All the good domains are taken!
A petition to “Stop Domain Name Parking and Cybersquatting” which was started in 2007 has received 775 signatures so far.
The 1717-day old petition reads:
“To ICANN President and CEO, Dr. Paul Twomey We, the undersigned, are concerned about domain name parking abuse and request that ICANN revisit the Anti-Cyberssquatting Consumer Protection Act and the Trademark Cyberpiracy Prevention Act to ensure that a domain names that are parked would be available for sale at a price tag that would not be considered extortion. We request that ‘Cybersquatting’ issues be discussed, reviewed and formalized this year into a written law to help stop the continuation of domain parking as an extortionist means that cause legitimate businesses to pay high price for the domain name.”
A lot of the comments are hilarious, simply because they attribute the term “cybersquatter” and “cyberextortionist” to anyone who has registered their wished-for domain and asks for a fair market price for it.
Says Chris H., from Peterborough Canada:
“was investigating the possibility of grabbing a domain name for my blog. I thought my last name would be nice, which is Hotte. WTF my last name is premium and they want 3k for it. Hotte.net. Go to website.ws, where the TLD participates in keeping the premium name revenue for themselves. Creating the .ws TLD was nothing more than a quick cash grab. There is no point to creating new TLDs until the issue of parking is resolved. “
Chris L. from London, UK states:
“Starting a new online business is now almost impossible because all good domains are parked with extortionate fees being demanded. This is blocking small-scale business on a global scale for the selfish profit of a few. They should use their turn their business minds to something which advances the real global economy and creates real jobs instead of cowardly blackmailing budding entrepreneurs.”
Joel E. is pulling his panties in a knot, yapping:
“PLEASE! They are stopping us from buying domains at reasonable prices.”
Shanti S. – an example of a lowballer says:
“I am going at it with a guy who is sitting on my name and want’s at a minimum $1000. I offered him $50 and he acted all offended and rude toward me. This is someone trying to sell me my business name that’s been established for 10 years?! Rude.”
It’s amazing when a few late newcomers to the Internet get upset that they weren’t born a couple of decades earlier! 😀
The real stupid thing is these people thing all these names would be there on a whim if someone else hadn’t registered them, like the guy with the last name above, so many people, so many of the same last names, yes only a few random tld’s. Just like the fact we can’t all live in Malibu, if some foreign billionaire wants to buy a house on us soil, and come live there for 3 days a year, maybe icann should take the house back as well.
They don’t have to worry anymore. ICANN is taking steps and giving these people .everything and .anything and .state and .love and .business. They now can use whatever name they want. But we know their next complaint will be… “but we really want the .com, all these other extensions are garbage”
Most if not all of those who signed that petition have a definite lack of knowledge towards the industry. I tried to post a link to an article on Business Insider which does a decent job of explaining the actual situation without me actually having to take the time to explain it and naturally they wouldn’t post it. If anyone is interested:
Why $10,000 For a Domain Name is Still Cheap
http://articles.businessinsider.com/2011-04-10/tech/30089979_1_domain-names-trademark-fair-value
won best poll for registrar even.
if looking up any name on the whois search. it tells this…
‘GoDaddy.com NameMatch has found similar domain names related to your search. Registering multiple domain names may help protect your online brand against internet squatters who could try to buy up these names in the hopes of selling them to you at an inflated price’.
so they show us recommendatons that you can buy in the cart but tell u it is from a squatter at inflated price. why r they selling squatter names then.
Hilarious. These people obviously have no understanding of how domains work.
It’s like saying the vacant lot on the corner of my block that has a for sale sign on it is not being used. I want to start build a store so he should have to give it to me, because he isn’t using it and is just trying to extort money by selling it to me for more than I want to pay.
I want to sell cheeseburgers, so I want cheeseburgers.com. Well, guess what, even if it wasn’t parked someone would have registered it in the last 20 years anyway.. Duh
Haha you guys seem to have no idea what “fair market value” actually is. You sit on a crappy domain that is only going to appeal to a blogger and ask $1k for it. they might offer $100.
That vacant block on the corner might be worth $1m if you build a restaurant on it but all you are doing is sitting your fat arse on it, no restaurant, yet you still ask $1m. You should expect an offer of 100k, prices aren’t set by how much you want to sell it for, it’s set by how much the market is willing to pay for the product. No one wants to pay $1k for a domain to blog on, sure you can wait and hope for some hollywood movie to be released with the same name. But even then the number of movie with (movie) tacked on the end of the name indicates even they with millions of dollars to spend agree that domain squatters are nothing but fucking morons.
Dan – I’m surprised you actually know which ‘crappy domains’ we collectively own. Please tell me what I’ll be having for lunch tomorrow, oh great Oracle!
But since you’re replying to a year old post, you must have come here doing some Googling. Please do share.
The issue is not that people cant get the name they want, its the fact the name they want is not being used at all. I think there needs to be a distinction between owning a domain for using it for your own purpose, and owning a domain to make money from advertising. I should be able to register any domain I want if I have a use for it, but I should not be allowed to place ads or sell that domain at an extortionate price (unless the domain is already being used legitimately). Basically the act of domain parking or domain squatting for the purpose of making a profit from the domain name (and not the website content) needs to stop, its killing the internet and prevents small business being properly represented on the web.
Laurence – When you buy a house, you can rent it or otherwise keep it unoccupied. As long as you pay your mortgage and HOA dues, you are master of your domain. The Internet is expanding, not shrinking. The proverbial ‘small business’ owners have to understand that buying a domain in the secondary market is a long term investment.