iEstates.com

Francois Carrillo the man behind Domaining.com and other sites in the domain industry just launched a new domain name registrar, DONA.com which is offering what its calling “UDRP Insurance” with every registration, plus is contributing 30% of all profits to the Internet Commerce Association (ICA).

Here is what Francois had to say about the new registrar:

“As you know each day, we are hit by more and more abusive UDRPs from people that try to steal our names.
“It costs a lot of money to defend our assets and I am afraid as more people become aware of this ugly method to get domains, this plague dramatically grows.”

“This is why I am pleased to announce that we’ll offer “UDRP INSURANCE” to everybody registering domains at DONA.com!”

“If you are hit by an UDRP:

- You will get free legal assistance to estimate your winning chances.

- A list of attorneys offering special rates to our members.

- And if you won the UDRP, we’ll reimburse you the legal fees spent to defend you!

This way you no longer have to be afraid about this plague. If you register your domain in good faith, you should no longer spend money defending against domain hijackers.

I am also proud to announce that 30% of the profit generated by DONA.com will be reversed to the Internet Commerce Association (ICA) who defend the domain industry interest at ICANN and Washington.

So when you register names at DONA.com, you are also indirectly contributing to have laws changes to our advantage.

We really need to have our voice heard to influence ICANN and governments to change rules and better defend our rights. It’s
critical and urgent that we unite and have a strong association to defend us. Without big changes things can only get worse, much worse…

Our rates are not the cheapest but are very competitive, watch here and compare with your registrar.”"

The registrar is a Enom.com reseller, with .com rates of $11.15.…

I just read through the earning call transcript that Tucows held yesterday after the released their earnings and found a few interesting facts and figures.

On the call Tucows CEO Elliot Noss said that :

Q1 was a record quarter for individual domain sales from our portfolio, with sales of gems being especially strong.

“Revenue increased 61% year-over-year.

“On previous calls I have discussed the success of our efforts to increase the average selling price of brandables and gems, and we saw this again in Q1 as we achieved another record average selling price, and our largest ever number of transactions in excess of $10,000.”

I’d like to remind you of my comment earlier that we did have a disproportionately large amount of gem sales in Q1, which we expect to even out over the year.”

“Growth in, both, new registrations and renewed registrations, was strong, at 24% and 21%, respectably. ”

“We, also, saw healthy sequential growth in overall transactions volume at 15%.”

“Renewal rates continue to be strong and take up slightly at 76%, remaining above the industry average.”

“Total domains under management at the end of Q1 were up 9% from the same point last year and surpassed the 12 million mark for the first time.”

“Finally, a brief note on the new top level domain name program.”

“The original target set by ICANN were for applications to close on April 12th, and for all applicants and applications to be made public by May 1st.”

“Due to technical difficulties that have been quite public, those dates have not been met, and the exact dates are still to be determined. We had expected to share some information on this call, but given the change in dates we will not be doing so.”

It sounds like Tucows may have some gTLD plans of their own, well won’t share any information because the application system still is going to re-open.

 …

Demand Media, Inc. (NYSE: DMD)  just reported its earnings for the 1st Q of 2012 beating expectations and sending the stock soaring in aftermarket trading up almost 20%

Some interesting stuff in this report including that Demand invested $18 Million in new gTLD’s.

Previously Demand reported it was allocating $5 Million for new gTLD’s meaning that they were going to apply for some 25 new gTLD’s but now at $18 Million Demand is going to be one of the biggest players for new gTLD program as this equates to some 100 new gTLD applications.

Demand now become a way to play the new gTLD market without having to apply yourself.

eNom revenue was up 17% and grew by about 600,000 domains in the quarter.

These results maybe why Demand reportedly turned down an offer of $1.2 Billion a couple of weeks ago to go private.

