The T.R.A.F.F.I.C. Silicon Valley conference  opened last night with a welcoming cocktail party at the Marriott in Santa Clara, California. Though the crowd is lighter than usual for a T.R.A.F.F.I.C. event, the caliber of people here (in terms of their ability to make deals and dispense potentially life changing advice) should assure that those who made the trip will get their money's worth. NameMedia drew a steady flow of traffic to their booth with a wine tasting event that actually started an hour before the official party got underway. 

NameMedia's David Zakur pours samples at last night's wine tasting during 
the welcoming cocktail party at T.R.A.F.F.I.C. Silicon Valley.

The NameMedia booth attracted attendees eager to try a full range of wines from Napa Valley's Suhr Luchtel boutique winery. The cocktail party ended at 9pm but many of the attendees simply moved around the corner to the hotel bar where the conversations were still going strong well past midnight.

The first full day of business got underway this morning with welcoming comments from T.R.A.F.F.I.C. Co-Founders Rick Schwartz and Howard Neu. The day's events are continuing as I write this but tomorrow I will have a post in this column recapping all of the Tuesday highlights. 

Companies continue to use T.R.A.F.F.I.C. as a platform to announce major news. This morning Parked.com announced the acquisition of mini-site monetization service WhyPark.com, a company founded by Craig Rowe that we profiled in our March Cover Story. For that piece we also interviewed Parked.com President Donny Simonton who essentially telegraphed the acquisition that his highly successful parking company announced today. 

At the time Simonton said, "Coming up with a way to combine a domain parking feed and a content system would be the best of both 

Parked.com President Donny Simonton
(today at T.R.A.F.F.I.C. Silicon Valley)

worlds."  That combination is now a reality and it will be interesting to see if this new hybrid can provide the breakthrough in domain monetization that so many domain portfolio owners are looking for. Just before the deal was announced WhyPark provided some extra incentive to try the service but making it completely free of charge (the company previously charged $99 to use their platform).

The 2009 GeoDomain Expo  completed an impressive run at the Catamaran Resort in San Diego Saturday. The annual event is staged by Associated Cities, an organization that boasts many of the world's top .com city domain owners among its members (Chicago.com, LosAngeles.com, Atlanta.com, and Nashiville.com are just a few examples of sites run by 

Borrell Associates CEO Gordon Borrell
speaking Saturday at the GeoDomain Expo

AC members). Though AC has a specific focus, the GeoDomain Expo is open to everyone and, because of its emphasis on how to develop profitable locally oriented websites it has built up a loyal among people who own domains in a variety of categories and extensions. 

The busy closing day scheduled opened Saturday morning with a thought provoking keynote address from Dr. David Brin, a well-known futurist and science fiction author who is based in San Diego. 

A seminar on how to earn money with travel affiliate services followed, then in another highlight of the day, Borrell Associates CEO Gordon Borrell delivered an uplifting talk at the noon luncheon. Borrell is an expert on local ad spending and he assured the geodomain owners

in attendance that they are perfectly positioned for the massive transition of ad spending from traditional media outlets to the web.

In an especially lively and informative session after lunch, the topic was the future of geodomains and ICANN's plans to roll out an unlimited number of new global TLDs starting early next year. The panel (seen in the photo below) included, left to right, Internet Commerce Association Legal Counsel Phil Corwin, Jothan Frakes of Minds+Machines, David Castello and Michael Castello of Castello Cities Internet Network. I'll have details on this session (as well as all of the others from the Expo) in our comprehensive conference review article that will be published within the next week.

In a new twist on the traditional live domain auction format, Aftermarket.com and DomainConsultant.com moved their sale outdoors so bidders could enjoy the gorgeous San Diego day. In the photo below spotter Sevan Derderian explains the auction procedure as attendees began taking their seats.

The auction wound up producing just over $100,000 in sales, led by SierraMadre.com at $15,000, followed by TowerOfLondon.com at $10,000 and  BrooklynJobs.com at $8,000. The curtain came down on the 2009 Expo with a series of small group dinners at the San Diego's best restaurants. Attendees could sign up for any of ten top restaurants for to celebrate their last night in town.

