The Yellow.com domain name has been acquired by a blockchain investment entity called Yellow Corporation. The transaction price and terms of the deal were private, so unfortunately, this sale will not likely be reported in DNJournal or NameBio. I reached out to the registrant of Yellow.com, and I did not receive a response to my query about the domain name and sale price. From what I can see, the company appears to be associated with Alexis Sirkia and Stefan King.

Yellow.com was sold by Internet Real Estate Ltd. (IRE), the domain investment company founded by Andrew Rosener. I have been tracking the domain name, and when I saw the new website launch, I was able to get Andrew to confirm that his company sold the domain name. Andrew’s Media Options domain brokerage firm brokered the sale of the domain name. Chris Zuiker brokered the deal on behalf of the seller.

From what I can see using DomainTools’ Whois History tool, Yellow.com appears to have changed hands a few times in the last few years. In 2015, it looks like the domain name was owned by Marchex. In early 2016, the domain name Whois information was protected by a privacy proxy service. In September of 2017, privacy was removed, and the domain name changed hands to an → Read More

This morning I wrote about some top .Net keyword domain names currently in auction at GoDaddy Auctions. In my opinion, these are solid keywords and I would love to own the .com domain names if I could.

My portfolio has very few non .com domain names, and I don’t see that changing any time soon. I am wondering if you would buy top .net keyword domain names at reasonable pricing if you had the opportunity. I am not necessarily referring to the names currently in auction, but just in general, if you would buy good one word .net domain names at fair / reasonable prices.

I was looking at GoDaddy Auctions’ most active auctions this morning, and it looks like quite a few strong keyword .net domain names are in expiry auctions. Some of the keyword .net domain names that are in the list of most active auctions include the following .net domain names:

• Dive.net
• Prize.net
• Sail.net
• Clubs.net
• Subscribe.net
• Exotic.net
• Newsletters.net
• Brutus.net
• Somewhere.net

It looks like auctions for these domain names end in a little over three days. Although the recent GoDaddy Auction changes would have made these domain names → Read More

Another valuable three letter .com domain name is subject of a UDRP filing. A UDRP was filed against CCK.com at the World Intellectual Property Organization. It is WIPO Case D2018-1357.

CCK.com was created in October of 1996, making it over 20 years old. The domain name is registered to an entity in China. From what I can tell using the DomainTools Whois History tool, it looks like the domain name was acquired some time in late 2017. CCK.com resolves to a website that has a 9800.com logo on the top left and a message in Chinese that may be offering the domain name for sale (based on the Google Chinese to English translator). From what I can see using DomainTools, it appears that the domain name had previously been owned by a pharmaceutical company.

CCK.com would be considered a “Chinese Premium” (aka Chip) domain name, and DomainIQ gives CCK.com an appraised value of $66,000. I do not see any broker sale listings for CCK.com in my email history, and NameBio does not have any archived public sales records.

The complainant in the UDRP is listed as → Read More

A UDRP was filed at the World Intellectual Property Organization against the seemingly generic Cassandra.com domain name. The decision was published this morning, and the three member panel ruled in favor of the domain registrant. In addition, the panel found that this was a case of Reverse Domain Name Hijacking (RDNH).

As an observer, it seems pretty clear to me that Cassandra is a women’s name and is generic considering how many people there are named Cassandra. As a domain name, a first name .com domain name like Cassandra.com holds considerable value, and the registrant shared a couple of public first name .com domain name sales to support this. In the discussion section of the UDRP, the panel offers some good language for domain investors who own first name domain names like this one:

“The Panel accepts that, where a party legitimately registers a domain name comprising commonplace or dictionary elements for sale, without intent to target the trademark of an existing trademark owner, then that offer for sale can give rise to rights or legitimate interests in the domain name as a bona fide offering of goods or services for the purposes of paragraph 4(c)(i) of the Policy (see e.g. Allocation Network GmbH v. Steve Gregory, WIPO Case No. D2000-0016; and Voys B.V., Voys United B.V. v. Thomas Zou, WIPO Case No. D2017-2136). The Panel finds that the same considerations are applicable to the registration of a personal first name. The question in this case, therefore, is whether the Respondent registered the disputed domain name in the knowledge of the Complainant’s trademark and with the intention of taking unfair advantage of the goodwill attaching to that trademark, or legitimately in the circumstances described above.

Based on the parties’ submissions in this case, the Panel can find no evidence upon which to conclude that the Respondent was aware of the Complainant’s United States trademark THE CASSANDRA REPORT at the date it registered the disputed domain name, or that it registered the disputed domain name with the intention of taking unfair advantage of that trademark.”

In the discussion about RDNH, the panel seems to have felt that the complainant brought the UDRP complaint as a means of getting the domain name for less than it is worth. According to the decision, the complainant offered → Read More

I don’t hand register all that many domain names each year. I would say the number is somewhere around 50 +/- and that figure varies each year. When it comes time to renew my hand registered domain names, I sometimes struggle to decide what gets renewed and what gets dropped.

I look at various factors including traffic and inquiries, with the inquiries and offers being more important than the (generally) negligible traffic figures. When I have owned a hand registered name for a couple of years and there are no signs of life, I start to wonder whether it is worth renewing. Yes, it is short money, but paying even $1k/year can add up after several years. If I renew 100 hand registered names for around $1,000/year, that $5,000 after 5 years could have been better spent if none of the names are sold. If that holds true, perhaps I should re-evaluate my hand registration skills, too!

It would be interesting to know how much time readers give their hand registered domain names before opting to drop them. You are invited to share additional thoughts in the comment section.

Yesterday’s poll question: How much is Mouth.com worth?