Starting July 1, users who have registered domains with Yahoo's small-business site will see their annual fee for the service jump from $9.95 to $34.95.
The news came in form of e-mail for anyone who has registered a domain with Yahoo Small Business, and a Yahoo representative told CNET News.com Friday that the e-mails have been sent 90 days, 60 days, and 30 days before users were set to renew their domain registration.
But some blogs are expressing dismay at the price increase, which is three and a half times what domain owners have paid in past years.
Yahoo said the $25 price increase is primarily being instituted to match the cost of doing business, and that registering domains--the process of creating a new Web address--can cost even more with other Web sites.
However, other competitors have much lower prices, including GoDaddy.com or Google Apps, both of which charge annual fees of around $10.
Since domain registration is not the core of Yahoo's small-business site, the company said its prices can not be as low as those of sites that focus on registering domains.
Low domain registration fees, though, can be a foot in the door to coax customers to upgrade to more profitable services.
According to Yahoo, new domain registrations will still only cost $9.95 and after a year, the fee will go up to $34.95.
The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers voted Thursday to relax rules for naming Web sites.
At its meeting in Paris, ICANN, a not-for-profit organization that oversees the naming scheme for Web sites, voted to accept a proposal that will allow companies to purchase new top-level domain names ending in whatever they like.
So, for example, instead of being restricted to sites ending in .com or .org., eBay could have a site that ends in .ebay, or New York City could end its Web site with .nyc.
The new naming process will begin in 2009. The first suffixes will likely be given to businesses and other major organizations. Countries are expected to keep their specific suffixes, but as in the example above cities could also get individualized URLs, such as .london or .chicago.
In an effort to deter cybersquatters, the organization is likely to charge a hefty price for the new names. Some experts estimate the new domain names could cost anywhere from $50,000 to $100,000 or more. ICANN plans to give companies with trademarked names priority for their names.
Paul Twomey, CEO of ICANN
(Credit: ICANN)The group also voted to open public comment on a proposal that would allow countries to use non-English script. For example, companies could use Chinese or Arabic script to identify their web sites.
Paul Twomey, the chief executive of ICANN, told the BBC earlier this week that allowing the new naming conventions would create new "real estate" on the Internet. But some experts worry that it could unleash a gold rush mentality. While trademarked names will only be available to those trademark holders, there are loads of common words that people could want to register, such as .sex.
The suffix .xxx was rejected by ICANN last year, but it could also prove to be a popular suffix under the more relaxed policy. Still, Twomey told Agence France Press that the organization will still try to block or reject any domain name it deems inappropriate for security or moral reasons.
The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers is getting ready to vote later this week to open up the Internet naming convention to allow more options.
On Thursday at its meeting in Paris, ICANN, the not-for-profit organization charged with overseeing the Internet's naming scheme, will vote on a proposal that would allow companies to purchase new generic top-level domains ending in almost anything they want. So instead of being limited to .com, .org or .co.uk as the last letters of their Web addresses, companies or organizations could add their company name to the end of their URL. For example, eBay could become .ebay or Intel could be .intel. Even cities could name their Web sites .newyork or .berlin.
But the new names, which could be ready in 2009, won't come cheap. As a result, it's unlikely that individuals will be able to take advantage of the new naming conventions to create more personalized Web sites. The exact price to register these new names isn't yet known, but some experts predict it could cost about $50,000 to register a new domain name.
The high price is also likely to deter cybersquatters. ICANN is expected to give priority to companies or organizations with trademarked names.
The new addressing scheme should alleviate fears that ICANN will run out of addresses. The organization estimated last year that only 17 percent of the original 4 billion network addresses remained available. And it predicted that it would run out of new addresses within the next five years.
Paul Twomey, the CEO of ICANN, told the BBC that allowing the new naming conventions would create new "real estate" on the Internet.
"It's a massive increase in the geography of the real estate of the Internet," he said.
If the proposal is accepted by ICANN's board then almost any extension that is 64 characters or less could be used. My colleague at ZDNet.co.uk points out that this means that the .xxx domain extension, which has been proposed for the adult entertainment industry could be used. ICANN rejected the .xxx application in 2007.