This show was a success despite being pulled together in a very short period of time. A lot of people share the credit for that with Associated Cities Executive Director Patrick Carleton and Mark Burgess, the owner of SanDiego.com, deserving special mention for the work they put in to make it happen. Our daily Lowdown posts from the show just skimmed the surface. We'll have many more photos and much more detail in our upcoming show review article.

Patrick Carleton and Mark Burgess

The first full day of business at the Associated Cities GeoDomain Expo in San Diego  got underway Friday morning (April 24) at 9:15 when San Diego Mayor Jerry Sanders welcomed visiting domain owners to this beautiful Southern California city. It is the first time in 5 years of attending domain conferences that I recall a local mayor showing up to greet attendees. Another sign that the world at large is starting to recognize the growing importance of geodomain websites in the Internet firmament.

Associated Cities President Dan Pulcrano 
delivered his State of the GeoDomain 
Industry address Friday morning.
(Photo courtesy of Dina Scoppettone)

Associated Cities President Dan Pulcrano then took the podium to deliver a well received State of the GeoDomain Industry address. With their potential to become the primary local media platforms of the future, the .com city geodomain owners who make up AC's membership have a lot to be happy about. However Pulcrano reminded them that there are also challenges to face and, if geodomain sites are to take the place of the traditional media outlets that are in decline, there will be a responsibility to act in the public interest as well.

The balance of the day was devoted to five seminars and a luncheon address from Chris Tolles, the CEO of news aggregation giant Topix.com. I'll have details and photos from Tolles's informative talk and all of the educational seminars in our comprehensive conference review article that will be published next week.

The 2009 GeoDomain Expo got underway Thursday night in San Diego with a luau-themed welcoming cocktail party at the Catamaran Resort and Spa. The outdoor event was staged on the Catamaran's scenic back lawn, just a few steps from the hotel's Mission Bay beach.

The GeoDomain Expo is staged by Associated Cities, whose members are .com city domain owners. However, the Expo attracts registrants who own all kinds of domains. The show's single-minded focus on website development has made it a "think tank" on building out domains and that has made the Expo a must attend event for many people. 

Above (left to right): Bob Olea, Tom Dailey and 
Brenda Jones enjoying the opening night cocktail party 
at the 2009 GeoDomain Expo in San Diego.

Below: Part of the crowd on hand for the opening event.

While the evening cocktail party marked the official opening of the Expo there had actually been activity at the Catamaran throughout the day. Each year a special set of seminars is held prior to the Expo opening for Associated Cities members only. Those sessions got underway at 9am Thursday and continued until the fifth and final one wrapped up at 4pm.

Scene from one of the Associated Cities members only seminars Thursday.

The public seminars and special sessions get underway Friday morning at 9:15 Pacific time. By the time the business day ends at 5pm eight sessions will have been presented on a wide variety of topics. The main event Friday evening will be a night out in San Diego's famous entertainment district, the Gaslamp Quarter. We'll have photos and highlights from the Friday schedule in our next post Saturday.
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I am in San Diego today  where the 2009 GeoDomain Expo gets underway this evening with a beach luau at the beautiful Catamaran Resort & Spa where the show is being staged. The photo below was taken early this morning from the balcony of my room, which is less than 50 yards from the beach on the Sail Bay section of Mission Bay.

Though the public Expo doesn't start until this evening there are some private sessions currently underway for Associated Cities members only. AC is the .com city geodomain owner's association that stages the annual show. Below is a shot from an outdoor luncheon served before the member's sessions resumed this afternoon.

After tonight's opening social event things will get down to business Friday morning with welcoming comments from San Diego Mayor Jerry Sanders, followed by a State of the Industry address from Associated Cities President Dan Pulcrano.

