name industry was going to skyrocket but at the time, there was simply no information I can use to guide me with my purchases. I actually ended up losing money at first… but I knew there was something there so you can say I made my own rules as I went along. [I'm glad I didn't give up!"

Those 'rules' are what John Khu brings to readers via the Expired Domain Secret eBook. "It is the most comprehensive guide on purchasing expired available domains ever compiled. It covers the most basic questions one can have about expired domains so it's for beginners, and then the eBook shares insider strategies for maximum profits so it's also for the more advanced expired domain buyer too," he adds.

Expired Domain Secret is now available at John's site for just US$47.00. Why the economical price? "I sincerely want to help educate people on the best way they can get into the virtual real estate market. Up to now, only very few realize that expired domains are excellent business opportunities. I want more people to realize and benefit from this."

"Also, a lot of 'big names' are now monopolizing the expired domain name list industry so most people think they need to subscribe or register all the time just to find expired available domains. In the Expired Domain Secret eBook, I provide a lot of FREE resources that you can use to find and profit from obsolete domain names," John adds.

On top of the wealth of information in the eBook, John is also offering an exclusive bonus for 'early bird buyers'. Check out ExpiredDomainSecret.com to find out what this special bonus is all about.

About ExpiredDomainSecret.com:
ExpiredDomainSecret.com is a website that offers the Expired Domain Secret eBook, a comprehensive and updated guide to buying expired domains today for maximum profit.

Contact:
John Khu
Author
ExpiredDomainSecret.com
101 Upper Cross Street #04-10 Singapore 058357
W: http://www.expireddomainsecret.com
T: +65 90681011
F: +65 65344123

Press Contact: John Khu
Company Name: ExpiredDomainSecret.com
Phone: +6590681011
Website: http://www.expireddomainsecret.com

# posted by (hris : 11:08 PM  0 Comments Links to this post

-----Original Message-----
From: mike [mailto:mike@domaininasia.com]
Sent: Monday, January 07, 2008 8:44 PM
To:  Sigfreid

Subject: Domain name of nielsentech

Dear CEO,

Happy new year!

We are the domain name registration organization in Asia, which

mainly deal with international company's in Asia. We have something important need to confirm with your company.

 

On the Jan 7, 2008, we received an application formally. One company named "HuaYang Holdings Limited" wanted to register following Domain names:

  nielsentech.net 
  nielsentech.info
  nielsentech.cn
  nielsentech.com.cn
  nielsentech.net.cn 
  nielsentech.asia

and Internet brand keyword:

  nielsentech

 through our body.

 

After our initial examination, we found that the keywords and domain names applied for registration are as same as your company's name and trademark. These days we are dealing with it. If you do not know this company, we doubt that they have other aims to buy these domain names. Now we have not finished the registration of HuaYang company yet, in order to deal with this issue better, Please contact us by telephone or email as soon as possible.

 

Best Regards,

Mike Luo

__________________________________________________________________________

 Sponsoring Registrar: Asia Domain Name Registration Limited

Address: Rm 402A 4/F, China Insurance Group Building., 141 Des Voeux Road, Central, Hong Kong

Tel：00852－30759838

Fax：00852－31771520

Email: mike@domaininasia.com

Website:www.asiadnr.org 

# posted by (hris : 9:18 PM  0 Comments Links to this post

Nation's Largest Car & Home Insurer Drives Leads for Agents via Innovative Mobile Marketing Execution

Austin, TX  -  December 19, 2007 - State Farm Insurance partnered with Blumo, The Mobile Experience Agency, to integrate mobile into its State Farm Win College Cash Sweepstakes. The program allowed prospective college students and their parents the opportunity to win up to $5,000 for undergraduate or graduate school tuition. In addition to entering online, fans attending select NCAA football games during the 2007 season had an opportunity to win up to $1,000 in cash instantly during in-game text-to-win promotions.

