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Unsolicited Offer For My Personal Domain Name?
Batzerto writes "Last Friday I received an unsolicited email offer for my domain — click the link below for the message. Their company name matches my domain, but with a country-specific top level domain (.NL in this case). They do seem to be legitimately using the domain in their country. As for my usage, the domain is my last name(.COM) and I'm only really using it for email. I'm not really that attached to it other than the hassle of changing email addresses. There are other flavors of the domain available (.US for example) that would suit my purposes just fine. So, Slashdot veterans, I ask you, what should I do? I'm leery of making an offer and falling into someone's legal trap. I wouldn't mind getting a chunk of cash out of the deal though."
From: ---
Sent: Friday, August 29, 2008 4:56 AM
To: ---
Subject: sell your domain ?
Dear Sir,
For my company I need the domain --- .
Is it possible to sell your domain to me?
Best Regards
N. de Robles
From: ---
Sent: Friday, August 29, 2008 4:56 AM
To: ---
Subject: sell your domain ?
Dear Sir,
For my company I need the domain --- .
Is it possible to sell your domain to me?
Best Regards
N. de Robles
This is capitalism.
Google bomb your url with their company name by creating a Slashdot user account with their name and submit thousands of stories each week with your url in the homepage. You can also drop the company's name with an href to your url in CNN comments and on comments for popular blogs to get your pagerank up.
Then inform them that your Search Engine Optimization Chief just caused your URL to be at the top of Google's result list.
If they fail to triple their offer, begin redirecting to goatse. You should see them quadruple their offer then. It's called hardball.
My work here is dung.
Can they accuse you of domainsquatting if you ask for money or something like that?
Seems like I've heard similar horror stories of people losing their domains because they asked someone to make an offer.
There is a war going on for your mind.
Sell it, on the condition that you can keep your email address on the domain.
Win-win!
As you probably noticed yourself, it's likely a legal trap; if you show that you're interested in taking money for the domain name, they will then use that as an argument during legal proceedings that you're a domain name squatter.
So simply don't respond.
Every expression is true, for a given value of 'true'
I think this is the website in question.
Don't know if I crossed a line, but it took all of 1 second on the google.
A lonely girl has sent me an email seeking a relationship. I am a man and this sounds good. Should I seek to get into a relationship with this unknown but self admitted pretty girl?
If you wanted to be really evil and as much of a bastard as a typical domain squatter for some reason, then sure. But why? By doing what you've suggested, you also end up polluting Slashdot, CNN and Google with crap, which is no better than your average link spammer.
There are many domains which people own that they're not particularly attached to and would be happy to sell. For someone looking in from outside, it's reasonable to think that this might be one of them, particularly if it's not immediately clear that the person's using it. (Lack of a website would imply this to some people.)
All they've done so far is politely ask if they can buy it. The request was short on words but that looks more like translation issues rather than an angry demand to hand over from a corporation full of lawyers. It could just as easily be someone's small family business which thought it'd be useful to have .com on the end of their name. How else are they supposed to find out if the owner's interested in selling if not by asking?
Tell them you'll entertain offers. If they throw out a number, it can only go up. If you throw out a number, it can only go down.
As others have noted, offering to sell your domain to them can be used as evidence of bad faith if there is other evidence you are cybersquatting. However, you can write them a letter and say you aren't really interested in selling the domain, what with the heavy email use you've been making with it for years, but if they request it you will put a link on the front page which says "Looking for Zerba the fashion designer? Click: www.zerba.nl" You could also offer to forward email to specific accounts to them if applicable -- in my case I have the dot-com for a name which some bloodsucking lawyer has the dot-net for, and people are forever sending me his mail. I have set up auto-forwards for all the accounts that seem popular at his office (so that I'm not accused of looking at private legal mail).
If you were a car dealer or specialized repair shop, then it may have been reasonable for you to own a domain using several of their trademarks. That's certainly too broad a set of categories to be a likely hobbyist organization. Sounds like you were cybersquatting.
That's a different case from acquiring generic names (which can be rather dubious as well), and a much different case from what the main article was about, which is somebody who owns a domain that's based on his own name.
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
Keep it, but offer to lease DNS records to them. Basically, rent "www IN A ....." while keeping control of the domain itself.
Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?
Legal proceedings are expensive, lengthy, and not guaranteed. Thus a company would rather pay a reasonable sum to just get what they want, rather than have a fight. If you make them a reasonable offer, maybe a grand or two for your trouble, they'll likely accept.