There will also be a full slate of seminars Friday. I'll be moderating one of those, Newsmakers & Buzz Generators, at 1:30pm local time. My panel will featuring Elliot Silver from ElliotsBlog.com, Andrew Allemann from DomainNameWire.com and Sean Stafford from SiteGraduate.com. We will be discussing the explosion of domain blogs and news outlets and the role they play in meeting  the ever growing demand for news and information about the industry. 

The GeoDomain Expo contnues through Saturday. On Sunday I'll fly north to Santa Clara, California where the T.R.A.F.F.I.C. Silicon Valley conference starts Monday. RickLatona.com has released their complete catalog (including all reserve prices) for the live domain auction they will be running at that show Tuesday afternoon (April 28) starting at 3:30pm Pacific time. The next day, Wednesday April 29, Moniker will run their live auction, starting at 3pm Pacific Time. Today Moniker released an updated
catalog that includes category information, including extension and domain length, to make it easier to browse through the more than 5,500 names that will be offered between the live event and the associated extended online auction that will run until May 7.

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I'm traveling today - en route to the GeoDomain Expo in San Diego that gets underway tomorrow (Thursday) and continues through Saturday (April 25) at the Catamaran Resort. 

They have put together an interesting program in one of the world's most beautiful locations so I expect this conference to be something special, just as the previous ones staged by Associated Cities have been. The show will include a live geodomain auction Saturday afternoon (starting at 4pm Pacific time) that will be staged by Aftermarket.com and DomainConsultant.com.

I will have daily updates from the show in this 

column starting tomorrow. On Sunday I will head up the California coast to Santa Clara where T.R.A.F.F.I.C. Silicon Valley gets underway Monday (April 27) and continues through Thursday, April 30. I'll be providing daily updates from that show in this space as well. I will also be posting updates on Twitter, so you can follow us there if you would like more frequent bits of information from this show road trip (our Twitter ID is @dnjournal). It is going to be a busy eight days but I'm looking forward to seeing many old friends again as well as making a lot of new ones!

Evidence of the new Internet start-up boom  that Time Magazine wrote about last week seems to be popping up everywhere this week. An article Monday in one of our local papers, the 

St. Petersburg Times, was headlined "Palm Harbor DVD Bulk Reseller Finds Boom in Economy's Ditch." The story detailed how Distribution Video and Audio was benefiting from a new wave of customers who have been buying their surplus DVDs to stock Internet retail businesses. 

The story said the company's CEO, Brad Kugler, "is  now presiding over the latest 

growth niche, one nurtured by people out of work and eager to make money off the Internet from home. Individual entrepreneurs buy small batches of the close-out inventory DVDs from Kugler's company and then resell them on the Internet, sometimes doubling their investment. Sales in that business slice, which DVA calls its special units division, are up 60% in the first quarter compared with a year ago."

Another article talked about how people who have been laid off and are unable to find a new job are deciding to turn something they are passionate about into their own business. Many of them are launching those businesses online rather than take on the high cost of a brick and mortar operation when their finances are already stretched thin. 

These new start-ups have helped boost aftermarket domain sales at the low to middle end of the market favored by small business owners while the high end continues to lag. It is likely that trend will continue for some time as most buyers have limited resources and have to make every dollar count. The net effect I have seen on my own domain business is stronger revenue overall as domain sales to small business end users has more than offset the decline in PPC revenue, even though the latter category has fallen by close to 50%.

One other note today, the latest GreatDomains.com premium online auction ends Thursday (April 23) at 1pm U.S. Eastern time. This month's auction includes many one-word and 3-letter .coms (NIB.com, RXI.com and GJR.com to name just a few). There is a full list of featured auctions here.

With the severe downturn in the general economy this might not seem like the best time to open a new business but that hasn't stopped a trio of veteran domainers we know from starting up three new companies this month. Founder/CEO David Harry of Australia's Xtra Parking 

Pty Ltd. has just opened the doors at KeyRPM.com, a service that is partnering with parking companies to provide a seamless keyword optimization platform that KeyRPM says can boost revenue from your current parked domains.  No name server changes are required ad you can choose which domains you want them to optimize. The company ran an invitation only beta test for several months and is now open to the public.

