iEstates.com

The auction for the domain name ePark.com ended yesterday on Namejet with a bid of $30,600.

While the domain has a nice ring to it, I think it priced at full retail at $30K

Speaking of full retail, FindAbook.com got a price of $8,610.

Ferdinand.com pulled in $6K but not sure what you do with that one either.

OrganicEggs.com sold for $5K but I’m not sure such a thing exists, I know of free range eggs but not sure about organic.

Mercenaries.com pulled in $4,100 but not sure what exactly one would do with that domain unless your going to go with a “jobs” type of site and then not sure that’s a totally controllable community

TaxAlert.com found at buyer at $4K but I still like the PayNoTaxes.com that I picked up for $310 at Namejet.com better.

MediationCenter.com went in comparison for a pretty cheap $2,100
.

7881.com got $2,600

This morning TechCrunch covered the acquisition and launch of the domain name ScienceFiction.com by “Domain name investor and blogger Patrick Ruddell (aka Chef Patrick)”

In an article entitled “ScienceFiction.com Aims To Become The “TechCrunch Of Sci-Fi””

According to the story Chef Patrick  bought the domain name off of Domain Capital for $175K after someone defaulted in their loan.

“”The goal of ScienceFiction.com is to offer top quality news, reviews and interviews about the world of sci-fi and fantasy.”

Ruddell tells me he’ll handle the business side of things, while one of his partners, who he adds has a journalism degree and has been writing for 20+ years, will take care of the editorial part of the equation.”

Its no small achievement to get your domain purchase covered by TechCrunch.

So congrats on that.

Interesting to note that no where in the story is does not say anywhere in the story that the Chef is employed full time for Moniker.com or that Moniker.com at one time had the domain under a brokerage contract.

I know the domain was in several Moniker Auctions including DomainFest 2009 which it had a reserve price of $100-$250K.

However I’m told the domain was not under contract at Moniker while the Chef was employed at Moniker

Its also interesting to note that at least 2 other Oversee employees seem to be involved in the project.

Michele Van Tilborg husband, Dirk Van Tillborg is listed on the site on Partner & Editor in Chief.

Rob McClinton is listed as as a Partner & Business Development Manager of the company.

Rob is the Director, of Oversee Client Services & Registrar Operations.

I actually looked at the domain myself but passed on it, because as the title of the TechCrunch article illustrates, most people will naturally want to shorten Science Fiction to Scifi and thought you really needed both versions.

The statement the TechCrunch took its title from is the quote of the Chef in which he says:

“”Or, as Ruddell puts it (and not us): the “TechCrunch of Science Fiction”.”"”

Yet when the story title went out TechCrunch shortened it to Scifi.

Despite that issue, with TechCrunch coverage the site is off to a great start.

Scifi.com is owned by NBC/Universal and forwards to SYFY.com which is the old Scifi network.

Enom and Moniker are both Live on Afternic as DLS Premium partners.

This means that if your names are registered at Moniker, Enom, Enom Central, or Bulk Register (or other DLS Premium Partners, NetSol, Register.com, Name.com) you can now opt-in to DLS Premium at Afternic.

Once you are opted in to DLS Premium, your names will be listed for sale at more than 24 major sites; including Enom, Moniker, NetSol, Register.com, Name.com, GoDaddy Auctions etc.

If the name is sold at a DLS Premium partner site – the names will be instantly transferred to the buyer at the time of transaction, without any further action on your part.

More than 35 Million domain queries a month are made across the DLS Premium network.

In a press release issued today by ICM Registry, who is seeking to run the .XXX registry, the announcement of a Founders Program was made.

The program allows for webmasters who plan to develop a site using a .XXX domain to secure it prior to general availability.

Here is the full release:

Adult Webmasters can secure premium .XXX domains if they proactively develop and maintain domains with the .XXX extension prior to the General Launch, in Summer 2011.

ICM Registry is pleased to announce the launch of the .XXX Founders program. This program is multi-dimensional and designed exclusively for adult webmasters. One part of the program is targeted towards adult webmasters who are interested in building their existing brands with .XXX domains or possibly launching new adult sites with .XXX domains.

Another part of the Founders program is for adult webmasters who are willing to develop new and innovative sites using .XXX domains that were previously unavailable in the adult market such as mobile.xxx, videos.xxx, free.xxx or possibly securing a super-premium adult domain.

In addition, the Founders program will also help adult webmasters secure their matching adult domain portfolio that already exists in other TLDs without having to go through the Sunrise or Landrush phases. In other words, adult webmasters are being given an incentive to secure premium .XXX domain names to build and develop into premium adult properties and then promote them.