Who would've thought a generic domain name would still have the capacity to pull in big bucks? Chris Clark, the seller of "Pizza.com," seemed a bit in shock after he managed to rake in $2.6 million from the auction of the domain name.
"It's crazy, it's just crazy," he told the Baltimore Sun after the close of the auction on Thursday.
Clark, who owns a software company, registered the Pizza.com domain name 14 years ago for just $20. Nothing fruitful ever really came of the domain, so he sat on it for a while, and then he and a friend turned it into an advertising and pizza directory. Then, they heard about the fortuitous sale of Vodka.com and decided to try their own luck with Pizza.com, according to the Sun. By March 29, the bidding hit $2 million and even more bids were coming in.
During the go-go days of the Internet, hopeful companies and entrepreneurs snapped up easy-to-remember, generic domain names with the expectation that they would translate to boatloads of cash--or even a heady IPO. But the gold rush began to die down as it became apparent that names like Jewelry.com and Meat.com were a losing proposition. Vodka.com and the even bigger sale of Business.com for $7.5 million in 1999 can be called anomalies among the many failures.
Clark's Pizza.com auction was held by Sedo.com, which currently features such aspirants as "fattoskinny.com," "waterfrontretreat.com", and "getforeigncurrecy.com".
Domain hoster Go Daddy has shut down a Web site that lets people criticize individual police officers, saying it was using too much bandwidth. But the site owner says he is being censored after police complained.
(Credit:
Go Daddy)
Late last week, KGO TV in San Francisco ran a news story saying that police officers wanted the site shut down, claiming it puts them at risk by revealing their information.
On Wednesday, the site continued to be offline displaying a message that says "Oops!!!" and urged the site owner to contact Go Daddy.
RateMyCop founder Gino Sesto contacted the company and was initially told the site was shut down for "suspicious activity," according to Wired News.
Then a supervisor told him the site had exceeded its 3 terabyte bandwidth limit, but Sesto disputes that, telling Wired News: "How can it be overloaded when it only had 80,000 page views today, and 400,000 yesterday?"
Go Daddy spokesperson Elizabeth Driscoll told CNET News.com that the site was using six times the amount of bandwidth allotted for its $15-a-month "shared server" plan.
"Basically, he was paying for compact car, when he really needed a semi-truck. The customer was not willing to work with our staff to resolve the issue," she wrote in an e-mail. "The situation was absolutely NOT about censorship in ANY way."
This isn't the first time Go Daddy has been accused of censoring a site because of outside pressure. A year ago, it pulled the plug on a security list Web site, after giving the site owner less than an hour notice, after MySpace complained that there its members' usernames and passwords were archived on the site.
After that incident, CNET News.com asked a Go Daddy executive under what circumstances would it suspend a customer's domain name based on the content of the Web site, in the absence of a court order. "Go Daddy takes action to suspend a domain name in cases where the domain name is being used for, or in association with, illegal activities. Our most common instances involve phishing sites, child pornography Web sites, terrorist sites, and the like," Go Daddy General Counsel Christine Jones said. "As an established partner with the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, we also take action based on sites that pose a significant threat to or exploitation of children--as was the case in this instance."
In todays' New York Times, David Pogue reviewed an updated version of Microsoft's Office Live Small Business, a suite of online services for making Web sites (I'm simplifying a bit).
He failed to point out an important defensive computing aspect of any Web site, divorcing it from the domain name registration. In addition, trusting Microsoft to handle domain registration is not your best option. To fully understand this, some background is required.
A domain name, such as CNET.com or JavaTester.org is a unique name on the Internet, one that is used for both e-mail and a Web site. Conceptually speaking, all domains are registered in a big master file in the sky. Hundreds of companies, called registrars, are authorized to register domains into this huge master file. Registrars offer many services, but simply registering a domain name ranges from roughly $9 to $35 a year.
Associated with each domain is a pointer to the computer running the Web site and a pointer to the computer that receives e-mail sent to the domain. The pointer system is called DNS, for Domain Name System. The pointers are indirect. That is, rather than pointing directly to the computer(s) with the Web site or e-mail, they point instead to server computers running DNS software.* A company that hosts Web sites is obliged to run a DNS server computer to handle the finger-pointing for all the Web sites under its control.