During the course of the promotion, thousands of fans were exposed to, and participated in, the sweepstakes sponsored by State Farm. Most importantly, 12% of those who participated in the sweepstakes requested additional information about State Farm products and services from their local agent.

"When done correctly, integrating mobile into an otherwise typical promotional campaign can have tremendous effects in driving participation and serving as a catalyst for new customer acquisition," said Sean Bartlett, Vice President of Sales and Marketing at Blumo. "By adding an activation mechanism to State Farm's existing media placements, we are able to engage the participant in a dialog that enables them to not only enter the text-to-win contest, but also be introduced to their local State Farm agent in real-time, creating a win-win situation for State Farm."

The State Farm College Cash Sweepstakes ran through November 30, 2007 and was promoted extensively in traditional media and at major college football games. The State Farm Win College Cash Text-to-Win started out like a typical text-to-win promotion, however, the similarities stopped after the first interaction. Participants were required to verify their eligibility and were given the option to receive a second entry for replying with additional information, including their zip code. Using the zip code, as well as the participant's mobile number's area code and exchange, their local State Farm agent was dynamically determined in real time. A reply was then sent to the participant introducing the local State Farm agent and offering them the opportunity to learn more about relevant State Farm products and services.

"We just finished the season and the results have been phenomenal," said Ronnie Lee Vandiver, Zone Marketing Manager at State Farm. "Branding and promotions are certainly a key component of our business, but the ability mobile provides to add an activation mechanism, show real business results, and provide detailed metrics in real-time makes it integral part of our campaigns."

About State Farm
State Farm® insures more cars than any other insurer in North America and is the leading U.S. home insurer. State Farm's 17,000 agents and 68,000 employees serve over 75 million auto, fire, life and health policies in the United States and Canada, and more than 1.7 million bank accounts. State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance Company is the parent of the State Farm family of companies. State Farm is ranked No. 31 on the Fortune 500 list of largest companies. For more information, please visit statefarm.com® or in Canada statefarm.ca®.

About Blumo
Blumo is a full-service mobile marketing agency that helps brands and other agencies develop and deliver interactive consumer experiences for the mobile phone and web. The company's flagship product, MobilePowered(TM), helps companies easily manage SMS and WAP-based marketing campaigns. Blumo is headquartered in Phoenix, Arizona. For more information, visit blumo.com.

State Farm Media Contact
Leslie Leal
512-918-4395
email protected from spam bots

Blumo Media Contact
Sean Bartlett
480-686-7326
email protected from spam bots

Press Contact: Sean Bartlett
Company Name: Blumo Inc.
Phone: 480-686-7326
Website: www.blumo.com

# posted by (hris : 10:28 AM  0 Comments Links to this post

ClaimThisDomain.com - Claim This Domain - iTime Marketing, Inc.

These idiots are registering domains they think are good and then SPAMMING the owners of other TLDs and offering them the domain at the bargain price of $247 that includes a year's registration...!!!

I am posting about them because I called and left a message for them after getting the first couple of SPAMs, then a couple of hours I got some more and now today I got more spam (we own quite a few domains...!). I want people to know two things about this company before they consider doing business with them: 1) They are SPAMMERS and should not be considered, and 2) They are charging a hefty price for something that may have cost them $60, but if they are pros would have cost them much less, like about $9.

They seem to use SnapNames.com and if you are interested in getting a .com domain to replace or add to your .net, .org, .info, .biz, or .us domain, then you should use SnapNames.com or another domain backorder service to get it yourself and save a lot of money. IT'S EASY!!! You can do this without paying an inflated cost. If you can't, then you can easily find someone (hint, hint) that can help you for must less cost!

What follows is two emails they send out, The first one sounds like it's a personal message, but it's not, and the second seems to be sent to help reinforce the idea that this is not spam (bulk commercial un-solicited email), but just a "helpful" person. We have received 3 sets of these emails in the past two days.