Scott Alliy at Allied Internet Solutions (parent company of eComInvestments and DomainsAvailableNow.com) has started a website announcement and promotion service that Alliy said is "designed to help newly developed sites get valuable exposure, links necessary to increase traffic and awareness of their web business." The unique element of the program is that it doubles as an affiliate program (for those who wish to use that feature) with an instant 40% payout with each completed transaction.

Even though the final shape of ICANN's controversial plan to roll out an unlimited number of new gTLDs is still very much up in the air, a number of companies are making plans to pursue specific extensions. The latest is San Francisco's BRS Media who announced today that they intend to go after a new .radio extension. BRS has a lot of experience in this category having launched the  repurposed .FM and .AM ccTLDs as multimedia platforms in 1998. For the .radio initiative, the company will be working with Minds + Machines as their consulting and registry back end provider.

Is Twittersquatting the new Cybersquatting?  An article published at Pingdom.com today says it is and they have some interesting facts to back up that assertion. A lot of companies are now using the fast growing microblogging site Twitter.com to market their products and 

services (many in the domain industry also use it to post news and information, including me under the user ID dnjournal).

With tens of millions of users on Twitter (and even more on Facebook), many believe that getting your company name as a user ID on those social networks could end up being almost as important as having your .com domain name.  While a number of domainers were quick to secure their Twitter names most corporations haven't, including the ones that should know better, tech companies.

A couple of other notes as we head into the weekend. The catalog has been released for the live domain auction at next week's GeoDomain Expo in San Diego. You can even start bidding now if you wish. The live event will be staged on Saturday, April 25 from 5pm-6:30pm (Pacific Time).

Earlier this week I saw another forecast for 2009 advertising revenues that reiterated previous predictions that the only media platform that will see growth in ad spending this year will be the Internet. All forms of traditional media will decline. 

Of course newspapers are the biggest basket case with some already folding their print operations and going 100% digital. But new data from the magazine industry shows that sector also got clobbered in the opening quarter of 2009.

According to the Publishers Information Bureau, rate card revenue for consumer magazines dropped 20.2% compared to the same quarter in 2009, while the number of ad pages plunged 26%.

No category escaped the carnage.  In ad pages,  Financial, Real Estate and Insurance titles collectively dove 45.7%,  Automotive plummeted 47.5% and Retail retreated 34%. The most solid performer, Drugs and Remedies, still had no antidote to the destruction, taking a 13% hit. 

Among individual well-known magazines, here are some examples of the across the board decline; Boating (-47.4%), BusinessWeek (-39.8%), Entertainment Weekly (-37.5%), ESPN Magazine (-31.8%), Martha Stewart Living (-37%), Motor Trend (-31.9%) and Spin 
(-39.3%). 

The .com city domain owners who will be meeting in San Diego are exceptionally well positioned to take advantage of the historic migration of media to the web. As you know, many city magazines are named after the city they cover (like Los Angeles Magazine and New York Magazine). The beauty of the .com city domain is that it already has the perfect brand for any local media operation, whether it be a city magazine, a newspaper or a broadcast outlet. It also has the versatility to be used, as many of them are, as a tourist/travel guide. 

For the truly ambitious owners of those domains, all of those ingredients can be combined into a dominating one stop shop that has the brand recognition needed to mop the floor with the competition. Virtually all of the major city .com owners have been hard at work developing and improving their websites for years now. The opportunity to get development tips from the large number of them who will be in San Diego makes attending that show an especially attractive proposition for anyone looking to turn a domain asset into a full blown business.

GoDaddy is being sued for alleged cybersquatting  in their domain parking program. We have learned that the plaintiff, Ubid, Inc. filed the suit April 6  in the U.S. District Court for the 

Northern District of Illinois, asserting that GoDaddy is diverting Internet traffic to deceptive parked domains in violation of the Anticybersquatting Consumer Protection Act (ACPA).