A small business setting up a new Web site is likely to be tempted by the one-stop shopping offered by Office Live Small Business. Many registrars host Web sites and any company hosting a Web site will also register a domain name. But, you are better off getting these services from different companies.
My JavaTester.org Web site, for example, is hosted at a company called A2 Hosting and the domain is registered with GoDaddy. A2 runs a pair of DNS server computers, ns1.a2webhosting.com and ns2.a2webhosting.com, which GoDaddy associates with the domain in the big master file in the sky. (If you want to impress your friends, the ns1 and ns2 computers are technically referred to as authoritative name servers.)
For one thing, using two companies makes it easier to switch Web site hosting companies in the future, should the need arise. More importantly though, it insures the domain is yours.
There have been times when a Web site hosting company registered a domain in their name rather than in the name of their customer. For example, instead of my JavaTester.org Web site being registered to me in the big master file, it would be registered to A2hosting.** In this case, it is not my domain, even though I paid for it. For a small business, this can be a really big deal.
What about e-mail? Companies hosting Web sites can also provide e-mail, as can most registrars. Then again, you don't need either one, you can have a third party handle e-mail for your domain.
Pogue on Office Live Small Business
The first Web site I ever created was hosted on a computer run by a school. The name was something like computerdeptserver.someuniversity.edu/~michael. Everyone in the class was assigned a userid on the server, and that formed the rightmost part of the Web site address.
From what Pogue says, Office Live Small Business does a similar thing, giving out names like bobsfleabag.accommodations.officelive.com (his example) to customers only interested in free services. Using your own domain, instead of one that ends with officelive.com, is what Pogue means when he refers to "customized domains." I point this out because the term "customized domain" has no real meaning--all domain names are unique.
If you want to use your own domain name with Office Live Small Business, Pogue's review said that Microsoft charges $15 per year after the first year. While the price is certainly fair, having Microsoft handle domain registration scares me.
The Defensive Computing Approach
If you are interested in using Office Live (which I have no experience with) to create a new Web site, first go to a registrar and register your own domain. The two registrars I recommend are GoDaddy and DirectNIC. GoDaddy is cheaper ($9 per year) but DirectNIC ($15 per year) is easier to use.
If you already have a Web site, but it was registered by the hosting company, I suggest first moving the registration to GoDaddy or DirectNIC before getting started with Office Live, or start over with a new domain name. For more on this, see my posting from last month on How to fire a Webmaster.
Microsoft's documentation
Registration of a domain is too important to trust to a company, such as Microsoft, that does it as a sideline rather than it being its core business.
Consider what its FAQ page had to say after Pogue's review came out:
"Will I be charged a fee when my domain name comes up for renewal?
Domain names are renewed on an annual basis. Microsoft will automatically renew your domain name for you, and you will not be charged a renewal fee. If you already own a domain name and transfer it to Microsoft Office Live, Microsoft will pay for any future renewals."
This directly conflicts with Pogue's account and I believe Pogue.
Also, it appears that Office Live Small Business domains are renewed on an annual basis. This is an accident waiting to happen. A real registrar can lock it up for many years.
The Microsoft Office Live Small Business FAQ also refers to "redirecting" a domain and "domain redelegation." The two terms are used interchangeably. But for what? I've dealt with domains and Web sites a lot. If you asked me yesterday what these terms meant, I would have given a different definition for the first term and couldn't have guessed at the meaning of the second.
The Office Live Small Business folks use these terms to mean changing the DNS server computers associated with a domain. For an existing domain with an existing Web site, that is how you point the world to the new Web site (at Office Live Small Business).
Good news, bad news
The bad news about changing DNS servers is that the actual procedure differs for each registrar.
The good news is that Microsoft provides instructions for making the change at a number of popular registrars. See How to set up your new Web site with an existing domain name.
The bad news is that the instructions for GoDaddy don't exist. Clicking on the link results in a Page Not Found error. The instructions for register.com are also missing. In fact, all
the "redelegation" instructions are missing. Maybe they were filed under changing DNS servers.
Update. February 16, 2008: The instructions now exist, there are no more "page not found" errors.
