3 ms·

A review by humanoids would consider historic context. End of the day the end user should benefit. Killing off your thunder isn't good for anyone, until it is.

keenmaster 7y ago
That makes sense. I was referring to the most egregious cases of traffic hacking, where a startup’s value is entirely derived from stealing a namesake competitor’s startup. The scenario I’d try to avoid is this: a world where, even if you create a startup with a reasonably unique name, you can nonetheless 100% count on someone trying to steal your thunder once your idea is validated. If they succeed, and they win when bidding opens, then you and your investors will get a haircut for losing your brand. You might never fully recover, or it could be a fatal blow. I must admit, I can’t say that’s an unmitigated bad outcome. In the end, your investors didn’t help increase the bid when they had the chance, which means they value your potential less than that of the other X. I could see the whole system resulting in a market for domain bidding loans, and the terms of the loan would be more favorable (low rate, long maturity) the more mature your company is and the more credible the vision. At least a ton more names would be available, so the potential competitor would be more likely to pick another name to begin with. Savage competition would only appear on obvious names like X. I would still be concerned about large companies trying to squash startups and make life as hard as possible for them, but I’m sure there’s a way around that. The rules governing the system would have to effectively outlaw such actions, as adjudicated and penalized by an independent committee. The system would have to be as fair as possible to startups, and perhaps even biased towards them, so that society may reap the positive externalities of competition. A hybrid between my idea and yours would only force the index schema on the most extremely simple domain names. Most combinations of two words (not a common phrase) and most “non-words” that do not correspond to a valuable company would be really easy for a startup to grab. They’d be able to force bidding to open immediately, skipping the index stage. The domain owner would have some amount of time to notify pre-existing businesses with the same name, if they exist, so that they have a chance to bid. Example: let’s say kentmobile.com is parked and you are a UK-based 5G startup. For whatever reason, you want to be named after the UK province of Kent. The only other business actually named Kent Mobile is a seedy mobile repair shop in the province. You can force bidding to open, and only you and that seedy store will be able to bid. Your business has much more potential, so you will definitely win the bid without paying an enormous sum to the domain owner. Without such a system, the domain owner can neglect to even list their domain for sale, intentionally preempt competition (ex: if Facebook parks some of the best potential social network names), irrationally strike down offers, or ask for an unreasonably high sum.
- kingludite 7y ago
  I had 2 thoughts: 1) I remembered how much everyone hated web directories (or did we?) and how annoying it is to have to click though to get to a page. 2) The other thought was that we've been here before. The solution back then was to give people second names. I would still bring in the review panel for that bidding war for an existing businesses website. The 5G company should probably outbid the previous owner by some proportional amount. I find internet navigation [by name] to be a fascinating puzzle since I don't really like any of the ideas. I'm going to have to think about it for a few more years.
  - keenmaster 7y ago
    It's definitely a tough problem to get right, but the status quo sucks so much that the only way is up. I think one feature of the system that would mitigate any issues with indices or bidding is the ability for users to "default" a website to a particular domain name. To use another example than x.com - let's say GrubHub didn't exist, and it was being founded today, but GrubHub.com is parked. Instead of using a sub-optimal name or paying tons of money for a domain before they even have revenue, they could go ahead and launch GrubHub.com as a "secondary domain." Users of their iOS/Android app would be told "hey, to get your $10 signup bonus, tap on this link and press 'default as grubhub.com on all devices.'" The users would gladly oblige, because they'd rather have grubhub.com point to an actual service rather than some rent-seeker's landing page. That's especially if there's free money involved. Once GrubHub gets momentum, they will be well-positioned to win the eventual bid, which won't have many bidders. There aren't many companies named GrubHub out there. Again, if they anticipate very limited/no competition in an auction, they can just force the bid to happen before formally launching and maybe pay a few hundred dollars for grubhub.com.

keenmaster 7y ago

That makes sense. I was referring to the most egregious cases of traffic hacking, where a startup’s value is entirely derived from stealing a namesake competitor’s startup. The scenario I’d try to avoid is this: a world where, even if you create a startup with a reasonably unique name, you can nonetheless 100% count on someone trying to steal your thunder once your idea is validated. If they succeed, and they win when bidding opens, then you and your investors will get a haircut for losing your brand. You might never fully recover, or it could be a fatal blow. I must admit, I can’t say that’s an unmitigated bad outcome. In the end, your investors didn’t help increase the bid when they had the chance, which means they value your potential less than that of the other X. I could see the whole system resulting in a market for domain bidding loans, and the terms of the loan would be more favorable (low rate, long maturity) the more mature your company is and the more credible the vision. At least a ton more names would be available, so the potential competitor would be more likely to pick another name to begin with. Savage competition would only appear on obvious names like X. I would still be concerned about large companies trying to squash startups and make life as hard as possible for them, but I’m sure there’s a way around that. The rules governing the system would have to effectively outlaw such actions, as adjudicated and penalized by an independent committee. The system would have to be as fair as possible to startups, and perhaps even biased towards them, so that society may reap the positive externalities of competition. A hybrid between my idea and yours would only force the index schema on the most extremely simple domain names. Most combinations of two words (not a common phrase) and most “non-words” that do not correspond to a valuable company would be really easy for a startup to grab. They’d be able to force bidding to open immediately, skipping the index stage. The domain owner would have some amount of time to notify pre-existing businesses with the same name, if they exist, so that they have a chance to bid. Example: let’s say kentmobile.com is parked and you are a UK-based 5G startup. For whatever reason, you want to be named after the UK province of Kent. The only other business actually named Kent Mobile is a seedy mobile repair shop in the province. You can force bidding to open, and only you and that seedy store will be able to bid. Your business has much more potential, so you will definitely win the bid without paying an enormous sum to the domain owner. Without such a system, the domain owner can neglect to even list their domain for sale, intentionally preempt competition (ex: if Facebook parks some of the best potential social network names), irrationally strike down offers, or ask for an unreasonably high sum.

kingludite 7y ago
I had 2 thoughts: 1) I remembered how much everyone hated web directories (or did we?) and how annoying it is to have to click though to get to a page. 2) The other thought was that we've been here before. The solution back then was to give people second names. I would still bring in the review panel for that bidding war for an existing businesses website. The 5G company should probably outbid the previous owner by some proportional amount. I find internet navigation [by name] to be a fascinating puzzle since I don't really like any of the ideas. I'm going to have to think about it for a few more years.
- keenmaster 7y ago
  It's definitely a tough problem to get right, but the status quo sucks so much that the only way is up. I think one feature of the system that would mitigate any issues with indices or bidding is the ability for users to "default" a website to a particular domain name. To use another example than x.com - let's say GrubHub didn't exist, and it was being founded today, but GrubHub.com is parked. Instead of using a sub-optimal name or paying tons of money for a domain before they even have revenue, they could go ahead and launch GrubHub.com as a "secondary domain." Users of their iOS/Android app would be told "hey, to get your $10 signup bonus, tap on this link and press 'default as grubhub.com on all devices.'" The users would gladly oblige, because they'd rather have grubhub.com point to an actual service rather than some rent-seeker's landing page. That's especially if there's free money involved. Once GrubHub gets momentum, they will be well-positioned to win the eventual bid, which won't have many bidders. There aren't many companies named GrubHub out there. Again, if they anticipate very limited/no competition in an auction, they can just force the bid to happen before formally launching and maybe pay a few hundred dollars for grubhub.com.