Rick Schwartz

2008: Year of Uncertainty in Domain Industry

I know it’s a holiday weekend, but I think everyone needs to take a few minutes to read Ron Jackson’s interview of Rick Schwartz. In the domain space, Rick has been something like a soothsayer, and when he speaks, I listen. While we don’t all own the same quality domain names as Rick, the things he is saying does affect all domain investors.

If or when Google decides to pull the plug and PPC as we know it drastically changes, there is going to be a lot of tumult in the industry. While quickly and efficiently monetizing domain names will be difficult and domain values will be impacted, domain owners need to keep the following things in mind:

  • Businesses who want to be online need a domain name
  • Advertisers will still want to advertise on relevant domain names
  • People will continue typing-in domain names looking for products or services
  • Easy to remember and relevant domain names are the most desired
  • Consumers typically have certain web browsing patterns, and many type in their keyword and .com as a starting point

The point is that while making easy money from domain names won’t be possible, there are still going to be plenty of opportunities in the domain space. Some people will have to sell more than they have in the past in order to maintain the same revenue levels, so some deals may be had.  I recommend buying domain names that would make sense to be developed. Just because a domain name did well parked, doesn’t mean that it would be good to develop.

I still believe the greatest ongoing revenue generating opportunity is selling advertising space directly to advertisers on developed websites. I believe websites are the newspapers of decades ago. Websites get the eyeballs that newspapers once received, and advertisers want to reach them. Motivated consumers are untapped leads that businesses would like to acquire.

I also believe that as companies continue to migrate their business online, more will get it, and more will want (or even need) the domain name that describes their business or industry. Generic and category defining domain names are rare, and they hold considerable value. Selling domain names to end users that get it will be the driving force behind the future growth of domain values.

Changing times call for changing strategies.  Those who adapt and adopt will survive, and those who sit back will not. Who knows when all of this will happen, but I think it’s important to be prepared for the worst. Read Rick’s interview and judge for yourself.

Yahoo and Intel to Bring Widgets to Television

Here are two excerpts from a hot off the press news bulletin in the Atlanta Business Chronicle:

Intel Corp. and Yahoo Inc. on Wednesday announced plans for the Widget Channel, a television application framework optimized for TV and related consumer electronics devices.

and furthermore…

Yahoo-branded TV widgets “will enable consumers to engage in a variety of experiences such as watching videos, tracking their favorite stocks or sports teams, interacting with friends, or staying current on news and information,” the companies said.

Just a few months ago, Widgets.com was listed for sale by Rick Schwartz on Ebay. If Yahoo employed forward thinking like Rick Schwartz, they would own the perfect domain right now. Well, I guess if Yahoo really thought like that, they would be owned by Microsoft now, but that’s another story.
Now, with dropping PPC payouts, Rick has begun to develop Widgets.com. While Widgets.com certainly wouldn’t have come cheap months ago, the value of this great generic domain name continues to climb.

Property.com Sold by King; Properties.com Retained

As everyone knows by now, Rick Schwartz just sold Property.com in one of the most lucrative domain deals ever. One of the coolest things about this is that Rick still owns Properties.com, which I believe is on par with Property.com. With the buyer’s plans to develop Property.com into a huge real estate marketplace, the value of Properties.com is now much greater than before.
Congratulations to Rick on another market shaking deal. Also, congratulations to Kevin of BigTicketDomains.com for finding the buyer in the deal.

Playboy Launching Gay Station – Did Rick Hit it Big Again?

According to a news story first released by XBIZ.com and followed-up today in an article in the New York Post, Playboy has announced that they will be launching a gay-themed television station/video channel. According to the article,

“Playboy Enterprises, the parent company behind the famous girlie magazine for men, confirmed they are launching a gay-porn cable station that could start operating as soon as next month.”

While the offering is currently being called “Gay Targeted VOD Package Service,” one would think that the name “Gayboy” sounds much more marketable. Interestingly enough, a Whois search shows the domain name Gayboy.com (a parked page) is owned by an investment company in the Caribbean, and a Historical Whois search shows the domain name was previously owned by Virtual Dates, a company founded by Rick Schwartz.

Domain Industry Tsunami

In 2004, Thailand, Indonesia, and nine other countries suffered one of the deadliest natural disasters in history, when a tsunami killed well over 200,000 people. Thousands of tourists and other people in the area were killed when an unexpected giant wave quickly swept onto land and through their villages. There were just a few seconds available to decide whether to climb a tree, enter a building with a solid foundation, or run as fast as possible to beat the wave. Many who made the wrong decision died while trying to survive. It was a terrible tragedy, and the affected areas are still in the process of recovering three years later.
An interesting thing happened just moments before the tsunami reached land that saved countless lives. As the ocean began to recede, many natives who saw this began running in the opposite direction. They grabbed their children, warned their friends, and they booked it as fast as they could run, leaving most of their possessions behind. They knew that a receding ocean meant a tsunami was about to devastate their area, and they didn’t stick around to see what would happen. They grabbed what they could and took cover as far away as their legs could take them in the five minutes they had.
While changes to the domain industry certainly are not

Rick's Last Blog Post

Rick posted that yesterday’s blog post will be his last. While Rick offers some poignant thoughts, I think one of the comments on his blog post sums things up best:

I hope you all realize what is going on here. The message should be loud and clear. Rick has been warning everybody all year to help him mount a defense against what is coming. Very few are paying attention, and very few are helping him build the fort to protect against the coming invaders. So, rather than waste is time blogging to people who don’t listen, he is leaving us to fend for ourselves and he will use his new found time to mount his own defense (probably by developing some of his domains and selling others). We have lost our visionary and a big industry voice.
WAKE UP PEOPLE! Rick stops blogging, Frank stops blogging, Yahoo kills arbitrage, Ask/Google, Snowe Bill.
The writing is on the wall.
Fast forward to 2010 and do a “Where are They Now” on the domainers of yesteryear. Some will have cashed out and be wealthy and happily retired. Some will have developed domains into businesses worth millions or maybe even billions. Most, however, will be EMPLOYEES working for a BOSS, wasting their hours thinking about the good old days and wondering what went wrong.” – Posted by: Robert Pearl

Everyone really needs to think about what is going on here. Our industry is changing. We had a much better chance a year ago when Rick first started discussing the problems that were on the horizon. They are no longer on the horizon – they are here. I hope it isn’t too late.

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