5 ms·

In my opinion this is a huge problem on the internet. I am all for freedom to own domains, but it's coming to the point where more often or not the domain name

In my opinion this is a huge problem on the internet. I am all for freedom to own domains, but it's coming to the point where more often or not the domain name I search for has no content up and is just conveniently being parked. For me, I guess the fact that the domain is parked tells me the owner is looking for a pay day from it, rather than to create their own content rich site. Big companies can force the little guy to submit to them and give them a domain, but little guys can't do anything to little or big guys to get a domain. It's a pretty messed up system. I sold a domain once for $5,000(us) to the biggest equipment manufacturer in the world. I wanted more, their proposal was to buy it for $3,000(us). I was happy enough with the $5,000 after they told me they were going to sue and take it from me...

jsomethings 15y ago
I completely agree. Something to keep in mind is that the domain name system is almost unlike any other commodity -- in that only one of each exists, and it can never be replicated. For example, no matter how rare a baseball card is, there is almost always a few others of its kind. Same with comic books, and so on. Now, no matter how rare an antique piece of furniture is (let's say it's a one-off, hand-made piece), you can still replicate it with enough attention to detail to nearly fully mimic the original. But, with a domain name, there's only one. And, you can't mimic it. (You can get the .co, but that's a whole other story.) Consequently, domain owners have a lopsided amount of haggling power.
- larrys 15y ago
  "But, with a domain name, there's only one." How do you figure that? You can get a name in a different gtld tld cctld etc. It may not be as desirable as .com (because of course I'm assuming that is what you mean). And why is there only "one". There is not only "one" name you can use for your business. Especially if you are starting one. You are free to call yourself whatever you want.
  - jsomethings 15y ago
    As both you and I already hinted at, you can get a name in a different TLD (or even prepend "get", e.g. "getAPP.com"), but you're taking a hit for a variety of reasons (perception, confusion). My point was only that you won't ever replicate it, and for that reason domains are unique. My personal favorite "fallback" is to use .io or prepend "get."
    - larrys 15y ago
      "get" is fine or "my" etc. But I would absolutely stay away from any cctld's like .io. If your site becomes popular you will end up having to purchase the .com assuming you even can do that. (Once publicity of your .io site gets out the price of the .com will go up if it's even possible to buy).
- gala8y 15y ago
  Feel I know exactly what you mean. One side of the problem is that "only one of each exists", the other is that many entities might 'need' (more or less) this very name, regardless whether we talk about local (eg. 3 bookstores in one small town) or worldwide. I imagine with system (resources on the internet) getting bigger and bigger single, nice, short and memorable domains will gradually become less important. I imagine factors like location aware, user aware, use of bookmarks, search, links attached to social profiles, NFC, qr, AI algorithms, you name it, will each play a role here. There could be moment in time when everybody will accept change of 'paradigm' and accept that addressing resources is not the way it used to be, or that it is 'many ways lead to the content' . We could even use bare numbers for lots of stuff. Also, this reminds me that people used to share domains back in 90's with a nice intro and screen split to two parts - you would choose which company/site you wanted to go. Sure its not the solution by any means, but I liked those sites, always getting some positive feeling that this was possible (people agreeing on sth). I have not seen such a site for a long time, though.
- njharman 15y ago
  > almost unlike any other commodity Art and people (sports, movie starts) are two I thought of instantly. And the insane, somewhat arbitrary (although it's always whatever someone is willing to pay) pricing of those makes domain market look clean and efficient.
  - jsomethings 15y ago
