Almost
everyone who reads this start to finish
account of the 2022 NamesCon Global conference
that ran August 31-September 3 in Austin,
Texas are in the business of buying, selling,
monetizing or developing domains or providing
services to those who do (many are also delving into
other digital assets). So, we are all dealing in virtual
rather than tangible "products" - yet most
of us have a powerful desire to see and talk to our
industry friends and colleagues in real life.
Perhaps
it is because we spend so much time behind a computer
screen that the need to see people face to
face is even more compelling for us than most.
However, I think the heart of
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the matter is
the kinship we feel for people who share our passion
for domains and other digital assets in a way that most of
the world does not. Though we are spread all over the
world and come from a wide variety of cultures and very
different backgrounds - this common interest has bonded
us into something that feels more like a family
than just a business.
So, while
NamesCon did a very impressive job of bringing us together
virtually through NamesCon Online events over the
past two-and-a-half years while a global pandemic kept us
apart, the old Motown song "Ain't Nothing Like the
Real Thing" still holds true. That's why the most
common word I heard attendees use in describing how they
felt about seeing everyone in Austin again was overjoyed
(or one of the many synonyms expressing that sentiment). We
hope this article will remind those who were there how
good it felt and encourage those who weren't there to
make a special effort to get to NamesCon Global in 2023 when
it will return to Austin (exact dates are still to be determined
but expect them to be in either the spring or fall
season).
The
Night Before NamesCon - Tuesday, August 30, 2022
I
noted above that NamesCon Global 2022 started August
31 - and that was the official start date - but it
actually began the day before when early birds
started arriving at the show venue - the Omni Hotel
in downtown Austin.
Above:
As soon as we walked into the Omni Tuesday
evening (August 30) we spotted some old friends in the
bar area that is immediately across from the
registration desk. After hugs all around, I had them
huddle up for a quick group photo. In front are Nancy
Bianchi (Senior VP at Trellian/Above.com) and
Ilze Kaulins-Plascakz (ExcellentDomains.ca). In
row two are Steven Kaziyev (NewYorkMedia.com),
domain investor Kevin McKim, Diana Jackson
(DNJournal.com) and David Warmuz (President and
Co-Founder of Trellian/Above.com) and in back, where
he is inevitably placed due to his commanding height,
is investor/entrepreneur Marty Kaulins. By the
way, Trellian is celebrating their 25th anniversary
this year and they served as the Title Sponsor
for NamesCon Global 2022. Congratulations
to David and his entire team on such a long
and impressive run! |
Above:
Shortly after arriving, I was also delighted to bump
into the two people who are most responsible for
making NamesCon Global run so well, Head of NamesCon
operations Helga Neumer and the Chairman of the
NamesCon Advisory Board, Soeren von Varchmin. I
knew I was lucky to see them together at the same time
because once the show began they would both be running
in 100 different directions putting out fires and
making sure the show stayed on track! |
Above:
Domain industry giant Sedo has traditionally
thrown a party for their clients and friends the night
before NamesCon and this year was no different. They
picked a spectacular venue this time too - Zanzibar
- and open air bar that sits atop Austin's downtown
Marriott Hotel. Left to right are Sedo CEO
Michael Robrock, Diana Jackson and Ron
Jackson (DNJournal) and Sedo Senior Domain Broker Dave
Evanson. |
Above:
Also among the many familiar faces we were happy to
see again at the Sedo party were NamesCon
Founder Richard Lau (left) and PTL.com Chairman
Dr. Gregg McNair with his lovely wife Lorraine.
Below:
Any time we can see Kate Buckley (Buckley Media)
and Todd Henderson is a special occasion as
well. Kate is one of the great brokers in the industry
and she has mow succeeded in selling Todd (a professional
branding consultant) on personally investing in
domains. Turned out to be good advice as he recently
made his first sale at $45,000!
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Opening
Day (Wednesday, August 31) - Bodis Keynote Hall
The
next morning it was time to get down to business
with the official opening of NamesCon Global 2022! |
Above:
A full house was on hand when NamesConGlobal
opened at 10am local time in the Bodis Keynote Hall
at the Omni Hotel in Austin Wednesday
(August 31). This was the same location where the last
edition of NamesCon Global was held in January 2020 -
just weeks before the global pandemic hit and stopped
in-person NamesCon events for the next two and a half
years. The long wait was finally over! |
Above:
When NamesCon Advisory Board Chairman Soeren von
Varchmin took the stage to welcome attendees, the
joyous look on his face made it clear how happy he was
to bring everyone together again.