The company my father used to work for went through this. They wanted a domain that a guy had. So they contacted him and offered him $10,000. They figured, as it was just a personal site, that he'd jump at it. It was an easy way to get what they wanted, and not a lot of money in the scheme of a company's operations. However, the guy decided that he wanted millions. Well, then they took him to court and won. However it probably cost them over $10,000 in legal fees.
So, if you respond with something like "Yes I'd be willing to sell my domain. However, there is going to be some inconvenience in dealing with a transition. So if you'd agree to $2000 to cover my expenses, I'd be happy to sell." I'd bet they go for it. That's not expensive to a company, and it makes everything real easy.
I recently sold my domain to a french company that reached me in a similar way. I told them i had no interest in selling the domain as I use it for personal and business reasons. I told them if they wanted to buy my company, then to make a reasonable offer (but again I had no interest in selling the domain at this time).
They provided a very attractive offer and I did end up selling the domain. They simply redirect the .com to their french site. I got 6 months of email forwarding.
My experience was good, but that does not seem to be what people here are saying...
You may be using it for email now, but who's to say whether you or any of your relations will develop some sort of product in the future that can be marketed via your .com address. It is, after all, your own name so you have sufficient right to hold the address without anyone accusing you of cyber squatting.
Similarly, there's a chance that the company will grow much larger in the future and their buy out offer will increase. Consider it an investment.
Simply add a redirect link at the top of the page. "Perhaps you were looking for company X? They can be found at [their URL]."
Lawyers do not get involved unless they are invited, but, there is always a lawyer who will take any stupid case that some idiot brings to their door.
......a dick.
Seriously. We all complain about the bullshit that surrounds us on a daily basis here at /. yet we see posts like the 1st one up. I am hoping he was being funny/sarcastic (as he was properly modded).
Try being the good guy, write them an HONEST email explaining your concerns, and ask them for a reasonable offer. You will always retain the right to reject (unless you foolishly give it away). So, what have you got to lose by being honest about things up front? IF, and I emphasize, IF, it ends up in a courtroom, you will have already scored some points in that you will be able to prove a good-faith effort to remedy the situation.
While I can agree with the "talk to a lawyer" suggestions, to some extent, I do feel that lawyers are sometimes wholly unnecessary and are merely a moneypit. Send the email, get a response, and then decide whether or not a lawyer is called for. And don't forget your gut. It talks to you. Listen.
The letter is very unbusinesslike. Its grammar is poor. It doesn't have the 'look and feel' of something legitimate. Most interestingly, the email conveys absolutely nothing to identify the potential purchaser.
If somebody doesn't have the time or ability to compose a good email, I would suspect that they wouldn't have the money to fund a substantial domain name purchase either.
If somebody isn't going to tell you (verifiably) who they are, why would you want to do business with them?
This smells bad.
Actually the style of the email and the grammatical errors are very Dinglish. (Dutch + English). Especially the closing and the way he signed his full (first initial last name). Most dutch people rarely include their full first name in correspondence, usually using only their first few initials. This is proper business etiquette. On the flip side, in the news, the first name last initial is commonly used to "anonymously" name suspected criminals who want to stay anon, for example Ali G.
Seeing as he comes from .nl - at least that part is legit.
Think about it from their perspective. They're probably worried they're missing out on a small number of customers who inadvertantly go to your site instead of theirs.
I would guess their lost revenue is low to very low, so don't get greedy. There are plenty of reasonable alternatives that could be worked out to make you both happy. Examples:
A priminent link on your website to theirs would be my favourite - sell it to them as 'advertising space' or donate it if they seem nice and you can't be bothered collecting a few dollars.
Offer to sell them a HTTP redirect service and keep the domain yourself.
Sell them the www subdomain but keep the MX pointing to you.
Sell them the domain and ask for an email alias.
Think of it as a normal business transaction between two individuals. Bargain in good faith and you're not opening yourself up to much legally. Try to charge something outrageous and you're likely to fall foul of the squatter rules.
This happened to me back in 1999. Actually, it happened to me a lot, but 1999 was when I finally won the domain name lottery.
I told him the same thing I tell everyone who asks: "Well, I'm not really looking to sell my domain name but feel free to make me an offer."
He said, "I'll give you $5000."
I said, "That's a reasonable offer, but I have both the .com and the .org and I'd want to sell them as a pair."
He said, "Okay, I'll give you $5000 each."
I said, "That's a very fair offer. I need to think about what it would take me to change my address and migrate everything off the name."
A week later he called and asked for my decision. I said, "You made me a very fair offer. I'm still thinking it through. Give me a little more time."
