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Bob Parsons, CEO of GoDaddy, has been talking about this problem since 2004. You can read his thoughts on it, and see a letter sent to ICANN in 2004 here.

The point being, they're fully in favour of an end to "tasting" and have been calling for it for ~3 years.

You both missed a very key point: they're not paying these domains.

The simply reserve them using a registrar's 5 day grace period & if nobody buys the domain from Network Solution for 5 days, they simply release the reserve. I.e., it's available again to the general public.

It's something a registrar can do, that you & I can't. Basically, a loophole that a few trusted companies in the system are exploiting for profit.

This came up a big back when a registrar would "try" domains, to see if the type-in traffic made more than the cost of registering. (E.g., by using Google's DomainPark for Domain Squatters.)

The President of GoDaddy wrote about it a little over a year ago:

http://www.bobparsons.com/DomainKiting.html.

One registrar in particular, DirectNIC, "registered" 8.4 million domains but only permanently registered -- i.e. paid for -- 51,400.

Overall, I'm with you in spirit of screwing bastards like this over, but it seems the only way to do so is close the loophole in the system.

-Bill

Really?, the founder of GoDaddy is strongly against that practice.

http://www.bobparsons.com/WhyyoucantgetthedomainnameyouwantGoDaddyrescuesRegisterflycustomers.html
http://www.bobparsons.com/MayKiting.html

etc. etc.

and I think his soulution is reasonable, make the small (around $.25) fee to ICANN for a domain registration non-refundable.

It would utterly destroy profits from that practice, while helping to fund infrastructure, and would only cost legitimate users a small amount, in the event they decide to cancel a registration.

Really?, the founder of GoDaddy is strongly against that practice.

http://www.bobparsons.com/WhyyoucantgetthedomainnameyouwantGoDaddyrescuesRegisterflycustomers.html
http://www.bobparsons.com/MayKiting.html

etc. etc.

and I think his soulution is reasonable, make the small (around $.25) fee to ICANN for a domain registration non-refundable.

It would utterly destroy profits from that practice, while helping to fund infrastructure, and would only cost legitimate users a small amount, in the event they decide to cancel a registration.

I don't have the link handy, but I recall reading about one of the other TLD managers implementing a maximum return ratio before they stop refunding the fee. Something like 10% or so.

FWIW, the Godaddy.com CEO has blogged about this topic a few times, the numbers are staggering.
http://www.bobparsons.com/index.php?/archives/118- MayKiting.html

Squatting sucks, but I don't think Verisign are doing this as a move against squatters. They'd didn't even *try* and use that excuse. They said they need the extra cash to "improve security and reliability".

The real reason: It's a fair bet they did it because they can. Extra money. No loss of business. Compliant Politicians. Docile Public. Why not go for the gold?

This isn't going to drive a single squatter out of business. 7% increase in registry prices? Buddy of mine bought a 3 letter .com domain for a five figure sum. "Cost of doing business" he said, and he's profitable to boot.

Another thing: most of the "squatters" are the registrars themselves. They don't have to pay when they register the domain. There is a grace period of something like 5 days, so they register thousands upon thousands. They're those thinnish google ad pages you see when you mistype a domain. After 5 days, they yank them and reissue them. Here's Godaddy complaining about it (maybe because he didn't think of it first) but if ICANN cared about squatting or anything else, surely they wouldn't allow this?

http://www.bobparsons.com/MayKiting.html

BTW It's not the 42c. It's the $6 already that's the ripoff. For $340M *p.a* from .com alone, must be enough in there for a new server farm every year and then some. For-profit monopolies suck for consumers.

I am concerned about control of the Internet.

The purpose was to meet Secretary Kneuer and to discuss face-to-face his general plans for ICANN and the Internet. Since there has been quite a lot of talk and fear about the governance of the Internet moving to the United Nations, I was quite interested to talk to Secretary Kneuer.

A strong ally in the battle for the Internet.