    The comparison of domains to sports and movie stars (when it comes to being un-replicable and heavily influenced by taste) is very interesting. Maybe I'll start telling people that domains are like movie stars :) An interesting question that then arises is what would be the equivalent of "character actor" in the domain world?
    - jacques_chester 15y ago
      * .blogspot.com, * .wordpress.com, * .tumbler.com etc.
sjtgraham 15y ago
The domain system desperately needs reform. It's unconscionable that one can simply park domains wholesale and wait for the bids to roll in. It's a huge problem that people wanting to create value are held to ransom by parasites, and there is little chance other than to pay through the nose.
- larrys 15y ago
  "It's unconscionable that one can simply park domains wholesale" "unconscionable"? It's a business model and it's legal. There is no requirement to use a domain name and there never has been one. "people wanting to create value are held to ransom by parasites" And what if the someone "wanting to create value" got to the name first and has their idea of a site is not as good as your idea of a site. The name would also not be available for you to use. This idea that if people weren't parking names they would be available when you wanted the name is simply not true. Someone else could have registered the name and used it to put up 3 picture of their cat. Then you'd have to approach and buy it from them. That said I can certainly understand the frustration that people feel in trying to obtain names for their startups (as I consult with these people).
  - jasonkester 15y ago
    "unconscionable"? It's a business model and it's legal. There is no requirement to use a domain name and there never has been one. Notice that your response in no way addresses the grandparent's complaint. Being legal doesn't change the fact that parking domains makes you a bad person. There are lots of things in this world that are technically legal to do, but make the world a worse place (domain squatting being a perfect example). There's also a type of individual that doesn't look beyond legality when determining right behavior. This is a good type of individual to be able to recognize, as it's a very good indicator of somebody with whom you never want to do business.
    - andyakb 15y ago
      Parking a domain makes somebody a bad person? How is this any different than a speculator buying undeveloped parcels of land and waiting for a developer to come along and buy them for more money? Are they bad people, too? It is annoying when you need to buy the domain you want from a reseller and have to pay more than if it wasnt registered, but saying it makes the reseller a bad person is going way, way too far.
orky56 15y ago
In the area of trademarks I believe, you need to demonstrate that you are not just "parking" the name but also actually taking actions to sell and market the product/service. A similar regulation should be applied for websites to ensure they are using it for the proposed purpose.
- newhouseb 15y ago
  There is precedent for this in WIPO court (around abusing domain parking), but unfortunately the shady businesses that profit off of parking domains are getting smarter by auto-generating "specialty based news services" based on the keywords in the URL instead of throwing up exclusively ads. Take for example, the World News Network which squats domains with pages like "http://policearrest.com/ http://policearrest.com/. (See an example WIPO proceeding here http://www.wipo.int/amc/en/domains/decisions/html/2005/d2005-0587.html http://www.wipo.int/amc/en/domains/decisions/html/2005/d2005...) World New Network had squatted a domain that we were interested in (a gobbledegook web 2.0 name, mind you), and they wanted 80k under the idea that this website was an important part of their news operation. If this was an English word it might make sense, but it was far from it so the whole game reeked of extortion (in the casual, not legal, sense).
nmridul 15y ago
There are lots of tlds available now. If one cannot find hisname.com, he should go for .biz, .info, .net, .org, .in, .name, .me or any of the extensions that are available for anyone to register. I'm sure hisname will be available in one of these extensions. Problem is, people feel entitled to own the .com name just because they have an idea that they think can change the world. If the idea can change the world, then the tld should not matter (or even the domain name should not matter).