Below:
After Soeren introduced the NamesCon MC's (all
of whom you will be seeing in photos of the various
sessions in this article) he called me up to chat
about what it was like to be back and what has been
going on the industry. Shortly after we started I was
surprised and touched to have NamesCon CEO Christian
Jaeger and Head of NamesCon operations Helga
Neumer bring a cake on stage to help celebrate my
birthday (it fell the day before when I was flying
to Austin then getting settled in at the Omni). For me, there
could be
no better way than this to spend a birthday! We also
talked about the show marking big occasions for
both Trellian
(25th Anniversary) and Radix
(10th Anniversary)!
NamesCon
Global has a dual track format so during most
of each business day two sessions are going on at the
same time - one in the Bodis Keynote Hall and
another on the TITAN Breakout Stage. I think the
best way to give you a sense of how things flowed on
each stage is to give you a chronological rundown of
everything that happened on the Keynote Hall Stage,
followed by a similar rundown covering the Breakout
Stage. Those will be followed by our coverage of the
evening events for that day.
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Above:
In the first business session in the Bodis Keynote
Hall, Paul Nicks, the President of GoDaddy's
Domain Registrars and Investors division, delivered an
illuminating address titled Igniting Investor
Success. Paul has always been an advocate
for domain investors as he has risen through the
ranks at GoDaddy. We would not be getting the
attention and continually expanding investor-oriented
services from GoDaddy we have seen in recent years
were it not for Paul. GoDaddy has also become a major
supporter of the Internet
Commerce Association, the
non-profit organization that fights for domain
owner rights. |
Above:
After Paul's talk I returned to the stage for a Fireside
Chat with Domain Investor/Artist Christian
Calvin (at right). Christian has been converting
his colorful large scale abstract oil painting to NFTs
so he was the perfect guy to cover a lot of bases at
once with. We talked about domains, about art and
how he developed his unique style, as well as about
NFTs and how those are created from original works and
the prospects for this rapidly emerging class of
digital assets. Christian's painting (seen above) as
well as the NFT version of it, were both sold in the NamesCon/RightOfTheDot
Live Domain & Digital Assets Auction the next
day.
That
led to an interesting story and a big career break for
Christian on the art front. The buyer, M2C Digital
Founder Mike McConville was approached by
industry legend Scott Day after the auction
with an offer to buy it and give Mike a significant
profit for his trouble. Turns out the painting is
titled "Late Night" and Scott owns
the domain LateNight.com. Mike, who spent several
thousand dollars on his new acquisitions, loved the
painting too and wasn't interested in selling, so
Scott commissioned Christian to do a new painting
for him and they may work together on a series of
additional works now. Plus, another industry veteran,
Luke Webster, bought two other paintings that
Christian had done before the show. Looks like there
Christian's trip to NamesCon will be paying big
dividends for a long time to come! (Photo
Credit: NamesCon)
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Above:
In another popular opening day session in the Bodis
Keynote Hall - the last before the lunch break, DNAcademy
Founder Michael Cyger (who recently sold his
company to GoDaddy) covered How to Value Domain
Names Step-by-Step. As the synopsis noted,
"To become profitable
as an investor or broker, you must understand the key
characteristics that define a domain name, use them to
find relevant, recent, and retail-priced comparable
sales, and know how to value domain names in the
wholesale and retail markets. You must also make
educated assumptions about aspects like desirability,
traffic and appreciation. Increasing your valuation
accuracy sets you up to make better decisions in both
buying and selling domain names." No one does
that better than Michael, the best Educator on the
domain business.
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Above:
As soon as the lunch break begins many attends head
for the Exhibit Area that is a short flight of
stairs down from the stages on the second floor. (Photo
Credit: NamesCon)
Below:
Three of the most familiar faces in the domain
business set up shop in the Exhibit Area for their
enticing new TLD .HipHop. The best thing is
that at this shop the HipHop T-Shirts were free
(got one myself)! Left to right are Partner
and Chief Legal Officer Jeff Neuman, Partner
Monte Cahn and Director of Marketing Scott
Pruitt. The
third partner in the enterprise, Ajene Watson,
is not pictured but was also at NamesCon drumming up
interest in .HipHop.
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Above:
After lunch, it was back to the Bodis Keynote Hall for
a very busy afternoon schedule. First up was a session
titled Be Ready For The Brussels Effect, It s
Coming Our Way featuring Pawel Rzeszucinski,
Global Head of Data and AI at CentralNic Group PLC
(standing) with moderator Kelly Hardy (seated).