During lunch, Wayne (CEO of NRA) and I discussed the possibility and negative consequences of the Internet coming under U.N. control. Like me, Wayne knows it would be a big mistake for the USA to lose control of the Internet. He promised to do what he and the NRA could to see that doesn't happen. Given everything he and the NRA have accomplished, I know when the NRA speaks, it pays to listen.

It felt great to count an organization like the NRA among our friends in the battle over the Internet as it evolves. Quite frankly, we can use all the help we can get.

If you hold the domains for less than 5 days at a time, then you can do this for free (aside from a deposit). Ironically (given the subject of this thread) it is Bob Parsons, of GoDaddy, who explains the process: http://www.bobparsons.com/DomainKiting.html

GoDaddy's IPO attempt failed last month, as their Net company continues to lose money. They're spinning as "we didn't want to go public, anyway". But maybe they've got bigger problems.

After all, GoDaddy is owned by a Conservative making his fortune from domain squatting. I expect there's quite a lot going on under the hood. I'm looking forward to his explanation, as are many, many people who registered with GoDaddy who expect due process before sudden shutdown.

GoDaddy's IPO attempt failed last month, as their Net company continues to lose money. They're spinning as "we didn't want to go public, anyway". But maybe they've got bigger problems.

After all, GoDaddy is owned by a Conservative making his fortune from domain squatting. I expect there's quite a lot going on under the hood. I'm looking forward to his explanation, as are many, many people who registered with GoDaddy who expect due process before sudden shutdown.

as to .eu, they could have paid more but did not, please do not get confused between generic terms and real trademarks - you americans love to do that.

I don't recall posting anything about trademarks...perhaps in your haste to out me as an ugly American you misread the original post?

The following is what I was referring to - and pretty much all the credible accounts of this story I can find agree with this posting:

http://www.bobparsons.com/EURidResponds.html

Besides, I think you missed the whole point of GP post - Godaddy has, in the past, been one of the "good guys" on stuff like this. Clearly they are NOT in this instance. I am not attempting to argue otherwise.

DirectNIC is a dirty company.

http://www.bobparsons.com/DomainKiting.html
http://www.rootfest.net/squatters.html

GoDaddy funnels its income into rightwing politics.

Well of course they're going to Microsoft - they're pro torture. GoDaddy's CEO's Blog.

The President and Founder of GoDaddy blogged about this a few days ago.

"The fact that this deal was approved is a loud signal that major changes are needed at ICANN. If we don't take this opportunity and step up and replace the incredibly inept leadership at ICANN, it will go a long way in providing the United Nations with the ammunition it needs to begin taking control of the Internet."

I would say it is Bob Parsons (http://www.bobparsons.com/) of godaddy.com

It's important to note that to date, there have been no fatalities among the prisoners at Gitmo. Some of the "terrible" techniques we are being decried for using in Gitmo are sleep deprivation, solitary confinement, exposure to cold and heat (as in a cold room), mental games, constant questioning, etc. All of it, when compared to what has been done in the Middle East to extract information from prisoners is mild, indeed.

** Sorry replying to myself to fix bad formatting (first time ever I choose not to click preview *sigh*) ***

Actually there is quite a bit of publicly available information about GoDaddy's financial position. Various snippets from their blog:

- Go Daddy has been cash flow positive and profitable since October 2001.

- Go Daddy has no debt and no equipment leases. Except for the monthly rent we pay for our buildings (which we made the decision to lease), the company has no debt service or lease payments

- Our sales this year were over $100 million. If we do nothing different (other than continue to promote our business the way we have been) our sales for 2005 should be about $170 million

- All of the products we sell are developed by us. We currently employ over 30 development teams, and spend well over $3 million a month in new product development

- we sell a new domain name at the rate of one every 7 seconds More here: http://www.bobparsons.com/index3.html

True, their domain sales are a major part of their service however their value added services - as pushed (far too much so in my opinion) at the checkout are another stream.