Here is are the results:

Q1 2012 Financial Summary:

• Content & Media revenue ex-TAC grew 4% year-over-year and increased 1% compared to the fourth quarter of 2011. Year-over-year comparisons were impacted by early 2011 search algorithm changes. The 1% sequential improvement included the second consecutive quarter of revenue growth for eHow.

• Registrar revenue (eNom) grew 17% year-over-year and 3% compared to the fourth quarter of 2011.

• During the first quarter of 2012, the number of registered domains grew by a net 593,000 compared to 442,000 in the first quarter of 2011, due to growth from new partners and organic growth from resellers.

• Loss from operations and net loss include $1.8 million of accelerated non-cash amortization expense associated with content intangible assets removed from service in conjunction with the Company’s previously announced plan to improve its content creation and distribution platform.

• Free cash flow increased by $11.8 million year-over-year. The increase was driven by an 81% reduction of investment in intangible assets to $2.7 million. The intangible assets investment decline was the result of planned decreased content spend on eHow as the Company continued to make improvements to its content creation and distribution platform.

“Our first quarter growth and significant free cash flow marks a great start for 2012, particularly in light of a tough year-over-year comparison due to early 2011 search algorithm changes,” said Charles Hilliard, President and CFO. “Demand Media’s increased guidance reflects our first quarter performance, our improved outlook for the remainder of 2012 and, for the first time in more than a year, a return to accelerating year-over-year revenue growth beginning in Q2.”

Business Highlights:

• In April 2012, Demand Media invested $18 million in pursuit of its generic Top Level Domain (“gTLD”) initiative, which it believes represents a complementary strategic growth opportunity for its Registrar services.
…

Namecheap.com just hit the 3 million domain under management milestone.

The countdown on the site is as of publication 3,001,439 domain names.

In celebration of the 3 millionth domain name, NameCheap.com gave away $3,000 to the 3 millionth domain registration/transfer and I guess they will be making an announcement shortly on who won the cash and what the domain name was.

Namecheap.com’s domain numbers are under the Enom umbrella and accounts for approximately 25% of all domains under management at Enom which is the world’s second largest registrar.

If Namecheap wasn’t under Enom, it would be one of the 10 largest domain name registrars in the world.

Congrats to Richard and his team.…

Namecheap.com just hit the 3 million domain under management milestone.

In celebration of the 3 millionth domain name, NameCheap.com gave away $3,000 to the 3 millionth domain registration/transfer and I guess they will be making an announcement shortly on who won the cash and what the domain name was.

Namecheap.com’s domain numbers are under the Enom umbrella and accounts for approximately 25% of all domains under management at Enom which is the world’s second largest registrar.

If Namecheap wasn’t under Enom, it would be one of the 10 largest domain name registrars in the world.

Congrats to Richard and his team.…

A new ICANN registrar PurityNames.com ts promoting itself in an unusual way as the “The World’s First and Only Family-Friendly Domain Registrar”

According to a press release out today:

“Up until now, if you were in the market for a domain name to launch a website, you would be forced into doing business with companies who almost certainly have been profiting from the sale of domain names being used to spread pornography. With the launch of PurityNames.com, consumers and businesses finally have a family-friendly option.

“PurityNames.com Founder and CEO Jim Prendergast said, “What makes PurityNames.com different is that we refuse to profit from pornography. Period. ”

“Instead of doing business with a company that profits from activities that offend you, why not do business with someone who respects your morals and beliefs?”"

“Everyone who signs on with PurityNames.com must abide by the Purity Code of Conduct, which states you will not use the domain name for a website that will host or distribute pornographic content. ”

“We will police the domains and websites registered and hosted with us to ensure that they are not used for pornography.”

“If we find someone who has violated the Code of Conduct, we will immediately transfer your business elsewhere. We put principles ahead of profit. Purity is that important to us,” said Prendergast.”