-------- Original Message --------
Subject:  eccao.com
From:  Matthew Smith <matthewsmith@claimthisdomain.com>
To:  domain-whois-contact@your-crappy-domain.net

Recently, eccao.com  expired and we acquired it
in a domain name auction.  Since you own the .net or .org
version of this domain name we wanted to provide you
with the opportunity to own the preferred .com version.

Our company specializes in recovering preferred expiring
domains and either selling them to individuals such as
yourself or building out our own web presence on those
valuable domains.

eccao.com is a pretty darn good domain name and,
the truth is, the .COM is a far stronger version of the
name than then .NET is. 

* .Com is the strongest brand on the internet.
When people think of a website, they intuitively
think ".com".   Odds are people trying to get to
your website are inadvertently going to eccao.com
because they assume that's where they can find you.

* .Com conveys Professionalism that .net & .org
cannot match.

If you'd like to own eccao.com, you can buy it
now by covering our acquisition costs and a modest profit.

If you have any interest I encourage you to act quickly
because this domain name will only be offered for sale
for a limited time.

Click Here For Pricing On eccao.com

https://secure.claimthisdomain.com/buy.php?eccao.com


Please advise,


Matt Smith
Matt@ClaimThisDomain.com
tel: 563.823.4644

ClaimThisDomain
322 N. Main Street
Davenport, IA 52801
============================================================
Here is the follow-up message:

-------- Original Message --------
Subject:  eccao.com
From:  Matthew Smith <matthew5@claimthisdomain.com>
To:  Man-your-domain-really-sucks-let-me-help-you@your-crappy-domain.net


btw....it just occurred to me - I should mention that you don't have to move off of your current site, or rebrand to the .com to get great value from the eccao.com domain name. The reason that this domain came to our attention is because it is currently getting traffic. Currently, that traffic is lost to you. By acquiring this domain, you can keep your current site and simply redirect eccao.com to your current site. That way, you won't lose this traffic at all, and you can, if you want, keep your current domain name as your main website.

To grab this domain while it's still available, you can buy it online at: eccao.com or by phone by calling 1-563-823-4644.


For your convenience, I am copying my message from earlier today below:


Recently, eccao.com  expired and we acquired it
in a domain name auction.  Since you own the .net or .org
version of this domain name we wanted to provide you
with the opportunity to own the preferred .com version.


Our company specializes in recovering preferred expiring
domains and either selling them to individuals such as
yourself or building out our own web presence on those
valuable domains.

eccao.com is a pretty darn good domain name and,
the truth is, the .COM is a far stronger version of the
name than then .NET is. 

* .Com is the strongest brand on the internet.
When people think of a website, they intuitively
think ".com".   Odds are people trying to get to
your website are inadvertently going to eccao.com
because they assume that's where they can find you.

* .Com conveys Professionalism that .net & .org
cannot match.

If you'd like to own eccao.com, you can buy it
now by covering our acquisition costs and a modest profit.

If you have any interest I encourage you to act quickly
because this domain name will only be offered for sale
for a limited time.

Click Here For Pricing On eccao.com

https://secure.claimthisdomain.com/buy.php?eccao.com


Please advise,


Matt Smith
Matt@ClaimThisDomain.com
tel: 563.823.4644

ClaimThisDomain
322 N. Main Street
Davenport, IA 52801
===============================================================
Matt Smith has voice mail, but does not seem to return calls. He sounds like a nice guy, but my question is does he even exist...?

The company behind this spam is:
iTime Marketing, Inc.
332 N. Harrison St. Suite 100
Davenport IA 52801
P: 563-323-4609 * F: 866-316-5278
http://www.itimemarketing.com/


Summary: Don't trust or do any business with anyone that sends SPAM. And if they are stupid enough to use their real information, report them to their ISP and SPAMCOP.NET.

You can read more on this subject at NamePros.com, a forum for the domain industry at which I am a member.

# posted by (hris : 11:45 AM  0 Comments Links to this post