Actually there is quite a bit of publicly available information about GoDaddy's financial position. Various snippets from their blog: - Go Daddy has been cash flow positive and profitable since October 2001. - Go Daddy has no debt and no equipment leases. Except for the monthly rent we pay for our buildings (which we made the decision to lease), the company has no debt service or lease payments - Our sales this year were over $100 million. If we do nothing different (other than continue to promote our business the way we have been) our sales for 2005 should be about $170 million - All of the products we sell are developed by us. We currently employ over 30 development teams, and spend well over $3 million a month in new product development - we sell a new domain name at the rate of one every 7 seconds More here: http://www.bobparsons.com/index3.html True, their domain sales are a major part of their service however their value added services - as pushed (far too much so in my opinion) at the checkout are another stream.

I have had similar problems with GoDaddy hosting. As far as a registrar, they seem to be fine in my experience. However, they somehow seem to mess up their hosting sever configurations, and when you bring it to their attention, instead of fixing it, they write it off as an "unsupported" feature.

Take, for example, using mod_rewrite. I discovered that on their servers you cannot rewrite anything with a .php extension. (You can go to a php extension but not from) When I contacted tech support, they claim that "we do not support mod_rewrite with php files."

This also screws up 404 pages. If you request a non-existant php file, instead of the 404 page you should get, you recieve a nice "No input file specified" error. This comes from the php parser when you execute it without a filename. After bringing that to their attention, they came back with "It's not our problem, fix your script so it doesn't reference a non-existant file" However, my scripts are fine, and that is completely missing the point. If someone bookmarks a file and later you move it. The user should be able to hit that bookmark and get a 404 page for your site, redirecting them. Of course after responding with that, they ignored my message and I have not gotten a reply.

Anyway, stay away from godaddy unless you want to just serve static html files. I wish they would spend less time writing blogs producing "radio shows" and just focus on getting their core business to work properly. I recently just switched to 1and1.com and they seem to be much better so far. After using 1and1's admin interface, it completely blows away the meager interface godaddy has.

Sigh. Yes.

But then these same people who are trying to enforce some rules (such as this) on blogs turn around, and are for forcing you to publish your own address, and aren't you also a Private Citizen? It's already happened for .us domains.

That is what I call "backwards", if you ask me.

Bob Parsons, founder of GoDaddy blogged on the subject recently. I actually discovered this via a mass-mail sent out from GoDaddy. Unfortunately I already deleted the email, but it had some insight as to how this actually happened under everyone's nose.

Here's the email I received from Godaddy.com regarding this issue:

"Today I have the unfortunate responsibility of informing you that there has been a decision made by bureaucrats of a Federal agency that takes away your right to privacy as guaranteed by the United States Constitution.

This decision was unilaterally made by the National Telecommunications and Information Association ("NTIA") www.ntia.doc.gov without hearings that would determine the impact on those affected, and delivered without notice -- in short, the NTIA decision was made without due process of any kind. This is exactly how our government is not supposed to work.

The effect of this decision is to disallow new private domain name registrations on .US domain names. In addition, if you already own a private .US domain name registration, you will be forced to forfeit your privacy no later than January 26, 2006. By that time, you will need to choose between either making your personal information available to anyone who wants to see it, or giving up your right to that domain name.

I personally find it ironic that our right to .US privacy was stripped away, without due process, by a federal government agency -- an agency that should be looking out for our individual rights. For the NTIA to choose the .US extension is the ultimate slap in your face. .US is the only domain name that is specifically intended for Americans (and also those who have a physical presence in our great country). So think about this for a moment. These bureaucrats stripped away the privacy that you're entitled to as an American, on the only domain name that says that you are an American. I am outraged by this -- you should be also.

If, like me, you are outraged at the NTIA's decision to strip away our constitutional right to privacy, www.TheDangerOfNoPrivacy.com will provide you with a petition to sign. (Only your name will be published, your address and email information will be kept private.) This Web site also provides a very easy way for you to send either a fax or an email, expressing your outrage, to your Congressperson and Senators. This is all provided at no cost to you. All that is required is for you to take the time to visit www.TheDangerOfNoPrivacy.com sign the petition, and send the fax or email to your legislators.

On my personal Blog, www.BobParsons.com there are a number of articles where you can learn more about the NTIA's unfortunate decision and what you can do to help get it reversed.