The Website goes on to say

At Purity Names, we put principles before profits. We are the only ICANN accredited registrar to prohibit the registration of domains for hosting or distributing pornography. We refuse to profit from pornography. When you register your domain with Purity Names, you become part of a community of people working to make the Internet a better place for families. Do business with a company who respects and shares your values. Go Pure! with Purity Names.”

“”

NameCheap.com just announced that it will be giving away $3,000 to the person or company that “registers” the three millionth domain name on NameCheap.com

NameCheap.com, is quick approaching the 3 Million mark for domains under registration according to the counter on the site, NameCheap.com has over 2,990,990 domains under management so they are about 9,000 registrations from reaching the 3 Million domain milestone.

They will also be giving away 1,000 free domains before the 3 million mark and 1,ooo free domains after hitting the 3 million mark.

“If you buy or transfer any 10th domain between 2,990,00-3,000,000 then we will credit the associated cost back to you.  Moreover once we reach that 3 million milestone we’re giving away another 1,000 domain names for free for every 10th domain purchase or transfer until we reach 3,010,000.”

NameCheap.com shows up under Enom under RegistrarStats.com and based on these numbers accounts for well over 25% of all Enom’s domains under management.

Enom is the world’s second largest registrar behind Godaddy.com.

If NameCheap.com wasn’t under Enom’s numbers, at close to three million registrations it would place it into the top 10 of all domain name registrars.…

Yesterday I was having a couple of meetings at the restaurant where the ICANN conference is being held with some RightoftheDot.com clients.

As we were seated a large group walked passed us and sat down at the adjoining table and I couldn’t help but notice their attendee badges.

Homeland Security, ICE, Interpol, FBI, DOJ.

Serious guys.

It was a large group of over 10 and all were law enforcement from all around the world.

Its clear to those of who have attended the last few ICANN meetings that law enforcement is insisting that registrars know their customers, the domain holders.

While privacy will still be affording to those desirous of having their personal information not listed on the public whois, its clear law enforcement is going to push registrars into a “know your customer” environment.

Law enforcement has made it pretty clear that registrars are going to “voluntarily” comply with law enforcement’s demands or face legislation or regulation forcing them to do so and that you the domain holder are going to pay the registrars cost of complying.

Phil Corwin of the Internet Commerce Association has come to the same conclusion and just published an excellent article on the issue, which I urge all of you to read.

In part Mr. Corwin states:

“”(In the) ongoing negotiations between ICANN and its Registrar Stakeholder Group to beef up the registrar Accreditation Agreement (RAA), particularly in response to urgent requests from national law enforcement agencies. ”

“And the heart of those negotiations is an increased effort to obtain and confirm valid WHOIS data to confirm that registrants are legitimate and can be readily contacted, and that their identification data is retained. ”

“ICANN staff reported that the negotiations could be concluded within the next few weeks, and that incentives will be offered to encourage quick registrar adoption.”

“We don’t have to look far to estimate the cost of enhanced WHOIS verification.”

“ICM registry already employs such measures for the .XXX domain, and at a session on WHOIS compliance held the previous day the CEO of ICM Registry described the scope of its effort and their price. ”

“ICM expends about $6 per registrant for WHOIS verification; on average, each registrant purchases three domains, bringing the per domain price down to $2.”

“WHOIS compliance will be a much higher percentage of the price for incumbent gTLDs as well as many of the new ones on their way.”

“Of course, registrants may pay for their domains for up to ten years at a time, and it is not yet clear what requirements will be placed on registrars to verify the WHOIS data of existing registrants, and all of that will affect how this enhanced compliance affects domain pricing by registrars.”

“Nonetheless, we suspect that the cost of registrant WHOIS verification for all gTLDs will be similar to what ICM now expends, and it is not trivial.”

“In a highly competitive marketplace registrars will have no choice but to pass this cost on to registrants.”

“So, while we sympathize with the need of law enforcement to have the ability to identify bad actors, and understand that effective WHOIS verification can prevent many ill-intentioned domains from ever being registered,   it is also important that these new steps to ensure domain integrity remain feasible in scope and reasonable in cost.”…

A new report says that 1/2 of all rogue online pharmacy domain names are registered at two registrars.

