Godaddy.com became the second domain registrar to cave into the Kentucky court order as it issued.
Godaddy has sent a “registrar certificate” to the court in Kentucky, which gives the bearer exercises control of the domain name.
Enom.com also transferred domains to Kentucky.
Its quite sad that neither of these registrars waited until the registrants had their day in court to object to the seizure order before transferring the domain.
All domainers should take note of the registrars that are protecting their customers and those that are giving their property away, without notice or hearing.
We will continue to keep you updated on this extremely important issue
Really sad and upsetting indeed.
I have thousands of domains at Godaddy….. now I just don’t know if Moniker or Fabulous is where I should put my better domains for now. I see this going beyond gambling here soon, like something is considered “indecent” in Kentucky or W. Virgina, etc……
Any suggestions?
Johnny
We will have a solution for you next week
please make sure “the solution” has killer pricing so it is affordable for everyone 🙂
looking forward to your solution.
Steve
If true, we all should be disappointed especially in Bob Parsons of GoDaddy, a man who–based on his strong opinions and “tough” approach to business–would cave in–and immediately so–to this illegal domain grab by Kentucky.
Thankfully, I don’t have (and now never will) any names with either of these shortsighted, week-kneed companies. Anyone who does needs to give serious thought to quickly moving them to one or more registrars with the guts to put up a fight for their clients.
Would be nice to see public announcements from those registrars willing to stand up and say that they’ll fight these kind of actions every step of the way…so we’ll know who we ought to keep our valuable assets with.
I was feeling a little smug about having transferred all my domains to godaddy from enom a few months ago but I guess I’m not so smug now.
It would be nice to see those public announcements from registrars willing to stand up to this type of thing – I figure we should go one step further and solicit that information, I’ll start with Dreamhost and see how far I get with getting an answer – I’m also interested in the hosting end of it too, I’d like to know of hosts that wouldn’t just hand over all my hosting info without at least attempting to protect my interests.
Agree. VERY surprised that Godaddy just gives in on a stupid court order.
Word will get around.
not knowing what solution Mike has in the works.
We would still advice you to move your names to Fabulous.com or EuroDNS
For a year I’ve been slowly moving my names from gocrappy to Moniker (am gone from 1and1 already) I guess I need to speed up the process…looking forward to your ideas soon Mike.
Guys
Just a few days out on a new solution
In the meantime I would stay clear of those that throw in the towel immediately before you even get your day in court.
I can tell you for sure that moniker has not giving up the domains, but put them in a escrow, disputed account.
Enom and Godaddy gave them up
Hearing is tomorrow.
More to come
This response will step on some toes.
Many of the so called business people have NO ethics or principals – they would sell their soul for a dollar.
There are many Company’s like Enon online – all they care is about themselfes.
First the evil is after casino related domain names then they will go after adult domain names and then they will go after any other domain name.
Many domain name owners are fools they think that their domain names are safe – gues what they are NOT.
Register your domain names with domain name registrars outside of the US / Australian / Canada / China region.
What a mindset in the Name of Democracy will protect you and take away your freedom (and your domain names) – That is the world of today
I posted the comment at Conceptualist.com a few weeks ago and guess what, it is slowly coming true
My post:
To all GEO Domainers!
You all have some of the best assets available on the net and lets all hope it never comes to the point, which happend in the German country code .de TLD. The .de TLD ruled by “Denic” and by German law decided that city names belong to the city and on every name dispute the original owner had to transfer the name to the City (Government).
I hate to see this might even be happening one day to the GEO .com which prevents me from investing in these names at the moment. For many GEO owners this might not be in there consideration. But it as already happend once and what should prevent some idiot popping up and putting down a law in the USA?
Scary !!!
Well, what can I say. I guess the war on geo’s names are starting off.
If Kentucky and the registrars should get away with this dirty pull.
Then no Domain or Domainer is safe anymore.
The registrars Godaddy & Enom should be punished for this easy give up of names.
Domainers, its time for a change! Start moving. Not just to ohter registrars but also out of the country. If the law is not on your side, why pay taxes on the names you own and provide this law with more money.
I will start moving my names for sure!
Think about it
Kentucky’s order to foreclose these domains on the premise of illegal online gambling activity is ludicrous.
This personal vendetta by governor Beshear that is having a ripple effect in the “should know better” registrars like go daddy.
As far as I know there is nothing to suggest that Kentucky made any effort to contact the owners of these domains, they simply effected the court order and said Yeeeha!
So are Kentucky’s gaming populous simply going to say “yes guv’nor, we is real bad folks, an gonna quit dem caseeners right way suh”.
NO
I wrote a post on my blog today slamming Bob Parsons and Go Daddy. Now I just read on DNJournal that Go Daddy is denying they turned over the domains (http://www.dnjournal.com/archive/lowdown/2008/dailyposts/09-25-08.htm). It looks like I might owe Bob an apology.
Looks like it’s true. I checked bet21.com’s WHOIS and it’s still with the registrant at Go Daddy.
Guys
Talked to Rick Schwartz, he talked to the godaddy people and they assured him they did not hand the domains over.
The initial report came from an attorney who is an adviser to the ICA.
What he said was they gave a document to the state which gave the ownership of the domain to the bearer of the certificate and therefore the domain might have been given up without the whois changing.
We will see how it plays out tomorrow.
Been a crazy week.
Also Netsol said they would not give them up.
This leaves enom as the only one
How about tucows ? is it safe, any rumors on them?