After Setting .Org Price Record By Paying $1 Million for Poker.org, Buyer Reveals For the 1st Time That They Also Bought the 2nd Most Expensive .Org Domain

The owners of PokerCompany.com made waves last week when they purchased Poker.org from National A-1 for $1 million, by far the highest price ever reported for a .org domain. PokerCompany.com CEO Markus Sonermo, who had told me the Poker.org deal was about to be

completed a few days before the official announcement was made, just told me about another huge .org purchase that his company was involved in. In fact, with the release of that information in this post it becomes the second biggest .org sale ever reported, eclipsing Engineering.org (which sold several years ago for $198,000). 

The new runner-up is Blackjack.org, a name that Sonermo's company paid $298,000 for in a previously unannounced transaction completed on October 31, 2007. PokerCompany.com went on to develop that domain into one of the shining stars in their stable of gaming names. Google even ranks the Blackjack.org site higher than Blackjack.com. Clearly, Sonermo's company knows what they are doing. 

Their success with Blackjack.org also gave them a good indication of just how valuable Poker.org would be to their company, explaining why they had no qualms about plunking down a cool $1 million to acquire Poker.org last week. They already have a splash page on Poker.org collecting email addresses so they can notify everyone who is interested when the new site is launched.

My wife and I have just returned from the extended weekend mini-vacation I told you we were heading out on in my last post Thursday. The biggest news that broke while I was away came from Elliot Silver who reported that Sex.com is to be auctioned off in a foreclosure sale March 18th. It appears that the group that purchased the domain for an estimated $12-14 million in 2006, Escom LLC, wasn't able to keep up with payments due the company that financed the sale. Whether or not the auction will take place remains to be seen. I have heard rumblings that one or more disgruntled partners in the troubled venture may attempt to stop the sale with a legal challenge of some kind.

I have some other domain news to bring you up to date on and, in another post later today, will couple that information with some photos and details about the weekend trip to Mount Dora, Florida that T.R.A.F.F.I.C. Co-Founder Howard Neu and his wife Barbara joined Diana and I on.