"The Brussels
Effect" was a term coined to reflect the fact
that the European Union is a truly global regulatory
power. Take GDPR for example: created to
protect only EU citizens, it's impact was profound
globally. The newest legislation - the Digital
Markets Act and the Digital Services Act
might have similar effects on many business domains,
including ours. This talk outlined the planned changes
and gave tips on how to stay up-to-date with the
inevitable.
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Above:
The next session titled The Traffic Report
gave attendees the latest
insights into how to monetize the traffic
hitting their domains. This expert panel, featuring
(left to right) Gregg McNair (PTL.com), David
Warmuz (Above.com), Adam Wagner
(Parking Crew), Christian Voss (Sedo),
Rick Latona (Giant Panda) and Matt Wegrzyn)
explained the dynamics shaping this cornerstone of
domain investing by examining real-life expiring names
and how to make them active in your portfolio.
(Photo
Credit: NamesCon)
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Next
up on opening day was Real Deals, Real Numbers,
hosted by Andrew Allemann (Domain Name Wire)
and featuring Mark Levine (Domain Theory LLC)
and Logan Flatt (Media Code LLC). Most
domain investors play it very close to the vest when
discussing domain portfolio performance, so getting a
sense of the dollars and cents in play can be harder
than you might think. Mark and Logan laid their
cards out for all attendees to see, and shared what
they’ve learned in putting together dozens of solid deals
over the past year. |
Above:
In this session I was back on stage with Trellian
President and Co-Founder David Warmuz (right)
to share our Insights Into the Domain Industry's
Evolution. As I mentioned above,
Trellian is celebrating their 25th Anniversary
so David has been there to see and help build this
industry from its beginning. He had some great stories
to share, including a fascinating account of his
22-year-long efforts to acquire the domain Trillion.com.
The original plan was to use Trillion as the company
name. David did finally get it but by that point
Trellian was the established brand. Still, you can
check out Trillion.com
to see how many well-known brands the company owns and
operates now. I think you will be surprised!
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Above:
Another highly anticipated session closed the day in
the Keynote Hall and drew a wall to wall crowd. This
one featured two of the best negotiators in the
business, Kate Buckley (Buckley Media) and the Domain
King himself, Rick Schwartz. Kate is seated
at far left and Rick appeared via a video link from
his home in Florida (moderators J.T. Tenenbaum
and Krista Gable are seated next to Kate). Rick
and Kate shared their views on the The Art of
Negotiating. The two industry veterans have
very different negotiating styles, yet both
consistently ring up huge sales. Insight into the way
they go about that made this session alone worth the
cost to attend NamesCon. |
Before
we move on to what happened on the TITAN Breakout
Stage Opening Day, a shout out to the Tipalti.com
crew that sponsored the Coffee Breaks
throughout NamesCon. I cannot tell you how essential
good coffee is over the course of a big conference -
it literally keeps you going! Meanwhile payment
solutions provider Tipalti keeps growing! They had a booth in the Exhibit Area where personable
Tipaltians Tameem Shah (left) and Craig
Gonzalez held court and handed out free mugs!
Opening
Day (Wednesday, August 31) - TITAN Breakout Stage
Now
let's reset the clock to 11:05am Wednesday and take
you through opening day on the TITAN Breakout Stage.
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Above:
Our long-time friend, ParkLogic Founder Michael
Gilmour, got the ball rolling with a talk titled Be
Inspired About the Future. Michael discussed
many undeveloped opportunities he believes will
provide huge dividends for both the investment
community and founding entrepreneurs in the years
ahead. Unfortunately, I didn't get to to sit in on
that session because I was hosting a Fireside Chat on
the other stage that ran
at the same time. Fortunately, Michael also delivered
a series of domain monetization MasterClasses
during NamesCon and I was able to catch up with him at
one of those to get this photo of him at work.
I
was still on the other stage when another friend,
attorney Ari Goldberger, was scheduled to do a session on Negotiation 101: The Real Deal.
I later learned Ari had to cancel his trip but I'm
pretty sure his able partner Jason Schaeffer would
have stepped in and done his usual superb job. Jason
was already scheduled for an afternoon session that we
will be telling you about.
Unstoppable
Domains Co-Founder Brad Kam also pulled double
duty Wednesday with a 12:15pm session on How
Domain Names Are the Future of Consumer Identity and
a second panel we will be showing you in a few
moments.
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After
the lunch break, action resumed on the TITAN Breakout Stage
with this session about How to Meet
Customers Where They Are In Their Domain Name Journey.
It featured (left to right) Michele Neylon (CEO
at Blacknight), Neha Naik (Radix), Mariah
Reilly (Identity Digital) and Elisabeth Klughardt
(i2Coalition). Entrepreneurs
and content creators can unlock hidden branding power
to set themselves apart from the global crowd, but
it‘s all about getting the domain investor and the
end user on the same page. The panelists advised
how you, the domain name investor, can thrive by
connecting the right name with the right person or
company.
