iEstates.com

Domain Guardians provide protection and management of domains in the event of death or disability

Domain name industry experts Mike Robertson, Jen Sale, Bill Vanderent, Adam Strong and Paul Keating have partnered to establish Domain Guardians, an ICANN accredited registrar providing domain estate planning and management services to domain professionals. The team will be launching the company and services at the upcoming ICANN Silicon Valley meeting in San Francisco, CA, USA from March 13-18, 2011.

The combination of Dark Blue Sea alumni, Robertson, Sale and Vanderent, along with Strong and Keating, offers over 50 years of combined experience in the domain industry. “Working with a group of this caliber is humbling, and we’re all very excited to offer the domain community a comprehensive suite of services that provide real value,” stated Robertson of this opportunity.

Domain Guardians has developed Domain Legacy to technically and legally protect and manage domain assets in the event of a portfolio owner’s death or disability.

Paul Keating, prominent domain lawyer, recognizes the complicated nature of managing a portfolio, “No one lives forever, and most domain investors are not planning enough for the future. Managing domains across multiple registrars and monetization providers is a daunting task. It requires a great deal of skill developed on the back of years that may include lost opportunities, missteps and other failures. What will happen to the asset base and income streams when the manager is no longer “there” because of a death or disability? How will our survivors cope in an industry where contacts and experiences are shared by word of mouth?”

Veteran domain professional, Adam Strong, addresses the importance of Domain Legacy for your loved one’s protection and peace of mind, “Like other domain investors, I’ve thought, ‘Who’ll take care of my domains when I’m gone?’… I’ll be transferring my assets to my loved ones, who unfortunately don’t have the skills or desire to continue managing my business. It gives me peace of mind to know that they can trust the expertise of Domain Guardians to do this for them. Every domain investor with a valuable portfolio should protect the future of that portfolio.”

For more information, and to arrange a meeting with the team at ICANN, please email hello@domainguardians.com.

Disclaimer: Adam Strong is also Managing Editor & Owner of DNN.

[via Press Release]

(c) 2011 DomainNameNews.com (1)

DNN received an email tonight from Mike Robertson and Jen Sale from Dark Blue Sea (aka Fabulous.com) that they have jointly resigned from their positions.  They will stay on board for a handover period that should end by February 28th. The down-under duo won’t be disappearing from the domain space any time soon though.  They have plans to stay in the space and partner together.

Sale told DNN, “We’ve both had a great run at DBS thanks to our co-workers and especially our clients at Fabulous. We’re really excited about furthering our careers in the space as we explore new opportunities together.”

Dark Blue Sea was taken over by Australian company Photon Group in late 2009 . CEO Richard Moore stepped down shortly after the acquisition and later Dan Warner moved on from the company to head DomainAdvertising.com.

DNN has seen nothing but praise from customers about the quality of support from Robertson and Sale. Many domainers consider them to be the best service and support team in the space.  After 9 years of working at DBS in Business Development and Account Management roles, they have a wealth of experience, contacts and satisfied customers that will surely be invaluable in whatever they do together.

(c) 2011 DomainNameNews.com (8)

As  Andrew at Domain Name Wire revealed, Fabulous.com is going to be releasing a new solution for Registrars and Resellers by the name of Yexa. According to the PDF published on the preview site, that also hosts a sign-up form for the beta of the software, The software is going to allow customers to sell domains, SSL certificates and Hosting.

DNN chatted with Jen Sale about the launch and the features of the new product via Instant Messaging. Read the full interview and learn more about the new product after the jump.

DNN: Thank you Jen for taking the time to talk to DNN today about this new product by the name of Yexa you are going to be launching at HostingCon. Can you tell us more about it?

Jen Sale: Thanks Frank! Of course. Approximately six months ago, we were on the hunt for an all-inclusive platform to manage a new retail registrar. We spent almost two months researching and testing a number of solutions but found them confusing, incomplete and expensive. Plus, there wasn’t just one solution that would do everything we required, or at the level of quality we expect for both ourselves and our customers. It was at this point we discussed creating our own solution, and many of the people we spoke to along the way expressed great interest in what we planned to develop.