The complaint says that GoDaddy receives all profits from its "free parking" service, as well as a 

share of the profits from their paid parking service. Ubid claims that GoDaddy is violating the ACPA both by "trafficking in" and "using" domain names that are confusingly similar to the plaintiff's trademarks, and by profiting from its advertising deals linked to the deceptive domains.

Eric Goldman, who is an Associate Professor at the Santa Clara University School of Law, offered some additional perspective on the suit Tuesday on his blog. Goldman noted, "Even if GoDaddy "turns off" its parking program, others may try to fill the void and monetize the exact same domain names. As a result, I'm still not clear exactly what uBid hopes to accomplish with this lawsuit (other than to take some cash out of GoDaddy's pocket if it wins).

The keynote speaker has been announced  for the T.R.A.F.F.I.C. Silicon Valley conference coming up April 27-30 in Santa Clara, California. Scott Klososky, an expert on executive 

Scott Klososky
Keynote Speaker for 
T.R.A.F.F.I.C. Silicon Valley

strategies for dominating with technology, was chosen to give the keynote address.  Klososky, who has been growing technology companies for more than 20 years, is the former CEO of three successful start-up companies, and he sold his last company for $115 million. 

Klososky helps organizations win in the market by helping them to better see the future and reorganize the way they implement technology as a tool.  He also helps people understand how the cultural changes driven by the new generation of employees hitting the market can be an asset instead of an anchor.

In other T.R.A.F.F.I.C. news, RickLatona.com has released the first half of the catalog for their live domain auction at this month's show. It is a very impressive list, including such gems as Belgium.com, French.com, Seoul.com, 

Sofas.com and PinballMachines.com. You can see the fill list of this first wave of names on Latona's blog and if you have top tier names you want to sell, they are still taking submissions for the second half of the catalog that will be released soon.

Moniker.com has released the complete catalog for their upcoming live and extended online domain auctions associated with the T.R.A.F.F.I.C. Silicon Valley conference that runs April 

27-30 in Santa Clara, California. There are over 5,500 domains in the catalog. Moniker will select some of the best of those for their live auction that will run April 29 from 3pm-6pm (Pacific time). The remaining names (as well as names not sold inthe live auction) will be available in the extended online auction that will run from April 29 to May 7.

The domains that will be on the block include Ad.com,  Realty.com, the powerful combo of WeddingGifts.com and WeddingGift.com and a couple of nice geodomains; SanBernardino.com and SantaClara.com. The latter name should be of special interest since Santa Clara is the host city for the conference. 

Earlier in the week, RickLatona.com will be staging their T.R.A.F.F.I.C. live auction. That sale will run from 3:30pm-6pm (Pacific time on April 28). They will be releasing their final catalog soon.

In a post last month I wrote about  seeing a noticeable uptick in my domain sales despite the severe recession underway in the general economy. The first quarter of this year wound up being a record one for me and it came on the heels of a record year in 2008. As I reported in March, others who cater to small business end users, like NameMedia's AfternicDLS were also seeing increased sales at the low to middle end of the market favored by start-ups with limited capital. 

I just got the new issue of Time Magazine (cover dated April 20) and it has a major article confirming that what I have been seeing is not a fluke. I had opined that the pick up in sales was being fueled by people who had lost jobs in the recession and who, with replacement jobs so scarce, decided to try starting up their own business. The most cost effective way to do that is to set up shop on the web and many of my customers have been telling me that is exactly why they are buying a domain from me.  

In a story titled "The New Internet Start-Up Boom: Get Rich Slow", Time's Josh Quittner weighed in on the trend, writing, "The economy might be melting down like a pat of butter on a hot Hummer roof, but for some people — you, maybe? — this could be a very good thing. 

The upper corner of the Time Magazine 
cover dated April 20 highlights an article 
on a new Internet Start-Up Boom.

