It’s always interesting to me to see domain names get discussed by non domainers. Most of the times there is only 1 or 2 comments on a website outside the industry. There was an interesting Reddit thread that has quite a lively discussion.
There were more pro domaining comments than I expected, vs the usual all domainers are squatters.
There were plenty of squatter comments and thoughts on how to restrict domaining.
This one is not in public view due to being voted down so much:
Interesting suggestion to make it harder on domain investors. Registries and registrars have already made it harder with some of those high reg/premium rates, which cut out the middle man (The investor).
I doubt many people in r/webdev care about new gTLDs.
All the comments are default talking about .com domains. 🙂
I can see where this might be a way to discourage squatting. I can also see it as the registrars making a boat load more money than they already do. Let’s not let the registrars like GD rip us off anymore than they already currently do!
Reddit ought to charge him $160 to post his ideas on their platform.
Lol
One can register a domain for use and later decide to sell it off..does that makes the person a domain squatter ? even if selling to a corporating who use similar name.
G’s already done that , prices could go up x100 times :)) and anytime without notice, in general the time you renew ( i’ m talking about some registries and not generalizing )
people missed that drama in reddit … , they seek a new drama 🙂
thanks for sharing that.
If that was the system the Verisign would propose the cap be lifted from $160 to $5000 before you know it!
It’s disappointing that so many people still consider domain investors “squatters”.
I know a married couple who registered many incredible domains in the 1990s — they were newlyweds after meeting at their university. Family members and friends thought they were crazy because of the $50 renewal fees.
They sold many of those domains, and with proceeds, they have funded hospitals, cancer research, and many other causes, and they have created comfortable lives for their families.
Homesteaders and wildcatters were called ugly names also —- and they helped change the landscape of the USA — and funded innovations and created economic opportunities across the land.
I guess I read this from you before and always wondered about it. Are they known in the industry as famous former domain investors? Can you say who they are and what domains they had?
So just the other day I stumbled upon a huge portfolio I’d never heard of before and never seen anyone mention anything about. I thought perhaps Frank Schilling had the most domains of any person or business, but this portfolio is almost 500,000. You can also download all the ones for sale. When I did a search on terms I was interested in, it became clear these were among the most horrifically worst and most worthless domains I had ever seen. Based on that sampling, it would seem to stand to reason that if I reviewed them all that would probably be the same as well. Who in the world carries a portfolio of almost 500,000 domains like that?
Was it HugeDomains.com? Haha
No, HD has good domains and has snapped up a lot of the ~1,000 or more I got rid of in recent years.
kind of an oxymoron:)
No I just let a lot of ones go that were good but not good enough for me personally to keep.
@John
This family (husband and wife) registered, in my opinion, one of if not the greatest premium domain portfolio in the 1990s. Not a portfolio of thousands of domains. But big-time premium domains, many purchased by companies to become their brands. Generic premium domains. They continue to purchase premium domains and made a very nice purchase a few years ago. I presented a proposal to them for building the URL into a company. But so have dozens of people, including major companies.
They are more active in philanthropy, curing diseases, their family and travel. They keep a low profile in the domaining world, although they certainly know some of the pioneers and well-known domainers.
I would love to own one of the domains they purchased in 2014. And so would a company that has a valuation of about $500 million. This company tried to buy the domain after securing a Series A round. The offer was declined, so they went with a brandable or catchy name, which has worked well for the company.
I’d prefer not to post their names, as they like to protect their privacy, despite their generous contributions to hospitals, universities, etc
Why didn’t I just buy my first computer around 1990 when I wanted to and get into it early like such early birds did? 🙂
Thanks for the share, I got a lot of giggles with that Reddit post.
WARNING, here’s a random reminder that “Estibot = Evil”:
https://www.domaininvesting.com/mike-mann-estibot-dramatically-deflates-the-value-of-a-domain/
Here is the problem with ‘taxing” cybersquatting as proposed (obviously could not be done without ICANN approval and a new contract to Verisign) even at $160 a year it will only get rid of unprofitable TM domains, the crap some marginal domains but the great TM domains make a lot of money so a lot of these domains are going to still exist; $160 is not going to get rid of cybersquatting, just make Verisign more money.