According to LegitScript verification and monitoring service for online pharmacies, “at least one-third of all active rogue pharmacy sites are registered at Internet.bs,” and maybe responsible for up to “nearly 44 percent.”

The story first reported by krebsonsecurity.com interviewed the President of Internet.bs Marco Rinaudo, who said that “LegitScript’s report was bound to be “excellent advertising for our company.”

“Rinaudo is further quoted as saying “he was under no obligation to police whether his customers’ business may be in violation of some other nation’s laws, absent clear and convincing evidence that his registrants were operating illegally from their own country.”

“Even though I understand they could bother some pharmacy lobby, if an industry likes us, what’s the problem with an online pharmacy, as long as they are operating legally from their own country?”

“We cannot accept pressure to shut down a legitimate business just because it is not pleasing to some political lobbying group. We and I personally make sure that all the domains that are in breach of an applicable law and for which we receive a complete report, will be acted on the same day.”

“I have no grounds to stop some pharmacy site from operating without breaching the ICANN registrar agreement,”

“ICANN is telling me, ‘Marco, you can suspend a domain only if you receive an order from a competent court or if you have a UDRP decision.’

“We don’t care about FDA regulators, pharmacy regulators, food regulators or whoever. We have to organize our business to support our clients, including pharmacies and those subject to unjustified pressure. We’re not going to close these businesses or change our policy.”

The other registrar named in the LegitScript report as rogue was ABSystems, doing business as yournamemonkey.com.

 …

In reading one of the many stories about Jotform.com the site whose domain was seized and then returned by the Government for reasons still unexplained and therefore unknown reasons last week.

I came across the servers SPAM-AND-ABUSE.COM on which the domain name Jotform.com was placed on a few days ago and then removed from on Friday.

According to DailyChanges.com, There are currently over 225,000 domain names on the servers SPAM-AND-ABUSE.COM (you might also see the servers listed as ns1.suspended-for.spam-and-abuse.com)

The domain name SPAM-AND-ABUSE.COM is owned by Godaddy.com

The domain name SPAM-AND-ABUSE.COM does not resolve, so if a domain name is moved to the servers the domain and site will no longer resolve and of course any email directed to the domain will bounce.

Out of the 225,000 domain names placed on these servers, 212K are .info domains or about 90%.

It looks just by those numbers that a substantial  portion of the domains placed on these servers are there for a good reason.

I reached out to Godaddy.com and asked about these servers; how domains get moved to the servers and how a domain holder can gets it domain name moved off these servers back to its normal servers and make their site and email operational again.

I also asked if the domain name once moved to these servers where locked at the registrar level or could be transferred to another registrar.

To the great credit of Godaddy and while I certainly didn’t expect a response during a holiday weekend I got one.

Actually I got several.

Ben Butler,  Director of Network Abuse for Godaddy explained the process as follows:

“”You probably know Go Daddy has a long history of addressing abusive practices on its network.”

” While we don’t “police” or “monitor” our systems for these activities (nor could we due to the prohibitively large scope of such an effort), we do receive many thousands of complaints every month on a variety of abusive practices such as spam, phishing, malware installers, and so on.”

“We investigate each complaint that comes in.”

“Those investigations sometimes demonstrate a need to re-direct the DNS of an abusive domain name in order to prevent further harm.  (For example, an extra hour of up-time for a phisher can result in thousands of identities being stolen, so time is of the essence in many cases.) ”

“Domains pointed at the name servers you listed will not resolve unless and until the underlying issue is addressed by the registrant.  Redirection of the DNS can also sometimes be combined with a “hold” status that would remain in effect until the customer can address the problem with our 24×7 Abuse Response Team.”

“There are many types of harmful and illegal activity that can result in a domain being suspended and directed to these servers.…