I also will be talking about our right to privacy on Radio Go Daddy, our weekly radio show that debuts today, March 30, at 7 PM PST. To find out how to listen in, please visit the Web site dedicated to the show, www.RadioGoDaddy.com.

You can be sure that I, and everyone at GoDaddy.com, will do everything in our power to get the NTIA decision reversed. However, we need your help. Please visit www.TheDangerOfNoPrivacy.com to sign the petition and express your feelings to your Congressperson and Senators.

Sincerely,

Bob Parsons
President and Founder
GoDaddy.com"

Bob Parsons, the owner of GoDaddy.com, posted info on his blog about taking out a Super Bowl ad. Cost of 30 seconds is $2.4 million, with about an extra million in production costs. But, unlike some of the tech companies advertising in the 2000 Super Bowl, it sounds like this cost will not be a problem for them even if the ad is not very successful. Here are some excerpts from the post:

Now, some facts about Go Daddy:

-- snip --

5. Go Daddy has no debt and no equipment leases. Except for the monthly rent we pay for our buildings (which we made the decision to lease), the company has no debt service or lease payments.
6. Our sales this year were over $100 million. If we do nothing different (other than continue to promote our business the way we have been) our sales for 2005 should be about $170 million.
7. The company will continue to have substantial cash reserves even after paying for the Super Bowl ad.

-- snip --

Here's the answers to some questions I've been asked by reporters and others, since it became known that Go Daddy is going to have a Super Bowl ad:

Q. How do you know that the Super Bowl ad will work for Go Daddy?
A. There are no guarantees. I don't know if it will work.

Q. Is the Super Bow ad a one shot deal?
A. Not really. We will be following up our Super Bowl ad with an extensive advertising campaign that will embrace television, radio and print.

Q. Do you expect to earn your investment back?
A. Not immediately and maybe never. What the Super Bowl ad will do is to lay the ground work for better recognition of our follow up campaign.

Q. What if the Super Bowl ad doesn't work at all? What will happen to Go Daddy?
A. You can be sure that I certainly want to see it work, but if it doesn't work at all we'll be just fine. The entire ad production costs and airtime have been paid for out of cash reserves earned last year. Many company owners would have taken this cash out of the company for themselves as a dividend. Not me. (What follows is the line that was misquoted by Brand Autopsy) I'd rather have a Super Bowl ad.

Bob Parsons, the owner of GoDaddy.com, posted info on his blog about taking out a Super Bowl ad. Cost of 30 seconds is $2.4 million, with about an extra million in production costs. But, unlike some of the tech companies advertising in the 2000 Super Bowl, it sounds like this cost will not be a problem for them even if the ad is not very successful. Here are some excerpts from the post:

Now, some facts about Go Daddy:

-- snip --

5. Go Daddy has no debt and no equipment leases. Except for the monthly rent we pay for our buildings (which we made the decision to lease), the company has no debt service or lease payments.
6. Our sales this year were over $100 million. If we do nothing different (other than continue to promote our business the way we have been) our sales for 2005 should be about $170 million.
7. The company will continue to have substantial cash reserves even after paying for the Super Bowl ad.

-- snip --

Here's the answers to some questions I've been asked by reporters and others, since it became known that Go Daddy is going to have a Super Bowl ad:

Q. How do you know that the Super Bowl ad will work for Go Daddy?
A. There are no guarantees. I don't know if it will work.

Q. Is the Super Bow ad a one shot deal?
A. Not really. We will be following up our Super Bowl ad with an extensive advertising campaign that will embrace television, radio and print.

Q. Do you expect to earn your investment back?
A. Not immediately and maybe never. What the Super Bowl ad will do is to lay the ground work for better recognition of our follow up campaign.

Q. What if the Super Bowl ad doesn't work at all? What will happen to Go Daddy?
A. You can be sure that I certainly want to see it work, but if it doesn't work at all we'll be just fine. The entire ad production costs and airtime have been paid for out of cash reserves earned last year. Many company owners would have taken this cash out of the company for themselves as a dividend. Not me. (What follows is the line that was misquoted by Brand Autopsy) I'd rather have a Super Bowl ad.