Will the Cowboys Ever Buy Cowboys.com?

Elliot Silver
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25

Cowboys.com is now a dating website, and a number of sports and mainstream news publications have picked up on the news. Some people have speculated that the new website may be a ploy to get the NFL Dallas Cowboys to buy Cowboys.com. In the words of one commenter, “I just can’t help but feel this is a ploy to shock the Dallas Cowboys into action. If so very well played.”

The Cowboys.com ownership group once put the domain name up for sale via Sedo, but a deal it never materialized. I would not be surprised if the group would be willing to sell the domain name now for the right price.

That said, I am wondering if you think the Dallas Cowboys will ever purchase the Cowboys.com domain name. My guess would be that many people type in Cowboys.com looking for information about the Dallas Cowboys to buy tickets, memorabilia, and clothing. Most will likely go to Google or directly navigate to the correct site, but there may be some traffic loss by not owning the brand.

So… do you think the Dallas Cowboys will ever buy Cowboys.com? Answer in the poll below.


Domain Capital Launches GraduatePrograms.com

Elliot Silver
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0

Domain Capital  and a partner just launched a new website on GraduatePrograms.com. The domain name is a  Domain Capital-owned property, and the company entered into  a partnership to form Graduate Programs LLC.

The newly launched website is “an online destination for prospective students to explore graduate school programs with information from the most reliable source: their peers.”

Domain Capital will not be operating the new website, and the company is excited about its prospects. According to company President Robert Alfano, “We are very excited about the launch of graduateprograms.com and the vision that our partners have for this amazing domain name.”

According to the Google Adwords Keyword Tool, the broad search volume for “graduate programs” is 1.5 million monthly and the exact match is 6,600 monthly. These strong search numbers indicate there are many people searching for graduate programs, and developing the site could drive serious revenues for Domain Capital and its partners.

The press release announcing the launch is below:

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Sex.com on Who Wants Be a Millionaire

Elliot Silver
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13

Sold in 2010 for $13 million, what URL is considered by the Domain Name Journal to be the most expensive domain name of all time?

I bet you can answer this question that appeared this afternoon on the television gameshow,  Who Wants Be a Millionaire? Of course the correct answer is Sex.com (after a very long saga), and the contestent answered the question correctly.

It’s neat to see domain names get attention like this in the mainstream, and it’s even better to see Ron Jackson’s  DN Journal get credit for providing the information.

Thanks to John Ferber, founder of Domain Holdings, for the tip and screengrab. The real question is what is John doing watching Who Wants to be a Millionaire in the middle of the day in the middle of the week? 🙂

Sorry, I Won’t Give Out That Email Address

Elliot Silver
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24

There are a few people I have written about over the years who don’t really have much in terms of public contact information. When people are trying to get in touch with someone personally, they often find an article I wrote and try to get their email address.

Take for example, domain investor Gregg Ostrick. Gregg doesn’t seem to have a Facebook or LinkedIn profile, and contacting him directly is apparently difficult. Every month or so, I receive an email from someone asking me to send his email address so they can buy a domain name. Same thing happens from time to time with Frank Schilling and Lonnie Borck. I guess it’s hard to find their personal contact information.

Unfortunately, if you’ve emailed me asking for a colleague’s email address, you are out of luck. I don’t think it is appropriate to give out someone’s contact information. If they wanted to be contacted, I am sure they would make it easier to be in touch.  Depending on the circumstance, I might forward an email along to someone, but I won’t necessarily do that either.

One thing I’ve given up a bit of with my blog is privacy. However, I am not going to give out someone’s email address or phone number, even if I know you. I don’t think it’s the nice thing to do.

NameJet Retiring Classic Design

Elliot Silver
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13

Late last year, NameJet launched a complete website redesign, although the domain name auction house chose to allow visitors to use the previous iteration in “Classic” mode.

According to a message on the website that was posted over the weekend, NameJet will retire the Classic view, and all users will be required to use the primary design. NameJet Classic will be discontinued on Wednesday, September 12, 2012.

In January, I posted a poll asking how many blog readers continued to use NameJet Classic, and I was surprised that almost 40% of those who responded opted to use the Classic design. The 75 votes probably didn’t produce a statistically significant result, and I would venture a guess that a poll like that had a greater response rate from people who felt strongly about the Classic look.

If you have a major issue with the active website design, I would think now is the time to let NameJet and Enom management know about it because in a few weeks, it will be discontinued.

Twitter Co-Founders Using Medium.com For New Venture

Elliot Silver
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4

In an article that was published on ComputerWeek today, it was revealed that a new web publishing platform will soon be launched on the descriptive domain name, Medium.com.  It appears that the founders of Twitter have acquired Medium.com from DigiMedia for this new startup.

According to Juan Carlos Perez of ComputerWeek, “Twitter co-founders Evan Williams and Biz Stone, who were also leaders at Blogger, have unveiled a preview of Medium, which they describe as a new Web publishing platform.”

A  Whois search reveals that the domain name was part of DigiMedia’s holdings until April of this year, when it changed hands. The domain name went under privacy in April, and it now shows WhoisGuard, a Whois privacy service, as its current registrant.

You may recall that when Twitter first launched, the domain name that was used was Twttr.com. The company paid $7,500 for the better Twitter.com domain name, which is also an interesting story. Perhaps they learned the importance of using the ideal domain name first rather than trying to purchase it after launching a startup.

I reached out to Scott and Jay from DigiMedia for comment about this possible sale, and I will update the article when I hear back from either of them.

Thanks to  George Kirikos  for the tip.

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