Here's why. At no other time in recent history has it been easier or cheaper to start a new kind of company. Possibly a very profitable company. Let's call these start-ups LILOs, for "a little in, a lot out." These are Web-based businesses that cost almost nothing to get off the ground yet can turn into great moneymakers (if you work hard and are patient)."

As Time stated, the new new start-up companies have tight budgets so their impact is being felt at the lower end of the domain aftermarket. Those who deal in higher end names are not seeing the same kind of surge, though blockbuster sales have not gone away entirely. Case in point, RickLatona.com sold Webcam.com for $1,020,000 in an online auction that ended Sunday. We'll get a further reading on the high end of the market when both Latona and Moniker.com stage live auctions at the T.R.A.F.F.I.C. Silicon Valley conference later this month (April 27-30 in Santa Clara, California).

You can stop calling Richard Gabriel now!  I had been hearing rumors that Physicians.com was sold for $250,000 earlier this week. That was confirmed this morning when the buyer, Richard Gabriel, called me and asked that I make the deal public so people would stop calling him at all hours of the day asking him if the rumors were true! As it happens Gabriel was also on the other side of one of the year's biggest deals last month. He was the seller of Auction.com, a domain purchased by REDC for $1.7 million. That is the third biggest sale reported so far in 2009.

Opposition to ICANN's plan to flood the Internet with an unlimited number of new gTLDs continues to build. Yesterday, the International Olympic Committee put ICANN on notice, stating that the IOC is reserving the right to “take action against ICANN for damages resulting to the IOC or the Olympic Movement from the implementation of the gTLD proposal.” As word of the ill-advised ICANN plan (that was widely publicized by USA Today and the Industry Standard earlier this week) continues to filter out I believe you are going to see a massive wave of resistance develop in the months ahead.

I am starting to get a gut feeling that, despite ICANN's insistence that the rollout of new gTLDs is going to happen, this flood of web flotsam and jetsam may never materialize. Similar to previous "sure things" that were derailed by public backlashes, like Verisign's WLS (Wait List Service) and the .xxx extension, a similar situation seems to be developing here. 

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Veteran domainer Edwin Hayward  who operates MemorableDomains.co.uk, has just published an ambitious White Paper that  underscores the value of generic domain names, especially with respect to using them to improve results from search engine advertising campaigns. His study showed that ads featuring a generic domain name produce up to 105% more clicks than identical ads using non-generic domains. Hayward noted, “We finally have some hard numbers to back up the long-standing belief that generic domain names attract more clicks in search engine listings.”

Hayward's study tested the AdWords performance of ads that shared identical headlines, copy and landing page content, but used different display and landing page URLs. Here are some of the interesting findings from Hayward's research:

• The CTR of ads featuring an “ideal match” generic domain was between 15% and 42% higher than either of the generic and non-generic domain name alternatives.
  

• The winning generic domain name also produced between 45% and 105% more clicks than the alternatives, across the same timeframe and keyword set. 

  Regarding the large jump in click throughs Hayward said the boost likely comes from these factors: 

• The close match between the domain name and the product searched for (irrespective of the search keywords used)
  

• Automatic bolding of search terms in the domain.
  

• The potential positive impact of the domain name on ad quality score.

Hayward concluded, “Businesses looking to improve CTR and clicks from their PPC SE campaigns now have a proven and simple technique for doing so: use a targeted generic domain name in your ads.”

The T.R.A.F.F.I.C. Silicon Valley conference will be held April 27-30 in Santa Clara, California, right after the GeoDomain Expo, and the official T.R.A.F.F.I.C. website has just gotten an attractive makeover. T.R.A.F.F.I.C. CO-Founder Rick Schwartz said, "There are many updates coming. But I think you will already see an interesting change. We'll be adding videos and other snips from previous T.R.A.F.F.I.C. shows. We also hope to broadcast interviews each day live and direct from the show. This site will be the place to check for updates."

