Several days ago, I reported that the S.CO domain name was acquired by MarkMonitor on behalf of a client. Because the Whois registrant information listed MarkMonitor’s privacy proxy service (DNStination Inc.) as the registrant, it was unknown who was behind the brand protection company’s acquisition.
This morning, a reader named Davis noticed that the S.CO domain name was activated, revealing that Snapchat appears to be the buyer of S.CO. If you visit S.CO right now, you will be redirected to Snapchat’s homepage.
I did some Twitter searching, and I do not see any mentions of the S.CO domain name by Snapchat or any other Twitter user. This isn’t surprising because the company likely hasn’t announced how the domain name will be used. I would not be surprised to see S.CO used as a url shortener in the same way that Twitter uses T.CO and Google uses G.CO, but that remains to be seen.
Prior to the sale, S.CO was owned by NameFind, a domain portfolio company that is operated by GoDaddy. When I reached out to GoDaddy to ask about the domain name sale, the company confirmed that S.CO was sold but the company would not reveal the purchase price (per company policy). Since Snapchat is a publicly traded company, perhaps the acquisition price will be reported in a future SEC filing, although I doubt it was high enough to warrant that.