The Founders program is similar to how other domain registries offered incentives help potential domain owners develop and promote new properties on the top-level domain. By having adult websites with targeted and more meaningful content, the consumer will choose .XXX domains as their destination of choice.

ICM is asking adult webmasters to review the entire program including a further explanation of the basic terms at http://www.icmregistry.com/founder/.

The weekly Afternic.com report is out for the week ending December 12, 2010.

In all just under $640,000 of domains were sold in reportable .com sales priced $2,000 or more & non .com’s priced $1,000 or more.

This report shows 8 domains selling above the $10,000 mark and 22 domains selling above $5,000.

Congratulations to Afternic.com on another successful week of sales, indicating the aftermarket will continue to be strong in 2011.

Here is the full list…
 

Afternic.com has just released sales for the week ending November 28th totalling just over $610k.

Leading the way was Hobbies.com which sold for $297,500.

Below is the entire reportable list of .com sales over $2,000 & reportable non .com sales over $1,000.

The other day we wrote about 9 domain names that were seized by the HomeLand Security Department based on selling or helping the transfer of copyrighted material or selling allegedly fake designer goods

Now according to AVN the number of seized domains and sites appear to be closer to 70 than to 9.

The seizures which all took place by the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE)which is part of the Homeland Security Department.

Looks like many of these additional domains were selling products rather than music.

According to AVN here are the domains that have been seized so far:

2009jerseys.com
51607.com
amoyhy.com
b2corder.com
bishoe.com
borntrade.com
borntrade.net
boxedtvseries.com
boxset4less.com
boxsetseries.com
burberryoutletshop.com
cartoon77.com
cheapscarfshop.com
coachoutletfactory.com
dajaz1.com
discountscarvesonsale.com
dvdcollectionsale.com
dvdcollects.com
dvdorderonline.com
dvdprostore.com
dvdscollection.com
dvdsetcollection.com
dvdsetsonline.com
dvdsuperdeal.com
eluxury-outlet.com
getdvdset.com
gofactoryoutlet.com
golfstaring.com
golfwholesale18.com
handbag9.com
handbagcom.com
handbagspop.com
icqshoes.com
ipodnanouk.com
jersey-china.com
jerseyclubhouse.com
jordansbox.com
lifetimereplicas.com
louis-vuitton-outlet-store.com
lv-outlets.com
lv-outlets.net
lv-outletstore.com
massnike.com
merrytimberland.com
mycollects.com
mydreamwatches.com
mygolfwholesale.com
newstylerolex.com
nfljerseysupply.com
nibdvd.com
odvdo.com
oebags.com
onsmash.com
overbestmall.com
rapgodfathers.com
realtimberland.com
rmx4u.com
scarfonlineshop.com
scarfviponsale.com
shawls-store.com
silkscarf-shop.com
silkscarfonsale.com
skyergolf.com
sohob2b.com
sohob2c.com
storeofeast.com
stuff-trade.com
sunglasses-mall.com
sunogolf.com
tbl-sports.com
throwbackguy.com
timberlandlike.com
topabuy.com
torrent-finder.com
usaburberryscarf.com
usaoutlets.net

Read more what this is all about at DNJournal (scroll down the article)

According to the Philadelphia ABC affiliate’s site, law enforcement returned to National A! headquarters on Thursday “as part of an ongoing investigation by authorities  “that began with a state police probe of an escort service there and alledged prostitution”.

“A raid that started yesterday morning went into the night. Federal agents from the FBI, IRS and U.S. Attorney’s Office loaded dozens upon dozens of boxes into a U-Haul truck under the watchful eyes of both city and State Police.”

“According to the company, in 2006 National A-1 was grossing $20-million annually JUST off of Hotmovies.com and that number was expected to grow.”

AVN reported:

“Well, there were a lot agents here yesterday, there are still a few around here; that’s the amazing thing, this keeps going on.”

“These agents still in control of this building behind me here, this City Center building; they arrived yesterday morning with their subpoenas, and they have yet to leave.”

AVN.com Has just updated its story on the raid on National A-1 this morning.

According to the updated story, the Local CBS affiliate is reporting, that the raid was related to a prostitution ring investigation.”

and according to the new report it could be the National A-1 owned site Escorts.com, that could be the issue rather than HotMovies.com

AVN quoted a special agent of the FBI, Special Agent J.J. Klaver who said:

“Any information about the raid will only come from the U.S. Attorney’s office, not our office, and it will probably not be today, or for quite a while.”

Initially our thoughts went to a possible record keeping violation under US code 2257, but if this new report is correct it could be an outgrowth of the government crackdown on escort advertising which lead Craigslist.com to withdraw the adult/escort section of their site last month.

Another service,  backpage.com announced recently that it was going to block some sections of its highly popular personal section.