* That the Internet grew to the extent it has over the years is due, in part, to the distributing of the responsibility for maintaining these pointers. No one company can screw everything up.
** I don't know that A2Hosting does this, I haven't tested it. This is only an example.
See a summary of all my Defensive Computing postings.
Contrary to claims that emerged Wednesday, Network Solutions said it isn't "front-running" the Internet address registration process, a practice in which a company registers a potential domain immediately after a prospective buyer searches to see if it's available. In fact, the practice that triggered the accusation is an attempt to counteract front-running, the company said.
Front-running can give a registration company an advantage over the customer who wants to register the site--for example by preventing the customer from registering it through a competing registrar or by selling it to the customer at an inflated price.
The company faced criticism of front-running Tuesday, with discussions cropping up at Domain Name News, Slashdot, and DomainState discussion boards.
"Network Solutions has instituted a four-day lock on all domain names searched on their site. They are effectively using phishing techniques to hijack or steal domain names and forcing domain name registrants to register their names at Network Solutions. The standard domain name registration fee at Network Solutions is $34.99--significantly higher than the leading alternatives," complained one commenter.
Although Network Solutions does temporarily register a site a customer searched for, spokeswoman Susan Wade denied there's anything nefarious afoot. "Network Solutions is not front-running," she said.
Network Solutions holds the domain for up to four days, during which time a customer can register it only from Network Solutions and after which it again becomes generally available if unregistered, Wade said. But that feature, she said, is a "pre-emptive" measure to protect customers--from front-runners.
That's because front-runners can tell when a customer has searched for a domain at Network Solutions, for example because Network Solutions then must check availability at other sites when a customer searches, Wade said.
"This search data is captured at the various registries. We believe there are registries and/or Internet service providers that may be selling this data to front-runners. So, by holding domains searched on Network Solutions, this pre-empts the search data being captured," she said.
When my Defensive Computing blog went live in July, the Web page address (URL is the nerd term) assigned to it was blogs.cnet.com/8300-13554_1-33.html. Shortly thereafter, CNET assigned the friendlier address blogs.cnet.com/defensive-computing/
That's still a lot for me to remember, let alone repeat to someone else. When I wanted to find this blog, I started at blogs.cnet.com and then hunted for my name. The address/URL blogs.cnet.com is easy to type and easy to remember. Whenever someone asked where to find my blog, that is what I told them to do.
Until now.
I just invested $14 or so to reserve the domain defensivecomputing.info for a couple years. But there is no Web site there and I'm not planning on ever having one. Instead, the domain is forwarded here. I don't know how you found this Web page, but if you enter defensivecomputing.info into your browser you end up at this blog. It's the computer nerd equivalent of a vanity license plate. Try it.
The home page for this blog now has three names that all point to the exact same place:
- defensivecomputing.info
- blogs.cnet.com/defensive-computing/
- blogs.cnet.com/8300-13554_1-33.html
My vanity extends to defensivecomputing.us , which is forwarded to a Web page for a class of mine on, what else, defensive computing.
Which Name To Show?
In both these instances of domain forwarding, you end up seeing the forwarded-to name, not the one you originally typed. It doesn't have to be that way; forwarded domains can be set up to show the originally entered URL.
For example, a relative of mine owns the domain dmdworkin.com. There is no such Web site, however; the domain is forwarded. He is a photographer and has an account at the photo site Digital Railroad.
The real Web site address is www.digitalrailroad.net/DMDworkin/Default.aspx. Whichever name you type, you end up at the exact same Web page. In this case, however, the real or target Web page address is said to be masked. You see dmdworkin.com in the address bar of your browser, even though you are at the Digital Railroad site.
Practical Uses
In the above example, domain forwarding is used to give the impression that Mr. Dworkin has his own Web site, when technically he doesn't. You could get a free website from any of dozens (if not hundreds) of companies, with a name something like harveysfreewebsitecompany.com/userxyz123 and then set up a domain such as michaelsstartrekclub.com and point it to the free website. If the company providing the free site goes out of business, you can sign up somewhere else and then just forward the domain there.
In my experience, domain names cost from $7 to $35 a year. You could print business cards showing your own domain name and pay more for the cards than the Web site.