For our initial product release, we have developed two software solutions – Yexa Registrar and Yexa Reseller. These two products are designed to work in conjunction with each other, and will address the gap we believe exists in the current marketplace. Yexa Registrar provides a fully functional white-labelled registry-registrar manager with a built-in reseller network. Yexa Reseller provides a cohesive, easy to set up and use, retail-facing domain and hosting solution.

DNN: So who are those two solutions mostly meant for existing registrars and resellers or new ones? It seems an interesting expansion of focus for you, considering you are launching it at a hosting conference.

Jen Sale: The two software solutions will cater to both existing and new registrars and resellers.

Yexa Registrar services individuals with ICANN and/or other ccTLD accreditation. This allows them to manage either their own personal domains directly (domainers), or operate a retail registrar with the option of creating their own reseller network.

Yexa Reseller services people wanting to run a retail-facing domain and hosting business, regardless of whether they’re an ICANN registrar or not. Existing resellers who wish to expand their customer offerings, and/or explore better provider offerings, can integrate Yexa Reseller which will support existing software via a comprehensive API.

One of the things we’ve been repeatedly asked for is an interface similar to Fabulous.com, and whether we’d be white-labelling it in the future. So this product is really a natural progression for us in offering domain services to our domain portfolio customers, and also extending into new business.

We’ve been on both sides of the fence, and have found the market distinctly lacking in suitable solutions, and we think we can do better.

DNN: Considering Fabulous.com’s background it seems that the software is mostly focused on selling domain names, yet the brochure also mentions SSL Certificates and hosting. Are you going to be offering a suite of different products?

Jen Sale: Yexa Registrar is targeted to domain operators (registrars). Yexa Reseller enables someone to create and manage a website which sells a number of web services, which may include domains, hosting, SSL certificates and more.

Yexa is fully flexible and provider neutral. It aims to provide a maximum level of choice to resellers, no longer tying them down to a single provider. Moreover, its modular structure will allow third parties to write custom extensions, in turn expanding choice even further and allowing resellers to provide innovative offerings to their end-users.

DNN: That sounds like a very smart and forward thinking platform design.

Yexa is described as a  software in your material and on the site, but yet the description (at least for Yexa Reseller) sounds more like it is actually a hosted service for your clients. Can you share some more details on how a reseller or registrar sets Yexa up on their own server? What is handled on the customer’s side, what’s taken care of on your end?

Jen Sale: Yexa is a software application which is installed on the clients server platform of choice. The software has been designed to run on either Windows, Linux or OS X. The databases supported are MySQL, PostgreSQL and SQLite. Minimum supported PHP is 5.1.

In most cases the client’s customer IP belongs solely to them and is stored on their servers. Only in certain situations where we distribute information on their behalf (such as WHOIS data) does customer data need to be stored on our servers.

DNN: This sounds like a good solution to an age-old problem as to who owns the customer.

From what I understand you’re aiming at a very easy wordpress-like install of the software. So does this mean you don’t need to be too technical to use your solution, but yet one can also build on it if there is technical in-house knowledge (since there is an API)?

Jen Sale: Our primary goal was to create an easy-to-use solution which has the flexibility to cater for more sophisticated requirements, and to grow with the client’s business.

DNN: Can you tell us anything about the pricing structure yet, or is this too early to ask?

Jen Sale: Yexa Registrar pricing is a tiered cost-plus model. Whereas Yexa Reseller is a tiered monthly software license, plus cost per provider unit model.

Our pricing will be extremely competitive!

DNN: Yexa is an interesting name for the product – how was the name chosen? I can see from the whois history that it was apparently bought from a Canadian Domainer – is it an abbreviation or just a short name?

Jen Sale: We chose the name because it’s short and easy to remember. No, it doesn’t abbreviate to anything.

DNN: Judging from the whois the company is a separate entity – is it wholly owned by Dark Blue Sea or is it a division of Fabulous.com?

Jen Sale: Yexa is wholly owned by Fabulous.com’s parent company, Dark Blue Sea.

DNN: You took care of the DomainDistribution Network before and Yexa is your latest project – what was and is your involvement with this new product?

Jen Sale: I’ve been closely involved with the project since its inception, and have the dual role of Product Manager and Business Development Manager. I will also continue to manage the Domain Distribution Network and ROAR.