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Above:
The Domaining on the Blockchain panel
that followed at 2:35pm was a fiery one with
proponents of competing decentralized domain platforms
taking aim at each other. The panelists (left to right)
were Ray King (CEO at Porkbun.com), Thomas
Barrett (EnCirca), Chjango Unchained
(dWeb Foundation), Brad Kam (Unstoppable
Domains), Chris Jeffrey (Early
Contributor to Handshake) and moderator Soeren von
Varchmin. The session synopsis noted "As
the decentralized internet grows, so does its
namespace. Domaining on the blockchain is an intricate
dance with the existing DNS, and the rules are
still being written. The panel featuring
blockchain-and NFT-based domain builders explained
how entities such as Ethereum Naming Services (ENS),
Handshake (HNS), and Unstoppable Domains (NFT-based
naming) differ (differences that were loudly vocalized
between Brad and Chris) - and how cryptocurrency, NFTs
and domaining come together. |
Above:
Next up the question was Should the UDRP be
Changed? That was debated by (left to right) Jason
Schaeffer (ESQwire.com), Karen Bernstein
(Bernstein IP), Zak Muscovitch (Internet
Commerce Association), Nat Cohen (Telepthay
Inc.) and Paul McGrady (Taft Law). Trademark
owners and domain name investors have come to rely
upon the UDRP
for 23 years, and ICANN is now committing to review
it. What should a revised UDRP look like? This
panel shared their proposals for meaningful UDRP
reform and heard audience concerns about the issue.
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Above:
Domain investors, especially new ones, are always
looking for tips on How to Build a Domain
Portfolio? These experienced panelists, (left
to right) Deepak Daftari (WebVision Pvt. Ltd.),
Rehan Ahmad (AccuMedia) and Braden
Pollock (Legal Brand Marketing) provided some
great advice for getting started on the right
foot. |
Above:
In the final opening day session on the TITAN
Breakout Stage, the subject was gTLDs: When
Lightning Strikes. The panelists were (left to
right) Bill Sweetman (Name Ninja), Ajene
Watson (Dot HipHop), Karn Jajoo
(Radix) and Negar Hajikhani (Sedo).
Hundreds of gTLDs are competing for investor and end-user
attention, but sometimes the stars align and smart
investors can score big. It’s not as random as it
might seem and this expert panel explained how to find
order (and good buys) amid the overabundance of
choices.
Now
that the day's business was over on both NamesCon
stages, it was time to party!
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Above
& below: In addition to being the Title Sponsor
of NamesCon Global 2022, Above.com hosted the official Opening Night Reception.
Company representatives on hand to greet guests
included (left to right) Simon
Saleem, Liz Corona, Nancy Bianchi, David
Warmuz and Nathan Parker.
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Above:
In addition to being a party, the reception was the
place where winners from Above.com's daylong
Scavenger Hunt received their prizes. The top
prize that included a bottle of Macallan 18-year-old
Scotch (typically retailing for $400-$500) went
to Marc Mojica (Sniamod LLC). Unfortunately,
shortly after Marc won the bottle, another attendee
picked it up to admire it and accidentally dropped the
bottle, shattering it and sending the sweet
smell of Scotch through the room - at least one
attendee even dipped a napkin into the pool of liquid
to sniff it! In yet another example of how attendees
at this NamesCon attendees were not going to let
anything dampen their spirits, Marc brushed off
the incident, noting he now has a great story to
tell even if it leaves a big hole in his liquor
cabinet! (Photo Credit: Above.com - preceding 3
photos)
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Above:
After the Above.com reception a number of attendees
headed out to attend various corporate events or to
explore Austin on their own. We were honored to join
some longtime friends of industry legend and Uniregistry
Founder Frank Schilling (at left above with
dinner host Dr. Gregg McNair (center) and
Frank's closest friend, Vern Jurovich) at Eberly
in Austin. The event gave us an opportunity to
celebrate Frank's success and thank him for the
inspiration and encouragement he has provided to so
many of us along the way.
Below:
After the private dinner, a party (also hosted by
Gregg McNair) that was open to all NamesCon
attendees got underway in another room at
Eberly and ran well into the night.
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Above:
The colorful party and Eberly featured a great
band and roving acrobats alongside the food and drink.
Below:
The lead singer wound up in the audience more
than once. Here Dynadot Founder Todd Han
(standing at right) appears to be waiting for his turn
on the microphone)!
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