Domain forwarding can also be used to give multiple names to a single Web site. Suppose, for example, your name is Groucho, you own a cigar store and the Web site for the store is grouchoscigarstore.com. You can prevent someone else from using grouchoscigarstore.org, .us. info and the like by registering those names too. If you own them anyway, might as well set them up to auto-forward to the Web site with the .com name.
Another use is typos. Have you ever been confused about the spelling of "Noble" in Barnes and Noble? It could end with either "le" or "el", both are valid spellings (at least phonetically). In terms of finding the company's Web site, it doesn't matter--both barnesandnobel.com and barnesandnoble.com work fine. So too, does bn.com. Two of these domains are forwarded, one is the real Web site.
When you register a domain, check if the forwarding feature is included for free (both with masking and without). The two registrars that I have used the most, GoDaddy.com and DirectNIC.com do include it for free. In contrast, Register.com wants an extra $50 a year to forward a domain and not show an ad for themselves when doing so.
And remember, you learned about domain forwarding at defensivecomputing.info.
Whether you're a multinational Internet retailer or a lone human just entering the Web world, there are many things to consider when purchasing a new domain name, not the least of which are core SEO (search engine optimization) parameters. Following is a list of considerations I'd supply to either entity mentioned above or anyone in between. Some may seem ridiculously obvious, but a friendly reminder won't hurt.
- Keyword research: Does the domain use popular and focused keywords? Make sure the domain and its associated URLs will be conducive to search engine visibility. Check it on tools like Overture Keyword Selector, Google Suggest, WordTracker, and Keyword Discovery.
- Linkability: Does the domain have appeal to bloggers and Webmasters who might consider linking to you? Links are crucial to your site's SEO. For example, NeopetsFanatic.com has link appeal, whereas free-neopets-cheats-hints-tips.info does not.
- Top-level domain: Choose the proper top-level domain (.com, .net, .org, .info, and so on). If your business is in the United States, then you should use .com as your domain. While there is nothing wrong with .net and .org domains, they are not perceived as being as "professional" as .com domains. The .org domain is still perceived as nonprofit. Sometimes that is a positive though--such as for my blog ChangesForGood.org, because in that case I wanted to distance the blog from any commercial interests. Top-level domains like .info and .biz are often associated, rightly or wrongly, with spammers.
- Used URLs: Check indexation levels of a domain name to see if anything is still indexed. Use query operators to check your site even if you're not buying it from a secondary source (DomainName.com). Or simply use an indexation checker like URL Check.
- Site age (if a used URL): Run the URL through The Wayback Machine. Make sure there aren't any previous associations with pornography, hate or violence. If there are, avoid the domain.
- Back links (if a used URL): Make sure a previously used URL doesn't have negative (see above) links coming into it. Use the query operators DomainName.com to check this.
- Blacklists check: See if the URL or its associated IP address has been blacklisted at a site like Moensted.dk .
- Relevancy: Make sure your domain name is relevant to your business. Don't buy a URL because it sounds cool or it has personal merit. Buy it because it has direct, focused keyword relevance to you business.
- URL length: On the other end of relevancy is the issue of being too specific. Don't get too long and detailed at the top; you can always get more specific as you go deeper into subdomains. Shorter domain names are also easier to remember--and type!
- Potential for legal conflict: Be aware of trademarks and copyrights belonging to other entities. While a URL like www.amazonbooks.com might be accurate to your bookstore in Amazon, Canada, it's also an issue with an existing business. Use the search engines to research the keywords contained in your URL. If something comes up that seems like a conflict, it most likely is.
- Double meanings: Does your keyword-rich URL have a secondary meaning? For instance, let's say you're starting a Web site that helps people to locate psychologists in their area. You come up with www.therapistfinder.com. But look more closely. Is there a second meaning in the URL? When joining words without a hyphen, take a step back and look again.
Domain name (and the business behind the name) Business.com is being auctioned off by the men who bought it in 1999 for a whopping $7.5 million. The Wall Street Journal cites unnamed sources "familiar with the matter" who speculate that Business.com could fetch as much as $300 million to $400 million. The site is a search engine, with pay-per-click advertising, for products and services.
