Domain investor, Page Howe, was visibly dejected today, after announcing the loss of gTLD domains to the Registry, Donuts, Inc.
Apparently, three full weeks after Page registered those domains at eNom, he received an email notifying him of a “mistake”:
“im speechless at the ineptitude of donuts.co , for those of you in the domain space, how would you like to get an email telling you names you had registered 3 weeks ago we being taken away. Welcome to my nightmare […] – we made a mistake and were taking the name back – hwo about YOU MADE A MISTAKE AND YOU PAY THE PENALTY AND CONSEQUENCES – how do i ever then know if i really have a domain name?”
This is really frustrating news about the particular domains registered by Page Howe; he raises a valid point: how late after registration can a Registry reclaim these domains citing an error?
We covered Page’s gTLD registrations last month; there was no information so far on which domains were reclaimed by Donuts, Inc.
Update: As stated by Paul Stahura of Donuts, Inc.: “There is a list of various governmental organizations (and their abbreviations – I think this one is short for “economic cooperation organization” or some such) that ICANN has temporarily restricted from registration pending outcome of their binding policy development process, and this “eco” string is on that list, and it slipped through the cracks on our reserved list.”
This post is 100% true!
This is theft no? Isnt a contract a binding agreement? If they will do this after 3 weeks…than why not 3 years?
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This is troubling and will immediately hurt Donut’s credibility.
Until this is sorted out, I will NOT be registering any more Donuts domains.
If the honchos at Donuts don’t figure this out and return those domains ASAP to Page Howe, their business will be dead in the water.
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A similar situation happened to me several years ago with ENOM where they had a premium .TV which was priced at $50. I bought it, paid for it with my credit card. It appeared in my account for two to three days and then I received a message that they had made a mistake and I would have to pay the full price or they would take the name back. Now let’s see – fi I misprice a domain at Godaddy Auction or Godaddy Premium Listings or SEDO or Afternic etc and someone pays that price, what happens if I refuse to deliver the domain because it was MISPRICED?
There’s more coverage by Mike Berkens at TheDomains right now. Apparently, it’s about Eco.* domains.
Imminent domain? It’s their game (gTLD registries) and they make the rules. Looks like ICANN has a lot more work to do.
Join the club Howe !
I had 2 names take out after two weeks from GD.
funds.today and flying.today what r u going 2 do…???
Update posted.
Page made a statement:
“donuts reached out to me today and explained the situation, and i do “feel” less antagonistic, and maybe like i overreacted……. its just a name, it just a mistake. its an ICANN policy. But Paul it was a short list, your guys should have got it right, an accident is when an outside surprise hits you, id say this was registry operations 101. I still feel like the manner it was pulled and the fragility of my position as a registrant was exposed for what i guess it really is. Ill absolve them of malice, and simply ask when do i know the names i have registered are really mine? And can you please put yourself in the mind of your customer, where each name is a valuable piece of property, and when we think we have it, we really do think it cant get taken back. Respect the Registrant . please.”
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Here’s the scary part about all this:
What if any of those eco domainer holders had sold their domains? Can you imagine the kind of disruption that would have caused both seller and buyer?
In such a case, does Donuts offer any kind of redress for what was essentially ITS mistake?
ICANN and the registries need to address these issues and have a policy in place when a registry makes an error.
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