jsomethings 15y ago

I completely agree. Something to keep in mind is that the domain name system is almost unlike any other commodity -- in that only one of each exists, and it can never be replicated. For example, no matter how rare a baseball card is, there is almost always a few others of its kind. Same with comic books, and so on. Now, no matter how rare an antique piece of furniture is (let's say it's a one-off, hand-made piece), you can still replicate it with enough attention to detail to nearly fully mimic the original. But, with a domain name, there's only one. And, you can't mimic it. (You can get the .co, but that's a whole other story.) Consequently, domain owners have a lopsided amount of haggling power.

larrys 15y ago
"But, with a domain name, there's only one." How do you figure that? You can get a name in a different gtld tld cctld etc. It may not be as desirable as .com (because of course I'm assuming that is what you mean). And why is there only "one". There is not only "one" name you can use for your business. Especially if you are starting one. You are free to call yourself whatever you want.
- jsomethings 15y ago
  As both you and I already hinted at, you can get a name in a different TLD (or even prepend "get", e.g. "getAPP.com"), but you're taking a hit for a variety of reasons (perception, confusion). My point was only that you won't ever replicate it, and for that reason domains are unique. My personal favorite "fallback" is to use .io or prepend "get."
  - larrys 15y ago
    "get" is fine or "my" etc. But I would absolutely stay away from any cctld's like .io. If your site becomes popular you will end up having to purchase the .com assuming you even can do that. (Once publicity of your .io site gets out the price of the .com will go up if it's even possible to buy).
gala8y 15y ago
Feel I know exactly what you mean. One side of the problem is that "only one of each exists", the other is that many entities might 'need' (more or less) this very name, regardless whether we talk about local (eg. 3 bookstores in one small town) or worldwide. I imagine with system (resources on the internet) getting bigger and bigger single, nice, short and memorable domains will gradually become less important. I imagine factors like location aware, user aware, use of bookmarks, search, links attached to social profiles, NFC, qr, AI algorithms, you name it, will each play a role here. There could be moment in time when everybody will accept change of 'paradigm' and accept that addressing resources is not the way it used to be, or that it is 'many ways lead to the content' . We could even use bare numbers for lots of stuff. Also, this reminds me that people used to share domains back in 90's with a nice intro and screen split to two parts - you would choose which company/site you wanted to go. Sure its not the solution by any means, but I liked those sites, always getting some positive feeling that this was possible (people agreeing on sth). I have not seen such a site for a long time, though.
njharman 15y ago
> almost unlike any other commodity Art and people (sports, movie starts) are two I thought of instantly. And the insane, somewhat arbitrary (although it's always whatever someone is willing to pay) pricing of those makes domain market look clean and efficient.
- jsomethings 15y ago
  The comparison of domains to sports and movie stars (when it comes to being un-replicable and heavily influenced by taste) is very interesting. Maybe I'll start telling people that domains are like movie stars :) An interesting question that then arises is what would be the equivalent of "character actor" in the domain world?
  - jacques_chester 15y ago
    * .blogspot.com, * .wordpress.com, * .tumbler.com etc.

sjtgraham 15y ago

The domain system desperately needs reform. It's unconscionable that one can simply park domains wholesale and wait for the bids to roll in. It's a huge problem that people wanting to create value are held to ransom by parasites, and there is little chance other than to pay through the nose.

larrys 15y ago
"It's unconscionable that one can simply park domains wholesale" "unconscionable"? It's a business model and it's legal. There is no requirement to use a domain name and there never has been one. "people wanting to create value are held to ransom by parasites" And what if the someone "wanting to create value" got to the name first and has their idea of a site is not as good as your idea of a site. The name would also not be available for you to use. This idea that if people weren't parking names they would be available when you wanted the name is simply not true. Someone else could have registered the name and used it to put up 3 picture of their cat. Then you'd have to approach and buy it from them. That said I can certainly understand the frustration that people feel in trying to obtain names for their startups (as I consult with these people).
- jasonkester 15y ago
  "unconscionable"? It's a business model and it's legal. There is no requirement to use a domain name and there never has been one. Notice that your response in no way addresses the grandparent's complaint. Being legal doesn't change the fact that parking domains makes you a bad person. There are lots of things in this world that are technically legal to do, but make the world a worse place (domain squatting being a perfect example). There's also a type of individual that doesn't look beyond legality when determining right behavior. This is a good type of individual to be able to recognize, as it's a very good indicator of somebody with whom you never want to do business.
  - andyakb 15y ago
    Parking a domain makes somebody a bad person? How is this any different than a speculator buying undeveloped parcels of land and waiting for a developer to come along and buy them for more money? Are they bad people, too? It is annoying when you need to buy the domain you want from a reseller and have to pay more than if it wasnt registered, but saying it makes the reseller a bad person is going way, way too far.

orky56 15y ago

In the area of trademarks I believe, you need to demonstrate that you are not just "parking" the name but also actually taking actions to sell and market the product/service. A similar regulation should be applied for websites to ensure they are using it for the proposed purpose.

newhouseb 15y ago
There is precedent for this in WIPO court (around abusing domain parking), but unfortunately the shady businesses that profit off of parking domains are getting smarter by auto-generating "specialty based news services" based on the keywords in the URL instead of throwing up exclusively ads. Take for example, the World News Network which squats domains with pages like "http://policearrest.com/ http://policearrest.com/. (See an example WIPO proceeding here http://www.wipo.int/amc/en/domains/decisions/html/2005/d2005-0587.html http://www.wipo.int/amc/en/domains/decisions/html/2005/d2005...) World New Network had squatted a domain that we were interested in (a gobbledegook web 2.0 name, mind you), and they wanted 80k under the idea that this website was an important part of their news operation. If this was an English word it might make sense, but it was far from it so the whole game reeked of extortion (in the casual, not legal, sense).

nmridul 15y ago

There are lots of tlds available now. If one cannot find hisname.com, he should go for .biz, .info, .net, .org, .in, .name, .me or any of the extensions that are available for anyone to register. I'm sure hisname will be available in one of these extensions. Problem is, people feel entitled to own the .com name just because they have an idea that they think can change the world. If the idea can change the world, then the tld should not matter (or even the domain name should not matter).