Frank Schilling talks about this in his latest blog post here.

I feel sorry for all .com.au domain owners. This policy is definitely open for vultures to take advantage of.

Then again, there must be a certain body to protect domain owners from such absurdity. Even for cases such as a generic or made-up word .coms.

There is also a big problem for domainers when trademark holders wield their power and files infringement lawsuits on domains that don't even come close to their trademarks. Well, this kinds of lawsuits will cost tens of thousands of dollars, just to have a counsel appear in court to defend the case. If the case is not defended, then there will be a default judgement and the court will automatically yank the alleged infringing domain to give it to the complainant!

Even after spending tons of money fighting the case and if you won, you will just earn the right to keep the domains. You cannot claim any legal fees from the other party, so most domainers will just give up their domains if it is valued only at a few thousand dollars.

I think this practice is called "reverse hijacking" and you will never know how painful it is until your are faced with one. Trust me, I have been through this!

I will add that this is for the seasoned domainer, the ones who have seen so many good and bad domains and instinctively knows the difference.

As for newbies, do read as much as possible first and avoid the registeration "binge".

After you are very familiar with what makes a good domain, "gut" feeling is definitely there for you to tap into. I have always been a firm believer of trusting your unconscious mind.

"When will you know when to take the next breath?" Just trust your instinct!

Al.

Yes, definitely the .co.uk domain market is heating up! Many research papers on domain names did mention that good .co.uk domains are hot properties nowadays. I do not doubt this....just look at those prices!

Good info at domainprices.co.uk! A real helper for investors to research .co.uk domain prices.

A number of £xx,xxx .co.uk domains were sold this week at a London auction. Check my site for details. If anyone wants a list of recent UK domain sales, try www.domainprices.co.uk

Sahar Sarid has a great and interesting view of this article. Here.

hi greeting ThANKing
please dig it up more from 'the forums e.t.c.
2[to] report the glitches of various domain auction site ,
v'r watching them very closely ,
because : :::::
v'r2 do 'the auctions via e.g. sedo  or greatdomains  e.t.c.

ThANKye , 2w

The first ever book I read on negotiation was "An Idiot's Guide to Negotiation". This gave me the very basic of the skill and after reading that, my skill sky-rocketed and I was much more confident to negotiate.

After that, I wanted more and bought a book by Roger Dawson. That was almost 10 years ago. That was an excellent book but the general idea is almost the same as the Idiot's guide. Roger advocates lots of rapport building.

The most importatnt thing is to do your research, practice, build rapport and be flexible. Thats it!

Al

Is there a particular book on negotiating that you would recommend?

I guess those who are smart and who really put in their due diligence will always end up with the busloads of money. Just check out Frank Schilling's latest post.

It saddens me to read about those who are building castles in the sky with their portfolio of crappy domains. Just remember, research, research and research before you go on a domain registeration binge! It is not that easy now but the opportunity is still HUGE for the smart ones.

Another investment 101 tip....NEVER  put all eggs into one basket!

Trademark owners are going overboard with "domain hijacking" nowadays, whereby they just file lawsuits on trademark infringement claims against domain owners even for some very absurd reasons.

If a lawsuit is filed, the defendent will have to hire a lawyer to defend the case. Just for lawyers to make an appearance in court, a deposit of $50,000 to $100,000 wil have to be made. Most domain owners cannot afford that and will just easily give up the domains. If no defence is made, there will be a default judgement and the court will just simply ask the domain registry to hand over the domains to the complainant. Just like in the bodog.com case.

With such practice so prevalent, I don't see any reasons why scammers will jump into the fray.

Al.

This is very good resource for those who are into developing their domains. From experience, domain name development takes lots of time and you can only develop that many domains.

Always choose your very best domains in competitive industries and develop them. I have seen many people developing their good domains into proxy sites or arcade game sites which generally don't earn much and take up huge bandwidth. This is a complete waste of time, money and good domains.

After you have developed your domains, next comes the marketing part...so you will have to be a "SEOmainer". I read somewhere on the net by some "gurus" that you should spend 10% of your time and $$ developing your website and the rest on marketing it! I guess this is somewhat true.


Al.

This is like fighting fire with fire. Or maybe it is "if you can't beat them, join them"?

Al.

Very informative! If anyone is serious about buying and selling anything, they should buy a book on negotiation. It costs less than $50 but you will earn every bit of it back everytime you negotiate, whether you are buying a car, a house or a domain name.

