Saturday, September 24, 2011

Are you Kidding me? Cellphone.ca drops

DomainReport.ca

I haven't participated in many TBR .ca drops in the last few weeks, but I do like to check the results.  I was doing that this morning and saw that cellphone.ca had dropped and was picked up by Jaz Domain Names Ltd.

I know that smartphones and superphones have been replacing cellphones, so they aren't as big a market as they used to be, but you would still think that cellphone.ca has enough value to be worth renewing.  Many people still refer to any mobile phone as a cellphone.

It would have been interesting if cellphone.ca had been caught by a registrar that auctions domain drops, because I would have liked to see the price it went for.

Another nice domain that dropped was cookinggames.ca

SportsForum.ca also dropped which was a nice one.

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CIRA considers IDNs for .ca domains

DomainReport.ca

IDN characters may soon be coming to .ca domains.

CIRA is considering adding french accented letters to .ca domain registrations.  This would allow for the true spelling of many french words in domains.  Considering about a fourth of Canadians are french speakers, I think this would make sense.  I also think if you own a .ca domain with one or more french words that should be accented, you should have first crack at the IDN version.  Stay tuned to see how this develops!

Here is the email I received from CIRA about this possible change.

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As part of our effort to continually enhance the .CA domain, the Canadian Internet Registration Authority (CIRA) is considering the implementation of French character Internationalized Domain Names (IDNs) at the second level (to the left of the dot).


An Internationalized Domain Name is simply a domain name that contains characters other than a-z, 0-9 or hyphens.

CIRA is planning the addition of the following accented characters to .CA domain names:

é, ë, ê, è

à, â

ô

ù, û, ü

ç

î, ï

This means you could soon see domain names like préside.ca, grâce.ca, etc. Before we can implement IDNs, CIRA is preparing a framework that will help us create a policy for launching accented domain names. As a Registrant, we are seeking your input on our proposed framework.

On September 20, 2011, CIRA opened a public consultation concerning our planned launch of IDNs. The feedback received from .CA holders like you, as well as our Members, Registrars and other stakeholders, will help us shape the final IDN launch policy. Learn more about the proposed policy and share your views at www.idnconsultation.ca.

About CIRA

The Canadian Internet Registration Authority is the Member-driven organization that manages Canada’s .CA domain name registry, develops and implements policies that support Canada’s Internet community, and represents the .CA registry internationally.

Monday, September 19, 2011

TeaParty.com worth $1 Million?

DomainReport.ca

A Canadian rock band is getting more attention due to their domain name.

Tea Party is a Canadian music group with a website on the domain TeaParty.com.  The Tea Party in the US is heating up with an election around the corner in 2012.

The band is considering selling the domain, and it could make them millionaires.

GoDaddy president Warren Adelman says teaparty.com could sell for "well over $1 million" thanks to campaigning politicians. "Last cycle, Barack Obama raised $500 million online," he says. "If you look at the money being talked about this time around, campaigns [are] raising $1 billion."

The article also gives a link to the top 20 selling domain names of all time, with webpage snapshots and estimated visitors per month.

To read the full article, go here:
http://ca.finance.yahoo.com/news/Is-This-Domain-Name-Worth-1-siliconalley-993373058.html

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Sunday, September 18, 2011

More background on InvestmentProperty.com.au sale

DomainReport.ca

Sydney Morning Herald runs article on domains giving some background on the InvestmentProperty.com.au recent drop and sale.

InvestmentProperty.com.au is an Australian country code domain that just sold at auction for $125,000.

The buyer of investmentproperty.com.au is Hunter Valley property developer Vision Homes. Comment is being sought from the owner Steve Rollan.


Anthony Ziino, the previous owner who let the domain name expire, did not know the name had expired when reached by phone but said he was going to investigate.


Domain name industry players on the DNTrade.com.au forum predicted investmentproperty.com.au would sell for $10,000, so the final price of $125,000 blew away their expectations.


“People are just beginning to realise that domain names are valuable and in this day and age it's essential for pretty much all businesses to be online.


“One of the ways to get to the top quickly is with a good domain name. As more domains are registered, supply is limited so it generally commands higher prices.”

To read the full article, click below:

http://www.smh.com.au/technology/technology-news/domain-name-record-smashed-after-schoolboy-error-20110915-1kb4m.html

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Saturday, September 3, 2011

DomainNameSales.com adds feature to homepage

DomainReport.ca

In catching up with domain name news this morning, I normally like to check in at Frank Schilling's DomainNameSales.com site to check on the 'Recent Action' section.  It has daily reports of domains they've had enquiries on, which gives a snapshot of keywords and subjects that are in demand.  Since they also have .ca domains, you often see one or two .ca's on the list each day which interests me.  Two recent ones on the list were alarm.ca and truth.ca.

Today I noticed a new header on the homepage that says "Why a Premium Domain Name... everyone starting a business anywhere in 2012 "must" secure a domain name".  When you click on Get Started Today, you are taken to a PowerPoint type page with an explanation on domain name prices and Virtual Real Estate.  It's well done and worth a read.  Some of this material may have been on the site previously, but they've changed the presentation of it and it is prominent on the homepage now.

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Friday, September 2, 2011

My Prediction on the New gtld's

DomainReport.ca

After months (years?) of anticipation for the slew of new gltd's, my prediction is that they will do no better or worse than other gtld's that have come after .com, .net and .org.

I'm talking about .info, .biz, .travel, .coop, .mobi, .tel and also country code extensions that have been marketed as gtld's, like .me and .co.  If these handful of extensions haven't made any significant breakthrough, why would anyone expect the news ones to?

I think the above extensions have already served as the litmus test for the new ones that are coming.  Each extension will have some hot, related words or terms that really suit it, and these will be used by individuals or upstart companies for cool sounding names.  Otherwise, many words and terms won't suit each extension.  For example, will babyclothes.xxx or TucsonRealEstate.xxx ever be viable domains someone would use?  I think some of the gtld's will also flame out, once registrations do poorly.

I don't think there will be any real take up of a new gtld to rival .com, .net or .org in numbers, but there will be a market for the ones that have commercial appeal and a strong related keyword(s) to the left of the dot.

Years ago Frank Schilling wrote that one possible extension that could get a good take up would be .web.  I tend to agree with this because it's a short word that has always been used when talking about the internet, and would also suit mobile sites which are seeing good growth right now.  I guess you could make the same argument for .net and ask why it doesn't seem to approach .com in appeal, but I think .web sounds cooler than .net.  So if a .web extension is born I may take a look at registering some of those, but I still wouldn't bet the farm.

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Back to .ca, I saw one .ca sale in the DNJournal.com sales report this past week, and that was:

Lentils.ca - $2,888 (sold at Sedo)

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