The topic of ICANN's plan to flood the Internet  with an unlimited number of new global domain extensions continues to be a hot topic. Following yesterday's piece in USA Today, one of my

favorite tech publications, The Industry Standard, weighed in today with an article by Paul Boutin whose thoughts were summed up in the story's headline - "Latest plan for domain names is as doomed as .coop and .mobi." I know that headline won't win The 

Standard any friends in the .mobi camp (.coop doesn't have to worry - they don't even have a camp), but whether or not you think .mobi has a future, I think the points Boutin makes in the body of the article are valid. 

Summing up the business community's objections to having a truckload of unwanted new gTLDs dumped in their laps, Boutin wrote, "If ICANN's plan goes into action, it'll allow what will seem like an infinite number of possible URLs. Competitors and opponents can potentially register them, to steal traffic away from authentic sites. Business owners told USA Today that they fear another round of spending to lock out domain claim-jumpers." 

Elsewhere we have some conference and auction updates to pass along today. Moniker has released a list of some of the most likely domains to be added to their April 29 live auction at T.R.A.F.F.I.C. Silicon Valley. The potential roster includes Ad.com, Realty.com and SantaClara.com (the city that will host the conference) to name just a few. They plan to release the final auction catalog April 14. 

In an especially welcome bit of news from Latona (because it involves his health) I was happy to read on his blog that he is kicking a 20-year smoking habit. Latona said it has been three weeks since he last lit up. He even announced plans to launch a new site to help others give up cigarettes at KickTheHabit.com (leave it to him to have the perfect domain name for the project!). It will be his first business to consumer ecommerce site in seven years and I think this one has the potential to be a massive hit.

USA Today just published an article  about the potential turf wars brewing over ICANN's plans to start rolling out an unlimited number of new global TLD extensions as soon as the end of 

this year. The article by Charisse Jones pointed out that many in the mainstream business community are unhappy about the plan because it could cost them millions of dollars to protect their trademarks and brand names in esoteric extensions that they have no interest in using.

I can see their point and am also of the opinion this is a poorly thought out plan. The USA  

Today reporter interviewed me for this article and we spent over an hour talking about the  ramifications of flooding the Internet with new TLDs, the vast majority of which would sink without a trace, just as several other new extensions have in recent years. 

Ms. Jones is a diligent reporter and I appreciate the time she spent researching the article and getting a grasp on the subject matter before writing about it (something too few mainstream reporters do when reporting about domain related issues). I do think I should expand on one of my comments that she quoted in which I said ".Com was the only choice in the early years of the Internet, so that has been branded in the public's consciousness. If you're a small businessman and you buy a new extension you've got an uphill fight. It's going to be like being invisible on the Web."

This was part of a detailed conversation that she obviously could not use in its entirety because of her space limitations. As you all know, .com was one of the three original primary extensions (along with .net and .org) but the only one meant for general use, so it was the only real option for businesses, other than network and internet service providers that the .net was intended to represent. As a result .com became synonymous with the Internet in the American public's mind (local ccTLDs held sway in many other parts of the world). 

That is why I say that a small businessman who buys a name in a new extension that will only be getting started next year will essentially be invisible on the web for a long  time to come (short of an unimaginably expensive marketing campaign - the likes of which no previous new TLD registry has had the capacity to undertake). 

There is certainly no shortage of available space in the under-utilized new TLDs that have been introduced over the past 8 years, so there is no need for a flood of new extensions when the existing ones are still finding their place on the web. I think the better path would be to continue to release new extensions in a methodical manner where a clear need and viable use can be demonstrated (though ICANN's painfully slow process for doing that could certainly be streamlined). The purpose of extensions in the first place was, like a good filing cabinet, to bring organization and meaning to the naming system. In my opinion ICANN's plan would replace that with clutter, chaos and unnecessary expense for thousands of businesses.

I became a fan of Australian domainer Ed Keay-Smith's  podcasts at OzDomainer.com in April of last year when I caught his in-depth interview with the Castello Brothers (Michael 

and David). Not long after that Ed went on a seven-month tour of the world (now that is what I call a holiday!) but he just got back behind the microphone for the first time since the Castello Brothers show. 

