Talk about having some bad timing.

The domain ChileEarthQuake.com dropped just 2 days after the 8.8 earthquake rocked Chile.

Today the expired domain was auctioned off and sold on SnapNames.com

While we always discourage people from registering domains that take advantage of any disasters we couldn’t help but notice the irony that this domain was not renewed by its former owner and then lost the domain just 2 days after the disaster struck.

Hopefully the new owner will do the right thing and send the traffic to the Red Cross or some other reputable charity, however right now its just parked.

Go Daddy announced today that it has just surpassed 40 million, registered domain names.

Godaddy said it typically registers a million domain names per month.

Godaddy also says they have a 50% market share of all active new domains registered in the world and is more than three times the size of its closest competitor.

Go Daddy CEO and Founder Bob Parsons is quoted as saying:

“”The Go Daddy portfolio surpassed 40 million domain names today.  The Internet is the heart of the new economy,” said . “The Internet is one of the few sectors showing monumental growth and Go Daddy is positioned in the sweet spot of the expansion. Think about it, to have your own Web site, you need a domain name and no one can deliver on a domain like Go Daddy. Our growth is essentially a window into what’s happening with the Internet.”

“For the last two consecutive years, Go Daddy has been registering, renewing or transferring a domain name at the rate of one every second of every day.”

Wow

“Over the next twenty-five years, I see the Internet growing exponentially,” said Parsons. “Think about it, whether you are communicating, learning or conducting business, being on the Internet is where it’s all happening. I’d say if you aren’t online with your business, you really aren’t in the game.”

Go Daddy’s growth is benefiting people looking for jobs right now too.   Currently there are more than 100 open positions available at www.GoDaddy.com/Jobs.

(Thanks Cole!)

What happens when a site which is suppose to be giving out unbiased reviews of products is accused of changing it reviews based on ad dollars?

Welcome to the world of Yelp.com, which was hit with a second class-action suit this week, alleging that they “extorted” companies by offering to hide bad reviews and promote positive ones in exchange for advertising.

The suit, filed by D’Ames Day Spa, in the federal district court for the central district of California, alleges that Yelp removed 13 of 14 positive reviews of her business from the site after she refused to purchase advertising on the site.

The suit goes on allege unfair and unlawful business practices and further allege that Yelp acted in violation of the Racketeer Influenced Corrupt Organizations Act.

Yes that a RICO allegation, serious stuff.

Late month, a veterinary center in California alleged that Yelp had offered to bury bad reviews in exchange for a $300-a-month ad buy.

The CEO of Yelp, Jeremy Stoppelman said on Yelp’s blog: “This suit, like the other, is without merit, we will fight it aggressively and we believe we will win”

Of course there are always conspiracy theorist and business owners looking for explanations of  why there services are rated low or their competitors are rated high.

Such is the danger of any any site that rates businesses while accepting ads.

It seems that lawsuits maybe part of the cost of doing business for such “rating” sites.

On the other hand with eyeballs comes a lot of power to make and break businesses especially restaurants which depend greatly on reviews and word of mouth.

There are those, including an article in the EastBayExpress, which claim these Yelp takes advantage of its power to get establishments to increased their advertising to hide bad reviews or add to good review, or will change reviews on based on the lack of advertising.

We will see how this plays out in the courts, but this is definitely something to think about if your planning on developing any of your domains into this type of site.

See the full sales list and some translations after the jump.

(c) 2009 DomainNameNews.com

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