A few days later he called and asked for my decision. I said, "You made me a very fair offer. I'm still thinking it through. Give me a little more time."
He said, "Look, I need to move forward, have graphics made for my business and so on. If you'll decide now, I'll double my offer."
I said, "Give me one hour. I'll call you back in an hour."
An hour later I said, "$20k? Done."
Down payment on my house, right before the real estate market headed for the sky.
Moderating "-1, Disagree" is simple censorship. Have the guts to post your opinion.
Maybe the sender is:
- a person who does not have English as their first language, and/or
- a techie?
That would account for the rough grammar and the informality.
I mean, seriously, if an IT guy from .NL wrote it, would you really expect it to read like an American lawyer wrote it?
Several years ago I registered a domain name for something I was trying which I was thinking about. Some guy, whose last name was the same as the domain I registered asked me if I'd be interested in selling it. Well, I needed the money so I quoted a reasonable offer. After the check cleared I did a change of the owner from me to him.
I took his personal check because he was in the U.S., the rules are very different when it's an international transaction. (I once paid for a shareware registration to a guy in Canada using a personal check drawn on a U.S. bank, I presume Canadian banks have no problem handling those; but I wouldn't accept anything but a guaranteed payment for an international transaction.)
Since the possibility of fraud is high when the buyer is outside the same country (on low value transactions where there's no money to chase them if you can't recover it), you make sure it's a guaranteed payment. I would suggest either wire transfer (and make sure the payment additionally includes your bank's incoming wire transfer fee) or Western Union for the same reason scammers use them: so the money is guaranteed and can't be revoked or a fraudulent transfer such as a forged check. Especially since the funds transfer is from a foreign country, it might cost you $30 or more to clear a check issued on a bank in some other country, presuming you don't get the check back in six or eight weeks as a forgery. If they want a written bill of sale or something, fine. But you get guaranteed payment before they get the domain.
Another option if the amount of the sale is not over the limit: set up a new, fresh account using Paypal or Google Checkout that goes to a new checking account at a bank (other than the one you do business with now) that will allow you to open one with no monthly fee (and check the paperwork they give you, sometimes they sneak fees in there), then, once the transfer clears, take all the money out except a token amount ($1) in cash, and then deposit the cash in your other account. Or close the account as you no longer need it.
This way, they can't undo the transaction and you've got the cash. Even if they try to reverse the transaction, the bank can't reverse it because you didn't use paper; if you took a bank check from them they could reverse the payment to your bank. Also you don't want to use the same bank as your own because they can use set off if the other side tries to renege on the transaction.
In fact, if they are going to use wire transfer, use a new account because I suspect the information needed for an incoming wire is the same as could be used for an outgoing one, and they might be able to siphon money out of your account. Or check with your bank to find out how to have a wire transfer that doesn't allow them to extract money from you, but I think wire transfers are ridiculous because of the fact that your bank charges you for the incoming transfer as well.
Automatic red flag: if they offer you more and want you to arrange something to send them money back. 99.9999999999999999999999999999999% of the time it's a scam for them to rip someone else off and leave you on the hook to make the person they stole from whole, since they can't be found, but you can.
I just went and looked it up for an example transaction, a Western Union transfer of $1,000 from Netherlands to the U.S. is about 711 Euros and costs around 41 Euros for the transaction, probably less than it would cost them for both ends of a wire transfer. If you're charging less than $1000 for the domain, the transfer fee to them will probably be less.
If you do these things and the transaction goes through, it hasn't cost you anything but a little time and you've protected yourself.
Otherwise it's no different from selling anything you own to someone else. A domain name has a registered owner, you transfer the registration to someone else, they own it. Most personal property doesn't have registered owners, if you sell something they just t
The lessons of history teach us - if they teach us anything - that nobody learns the lessons that history teaches us.
If the domain were just his name, none of this would matter. But the fact that the company's name matches the domain makes it a potential trademark dispute, so you must be mindful of ICANN's Uniform Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy. It explicitly lists several types of "bad faith" registrations, and the first one is acquiring a domain primarily for the purposes of selling it. If you throw out a number, that can be interpreted as evidence of intent to sell, and thus bad faith and grounds for losing your domain.
Instead, get them to make an offer first. Something like, "I hadn't really thought about selling it, but my bills have been getting kind of high recently. How much were you thinking?" Although the most bulletproof is, "Sorry, not interested" and hope they make an offer.
Go to Moniker's domain auction site for some ballpark figures of how much domains similar to yours are selling for.
http://xkcd.com/374/
Don't thank God, thank a doctor!
You should solidify your ownership of the domain immediately, and consider specifics about offers, etc. later.