DNN: Thank you very much Jen again for taking the time for chatting with DNN and telling us more about your new product. We’re looking forward to learning more as the work progresses.

Jen Sale: You’re very welcome Frank! Thanks for the opportunity. If anyone would like more information, please sign-up for our exclusive beta program at www.yexa.com.

While I know that the desire of those who give of their “time, talent and treasure” is not to seek recognition, I’ve decided to point out several stories from people that I’ve met in the domain business that are giving back in ways that I find inspiring. Over the last few months, some of their stories have inspired me to think differently and look at the world in a different light. Some of them are donating money to charity, some of them are putting in time and serving and some are donating their talent to do good. I thought I’d share these short glimpses of what others are up to as a way to pass along the inspiration I felt from their efforts, in hopes of inspiring more stories.

I’m sure I’ll forget a few, but several stories that come to mind from the past include Donna Mahony and Bido’s benefit auction for the burro rescue, Michael Mann’s efforts with Grassroots.org,  Eytan Elbaz’s whose PSA “Dear Parents” donated $25,000 to the Museum of Tolerance,  Aftermarket.com Domainer Mardi Gras auction benefiting New Orleans Habitat for Humanity and Fabulous.com’s head shaving fun (several times) to benefit cancer research. Domain registrar behemoth Godaddy.com even touted charitable donation of a bunch of money toward several charities last year.

Recently, Ron Jackson pointed out a story of a group of domain investors and domain business leaders who are travelling to Kenya to learn of the efforts of the Water School.  The Water School a charity that is aiding in efforts to bring clean water to Africa.

Continued after the jump.

Through the charity’s Ray of Hope program The Water School empower schools and other existing community groups like hospitals to teach solar disinfection of water. Students and families are provided with education and materials to meet their own water needs.  According to the group’s website “One $50 Ray of Hope will provide a family of six with safe, clean drinking water for years to come.”

The group includes Richard Lau, Ammar Kubba, Susan Prosser, Gregg McNair and others.   We hope to hear more stories from our colleagues as they return from their trip to Kenya around September 29th.

To learn more about The Water School please visit TheWaterSchool.org

And just as one group wraps up their trip to Africa, tomorrow another colleague in the domain space, Jen Sale from Dark Blue Sea is heading off to Sudan with Door of Hope Australia (DOHA) to film a documentary. DOHA is a child-focused, non-government organization established to help alleviate the suffering caused by poverty in developing nations.  The film that Sale and her colleagues are filming will cover “the history and reasons behind the civil war, the 21 1/2 year struggle, the Comprehensive Peace Agreement, the upcoming election and referendum, the tragic death of Dr John Garang, and the struggle to bring about development in the devastated Southern Sudan. The film will feature firsthand stories by those who dedicated and sacrificed so much to ensure equality could come to the marginalized people of Sudan.”

Sale has a blog at JenSale.com where she has already begun blogging about the trip . She plans to continue updating with video posts throughout the trip.

Learn more about Door of Hope Australia at DoorofHopeAustralia.org

Last year I learned of a story of a little girl named Gwendolyn Strong. I don’t know Gwendolyn and although we share the same last name, we aren’t related. However, we do have a connection through her father, Bill Strong, who I met through the domain channel.  I first read about Gwendolyn on a blog started by her parents. Gwendolyn has Spinal Muscular Atrophy (SMA), the leading genetic killer of children under 2 years of age. (You may have seen banners on DNN linking to the End SMA petition.) Her parents, Bill and Victoria, have created the Gwendolyn Strong Foundation to raise awareness, fund research and support those affected by this disease.

Learn more about the Gwendolyn Strong Foundation at GwendolynStrongFoundation.org
and read more about Bill, Victoria’s and Gwendolyn at their blog at GwendolynStrong.com

Most in the domain business should feel truly blessed. While it likely took hard work for many of us to get where we are in life, I’d venture to guess many of the “struggles” we face pale in comparison to what the rest of the world faces every day. It doesn’t take much effort to look around, outside of your bubble, and realize that life could be much different. I know it’s a bit cliche, and I don’t mean to be preachy here, but I hope by passing on some of these stories that you might take a minute to read what others are involved in, even the small things, and that you might appreciate the things you have and strive to help others in any way that you possibly can.

(c) 2009 DomainNameNews.com

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