One rule I have always followed is to have rapport with the other party. That is the very basic. Once good  rapport is established, try to negotiate to a win-win price. Some people think that negotiation is a zero-sum game, where one party wins and the other lose. This type is very confrontational and will make or break the deal fast.

All over the world, different cultures or individuals negotiate differently and the best negotiators in the world are actually the most flexible. They can adapt well to suit different negotiation styles.

But nothing beats this...RESEARCH! Do your due diligence in researching prices, the history of the other party (by trolling the forums) to find out what type of negotiator the/she is.

The best part of it all is that if the other party thinks he/she has got a great deal (even though you have slaughtered him/her) you will get more in the end. Imagine a repeat customer or somebody who keeps offering you great domains at good prices because you are such a nice guy and you let him win so often (thats what he/she is supposed to think)

Hope this helps!

Al.

HAH! Talk about trademark protection, Hulu.com just got sued for trademark infringement by Lulu.com.

Check out the post at Sahar Sarid's blog here.

I wonder if the LLLL.com that domainers own are in trouble..

Luckily these are big corporations and they have the $$ to defend the case. As for new start-ups, just for the lawyer to make an apprearance in court to defend the case will cost at least USD50,000 to $100,000 as a deposit.

Big companies are taking full advantage of this to "reverse hijack" domain names from newbie domain investors or start-ups. Surely a damper in the domain industry.

Al

Designers have no need for access to the domain. They could simply pass on instruction to the owner, which the owner can then pass on to registrar support if they aren't sure what to do. We see domain hijacking a lot. Sometimes it's hard to pin fault - is it the person who did the hijacking? or the person who left the gates wide open to allow it? After all, you wouldn't sit in a cafe with your wallet lying wide open!

This is a must-have list for all domainers especially for a newbie like me.

I agree, I go through this entire list every other day (half one day, the other half the next day) and read everything new. If there's nothing new I often go back and read an older post.

I cannot disagree with Iamned more! :) I have consistently registered generic dotcoms WITH type-in traffic(though they don't come in immediately) and I believe the opportunity is even more today.

Just imagine there are new developments in every erea: telecommunications, health, alternative energies,stem cell and so forth. These new technologies will become household items once the products or services roll out in the next few years...so to grab new generic dotcoms, you just need lots of research and a opportunistic mind.

Somebody who registered 3gcellphone.com, mp3songs.com or hybridcar.com few years back when these stuffs were not even in the market are living proof that there is in fact a HUGE opportunity in hand-registering domains.

I have seen this happen all the time, all over the world. If you want to build a website, register the domain name by yourself and never reveal the password to the web designer. Then point the nameserver of your domain to the hosting company, never let your designer do it.

If you don't know how, just go to the forums or google for the answer. Most newbies think that it is an all-in-one package for the webdesigner to register the domain and design their site.

Such laziness will only cause much pain later when the designer decides to keep the domain for him/herself. Sometimes, the design company closes down and there is no way to contact them. Renewal time for your domain comes around and then you have no password to renew your domain...resulting in the complete shutdown of your website.

I think it is about time our industry comes up with something like this. Well done Jay!

If you want to be succesful like some of the top guys, just model after them. Find out what they do or did when they started and follow as closely as possible. Pick out all the good resources from the various gurus and learn their tought patterns. Their blogs are most definitely a place to dissect their thinking and model their successes. A very good list indeed. Most of them are my daily domaining vitamins.

An excellent list of blogs to read. I've read many of them and read some of them every other day, but there are definitely some other interesting blogs in there that I'll be looking at more often.

Sahar just nailed it for domain investors with this idea! This model is used by almost all savvy property investors and is tought by investments gurus such as Robert Kiyosaki. With domain leasing and financing readily available today, the repayments can be offset by the earnings the domains are getting. If there is a nett gain from the difference, then you are making money using the financier's money and NOT yours. This is also how Donald Trump makes his money..."Use other people's money to make money"!

Just look at the potential of the .cn and .in! These ccTLD really have the potential to make some smart investors millionaires in the future. The cultures in these countries are very much into numerology and numeric ccTLDs will should be a great investment. Remember, the Chinese people really consider the numbers 3 and 8 to be auspiscious, so short numeric domains such as 388.cn, 3388.cn, etc will make some money if you buy them cheap and resell later. Great and valuable post again, Michael!