I had an interesting challenge to my ownership of the Chaco.com domain. We were using it legitimately to host material on Chaco Canyon, as well as hosting our MUD client (formerly owned by our company Chaco Communications). And yet, we were challenged by Chaco Sandals. The challenge was close; we almost lost the domain, just because we were a little sloppy.
The details are here:
http://domains.adrforum.com/domains/decisions/791739.htm
Based on my experience, I would suggest that you get all the domain ownership issues in a solid form: Use your own name, make sure the addresses are correct and usable, don't use a "privacy filter" like GoDaddy sells to hide your identity.
Good luck.
I also own the .com version of my name. In my case my last name is the name of a company that does about $100 million a year and has had a trademark on my name and a few versions of it for over a 100 years.
I can tell you for a fact that companies that are serious about getting your domain name do not send you a polite email asking to buy it. They have their agent or lawyer send a registered letter and follow up with a phone call.
Most likely the guy who contacted you won't pay you enough to make it worth the hassle of changing your email address. But, speaking as someone who has turned down offers ranging from a couple of shirts (no, I am not making that up, they were very nice wool shirts...) to $20,000 for my domain name and as someone who has been threatened with being sued over my ownership and use of the domain name 6 times over the last 12 years here are a few things to think about.
1) It is your name. (The web cred for being first-name @ last-name . com is incredible.)
2) It will only become more valuable with time.
3) Don't fall into the nice guy trap. You are not doing this guy a favor, he doesn't give a shit about you. This is no different than if someone walked up and offered to buy your truck. (That has happened to me too.) You have something he wants, but you want it too. You do not have to share.
4) Research the company. What does D&B say about them? How much can they afford to spend? How much is the domain really worth to them?
5) Never never never tell them what you will sell it for. No matter what price you mention they will make a lower counter offer and will never (well... almost never) pay what you ask. More importantly, they will pay *no more* than what they *think* it is worth to them. If you quote a price that price will be the maximum they will pay. If they quote the first price that price will be the minimum they will pay.
6) If the sale is contingent on your getting a .us domain then make sure you have that domain before you finish the deal. My dear friends went out and grabbed all the names I might want as an alternate domain just so they could use them as bargaining chips.
7) If they make an offer get a lawyer. Do not reply to an offer until you have a lawyer. BTW, a *good* intellectual property lawyer is not cheap The first one I tried to talk to wanted a $30,000 retainer. So, I had to go with a not very good lawyer... BTW, you should note that the cost of a *good* lawyer started out $10,000 higher than anyone ever offered for the name.
My best advice is to send back a polite email asking what he is offering. When the reply turns out to be less than $100 you can laugh, tell the guy to blow you, and at least know you had the fun of getting a personal question posted on /.
Oh yeah... in the end I still own the name and I am in the hole a few thousand for legal bills. I am pretty happy about that. They could have sued (even though they would have lost) and bankrupted me with the legal fees of winning the suit.
Stonewolf
I've sold three domains I was legitimately using and made a pretty nice wad of cash.
I registered a domain name about 6 years ago with the intent of starting a company that offered a service pertinent to the domain. It was a mashup of two words that I created myself. About 3 months after registering it I got an email from someone in Israel asking me if I would consider selling it. My response was along the lines of, "No, I hadn't considered selling it but so that I can compare with what I had planned to do with it, could you let me know your offer?" He came back and said $1,000. That is not a lot of money, but I had a pipeline of about 20 other web projects in front of the one I was considering for this domain so I took it.
We did an escrow.com jobby and everything worked flawlessly.
I'm a big tall mofo.
+1 on escrow.com
I sold a domain 2 years ago using escrow.com and everything went smooth as silk. To this day I do not know who the buyer was, but his agent handled a few details, and the money was wire transfered - ba da bing.
This was a domain I registered back in 1992 and I got an ridiculous amount for it. But if I knew then what I know now ... Sigh. I could have had sex.com, auto.com, business.com, etc.com. Sigh. Back to working on the perpetual motion machine.
At a certain point, when you realize the guy isn't squatting, you cut him a check for $250K and you're done with it.
Nissan has spent more than that on lawyer's fees and are further from their goal. If I was on the board of directors, I'd ask to have the guy pushing this fired. Not because of the money, but because of poor judgment. If you can't use common sense in obvious things, you probably can't suddenly turn it on for complex issues.
Really, fire the guy at Nissan Motors who keeps pushing this lawsuit, and then pay the guy a few bucks for the domain.
You were mistaken. Which is odd, since memory shouldn't be a problem for you