I had the pleasure of being the interviewee for Ed's latest show released today, which is the 9th episode in his series. We covered a lot of ground in the 57-minute podcast including ideas on today's best domain opportunities, the most effective places to sell names, the most important things industry newcomers should know, thoughts about ccTLDs (including Australia's .com.au), domain forums, conferences and more. Ed is a very solid interviewer with a casual, engaging style that I think you will find very appealing. I hope you enjoy the program and thanks again to Ed for the invitation.

Organizers of the Domain Roundtable Conference coming up June 14-17 in Washington D.C. have released the agenda for their event. The show opens with a Sunday evening cocktail 

reception at the Grand Hyatt, followed by two full business days culminating in a three-hour live auction to be staged by Aftermarket.com on June 16th. 

The conference will capitalize on its Washington D.C. location by calling in experts to talk about potential legislative threats to domain owners. While the agenda has been set, the roster of speakers has not yet been finalized. Registration for the show is open though and you can take advantage of an early bird discount if you register by April 15th.

BuyDomains has announced another free event in their ongoing series of Webinars. The next one will focus on "Using Google Analytics to Help Your Email Marketing Campaigns Succeed." The 30-minute webinar will get underway at 2pm on Thursday, April 16. You can reserve your seat by registering here.
(Posted April 3, 2009) To refer others to the post above only you can use this URL:
http://www.dnjournal.com/archive/lowdown/2009/dailyposts/04-03-09.htm

I was sorry to hear that Dark Blue Sea CEO Richard Moore would be leaving that post at the end of June.  After stepping down, Moore will continue to serve the DBS board as an 

Executive Director but once he leaves his current job I'm afraid we won't seeing as much of him as we have in the past. 

As most of you know, Dark Blue Sea is the parent company of Fabulous.com, one of the most highly regarded customer-centric companies in our industry. Many domainers have had the pleasure of getting to know Richard over the years as he ably represented Fabulous and DBS on the conference circuit - and even more so when Fabulous hosted their own unforgettable  T.R.A.F.F.I.C. conference last November on Australia's Gold Coast, near their home base in Brisbane. 

In their dealings with the domain community Richard and his team have consistently lived up to the company's most recognizable brand name - Fabulous. Though his role will change this summer we are hopeful that Moore will continue to be available to share his broad knowledge of the industry with all of us.

Richard Moore
Dark Blue Sea CEO

Dark Blue Sea has named the company's current CFO, Gregory Platz, to fill the CEO position effective July 1. Gregory has been with the company since it was founded in 1999 so he obviously knows the firm inside out and we wish him the very best in his new assignment leading Dark Blue Sea. 

Bido.com's first charity domain auction raised $2,120 this afternoon for the Hacienda de los Milagros  (House of Miracles) animal rescue shelter in Arizona.  The shelter is in danger of closing as donations have dried up in the wake of the current economic downturn (Arizona has been one of the hardest hit states in the U.S.). In addition to the auction proceds, Bido's Sahar Sarid told us domainers had also made $5,000 in direct donations to the Hacienda.

Veteran domainer Donna Mahony, who lives near the shelter, sounded the alarm and it was very good to see the domain community rally behind this effort. The winning bidder will receive a lot of approximately 100 animal related domain names (plus some nice extras) that were given to the cause by a number of generous donors.  Even though the auction is over you can still help by making a donation directly to the Hacienda. 

In another innovative auction event, 

Photo from the 
Hacienda de los Milagros

DomainConsultant.com's Domain Madness live online domain auction (powered by Aftermarket.com) was staged Tuesday and televised on the web from the Kingpin Suite at the Palms Hotel in Las Vegas. 21 domains were sold for a total of $136,320, with top sale honors going to Loco.com at $55,500. Those were respectable results for a debut effort and more importantly the DC team came up with a very interesting new concept for domain auctions that I can see growing into a real force.