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It reminds me of Justin Hall's story about holding out and refusing to sell "bud.com" to Budweiser. Instead he just hung onto it, and eventually used it for hi

It reminds me of Justin Hall's story about holding out and refusing to sell "bud.com" to Budweiser. Instead he just hung onto it, and eventually used it for his own bud delivery company, once recreational cannabis was finally legalized. He was much happier that great three-letter domain name be used for something he loves, strong kind bud, instead of something he hates, weak piss beer. https://bud.com https://bud.com https://bud.com/history-of-bud-com/ https://bud.com/history-of-bud-com/ >In 1999 I was contacted by a lawyer Steven M. Weinberg, representing Anheuser-Busch, makers of Bud beer. >We chatted by phone: “So, you’re a college student!” >Actually I graduated the year before. >He continued: “Well, how does $50,000 sound for bud.com?” >I replied that $50k should be the interest generated by the money someone pays for bud.com. This is a three letter, actual word, dot com domain, and if I’m going to see it on every beer can you make forever, I should at least be well compensated. I remember reading that the marketing budget for Budweiser beer that quarter was $16.1 million. BUD was the company’s stock symbol. >I wasn’t going to sell lightly, and they weren’t going to bid against themselves, so we didn’t get anywhere. The story about his fight to register the four-letter domain name fuck.com is also hilarious: https://www.links.net/webpub/fuck.com.html https://www.links.net/webpub/fuck.com.html

zamadatix 4y ago
I'm torn on this story. On one hand I'm really glad he got to keep using it personally out of the gate and eventually was able to later use it again for the intent it sounds like he gave when registering, couldn't ask for anything more for a short domain. On the other his reasoning for not selling was really unrelated to any of that. His response was standard squatter logic - I registered it first and you have a lot of money + will actually use it heavily so I'm not selling unless it's for tens of thousands of times what I got it for. It wasn't like he responded "I think I will get more than 50k of use out of it" or "It's more than 50k of inconvenience for me to change my email" it was straight up "I replied that $50k should be the interest generated by the money someone pays for bud.com. This is a three letter, actual word, dot com domain, and if I’m going to see it on every beer can you make forever, I should at least be well compensated". Kind of ruins the inspiration when the thing he actually held out for was rent seeking. On the third hand Budweiser is indeed really shit beer...
- expazl 4y ago
  That's not squatters logic any more than you're a squatter in your own home if you refuse to sell even if a generous offer comes along because you value your home a lot more than even an above market offer, but you'd still likely sell at 100 times valuation. Again, that doesn't make you a squatter, just someone holding on to something and saying "If you really want this, you're going to have to offer me something grand, and I know you can afford it, otherwise I'll hold on to it".
  - zamadatix 4y ago
    I mean there are a lot of differences here, primarily that you by definition don't own domains you lease them to use, but yes that'd also be its own flavor of extremely uninspiring story. Holding out to get the value something is actually worth to you before you give it up is great and interesting but that's not the reason they gave.
  - quickthrower2 4y ago
    Rich people buying homes and not living in them or renting them out is an issue for housing supply.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- bcrosby95 4y ago
  I'm not torn. They were actively using the site. They weren't sitting on it simply to sell it. But of course, everything has a price... it was just significantly higher than $50k. I have a story similar to this. My friends and I had a joke about some famous person in high school (in the 90s). We registered a domain with his name and used the domain extensively. 10 years later the guy tried to sue us for control of the domain. We were actively using it though and it was just an inside joke. Random internet people with no clue about the situation would have thought we were just squatters.
  - zamadatix 4y ago
Upvoter33 4y ago
It doesn't seem like a very similar story at all. One is a story of hard work for many years on something one loves; the other is cybersquatting eventually (kind of) turning into a business?
msla 4y ago
I'm surprised WIPO didn't perform some dispute resolution by taking bud.com away from him and giving it to Budweiser.

zamadatix 4y ago

I'm torn on this story. On one hand I'm really glad he got to keep using it personally out of the gate and eventually was able to later use it again for the intent it sounds like he gave when registering, couldn't ask for anything more for a short domain. On the other his reasoning for not selling was really unrelated to any of that. His response was standard squatter logic - I registered it first and you have a lot of money + will actually use it heavily so I'm not selling unless it's for tens of thousands of times what I got it for. It wasn't like he responded "I think I will get more than 50k of use out of it" or "It's more than 50k of inconvenience for me to change my email" it was straight up "I replied that $50k should be the interest generated by the money someone pays for bud.com. This is a three letter, actual word, dot com domain, and if I’m going to see it on every beer can you make forever, I should at least be well compensated". Kind of ruins the inspiration when the thing he actually held out for was rent seeking. On the third hand Budweiser is indeed really shit beer...

expazl 4y ago
That's not squatters logic any more than you're a squatter in your own home if you refuse to sell even if a generous offer comes along because you value your home a lot more than even an above market offer, but you'd still likely sell at 100 times valuation. Again, that doesn't make you a squatter, just someone holding on to something and saying "If you really want this, you're going to have to offer me something grand, and I know you can afford it, otherwise I'll hold on to it".
- zamadatix 4y ago
  I mean there are a lot of differences here, primarily that you by definition don't own domains you lease them to use, but yes that'd also be its own flavor of extremely uninspiring story. Holding out to get the value something is actually worth to you before you give it up is great and interesting but that's not the reason they gave.
- quickthrower2 4y ago
  Rich people buying homes and not living in them or renting them out is an issue for housing supply.
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
bcrosby95 4y ago
I'm not torn. They were actively using the site. They weren't sitting on it simply to sell it. But of course, everything has a price... it was just significantly higher than $50k. I have a story similar to this. My friends and I had a joke about some famous person in high school (in the 90s). We registered a domain with his name and used the domain extensively. 10 years later the guy tried to sue us for control of the domain. We were actively using it though and it was just an inside joke. Random internet people with no clue about the situation would have thought we were just squatters.
- zamadatix 4y ago

Upvoter33 4y ago

It doesn't seem like a very similar story at all. One is a story of hard work for many years on something one loves; the other is cybersquatting eventually (kind of) turning into a business?

msla 4y ago

I'm surprised WIPO didn't perform some dispute resolution by taking bud.com away from him and giving it to Budweiser.