Domain names once again fetch top dollar
Posted by configure on 26 December 2003 - 02:56 · 4 comments & 641 views
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configureContact: via forum PM
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#1 Posted by Moonsinner on 26 Dec 2003 - 03:59
- ok, then anyone want my PALTRIP.com?
500.000$ should be enough
because i'm a good boy
Alex
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#2 Posted by Huezo on 26 Dec 2003 - 21:09
- Anyone interested in "intelsucks.net" ?
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#3 Posted by matric on 27 Dec 2003 - 12:12
- Hmmm... microsoft.com is coming up for renewal soon. Anyone want to buy it from me?
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#4 Posted by Gercel on 29 Dec 2003 - 20:15
- If you buy a domain that someone is interested in. E.G - www.windowsxp.nu - Binks website. What rights do you have, do you have to give it to them or do you have the right to sell it to them?
Last week, a Florida man sold men.com for $1.3 million, a healthy profit over the $15,000 he paid for it in 1997. The buyers, largely entertainment industry folks who have opted to remain anonymous behind the acquiring company, men.com LLC, want to create a portal for men.
"In the last couple of years, the domain names were selling for significantly less than what they did in '99, 2000," said Monte Cahn, chief executive of Moniker Online Services, which brokered the sale.
He said the seven-figure price tag for men.com "is a big indicator of what's yet to come."
At the market's height, a handful of domain names sold for millions of dollars, including $7.5 million for business.com in late 1999 and $3 million for loans.com in January 2000. But countless others sat unclaimed, and the dot-com bust forced many domain name speculators to give them up when they came up for re-registration, at roughly $30 apiece.
Ryan Levy, vice president of marketing for men.com, said the company also has purchased more than 1,000 other domain names over the past year at fire-sale prices to use in conjunction with the new portal.
The seller, Rick Schwartz, believes he could have gotten much more for men.com by waiting longer. But Schwartz, who owns more than 4,000 other domain names, said he wanted the money now -- so that he can buy others before prices really skyrocket. (Ah, a man with visionary... -Ed)
Positive Reception
The USO, known for thousands of "USO canteens" around the world, has taken the original concept into the realm of "cybercanteens." These high-tech canteens feature computers with free Internet access that let U.S. service personnel keep in contact with friends and family while deployed both overseas and here in the U.S.
"That really jacks up morale," says John Hanson, senior vice president for marketing and communications at USO headquarters in Washington. Hanson served in the U.S. Air Force in Thailand during the Vietnam War. He says he can't overestimate the positive impact these new methods of staying connected to the rest of the world have on service personnel and their friends and families.
AOL launched its Project Video Connect around Mothers Day. The service enables service members and their families to create video e-mail messages they can send from USO centers in the U.S. and abroad. As an example of the unique qualities of video e-mail, Hanson tells of a pregnant military wife who, at one point in her video message, backed away from the computer so the camera could get a wide shot showing her husband how big she was getting. "It's a tangible way to connect with a loved one," Hanson adds. The video e-mail can be saved and viewed repeatedly.
Microsoft's participation--dubbed Operation: Live Connections--is being installed in both the U.S. and overseas. One Xbox Live service is going into a USO center in Kuwait, at a military base that troops pass through as they return from or are deployed to Iraq. "It's a tent with a hard floor, but we have DSL and electricity, [and] it's close to where the troops come and go," Hanson says.
Each Xbox Live station includes a game console, a monitor, and a headset so players can talk to each other while they play. "The usage [of the systems] is very high, [and] it's a way for them to get a feeling that's as close to home as possible," says Julia Miller, Microsoft director of Xbox Live.
Other Connections
Another recent innovation is USOs that are supplied with wireless laptops that soldiers can check out while they're in the facility. This helps to eliminate long lines of people waiting to use a dedicated e-mail station. The wireless laptops are provided by "a large computer manufacturer" that prefers to remain anonymous, Hanson says.
All the high technology aside, other technology companies provide soldiers with services that are essential, though they may not be as trendy. For example, Computer Associates employees help stuff care packages that include personal items such as toothpaste, shampoo, and baby wipes, which troops in the field can use to keep clean when they don't have access to showers.
So besides catching a live show by Robin Williams and hearing his familiar greeting of "Good Morning, Baghdad!" this holiday, lonely soldiers in far-away places can, with some assistance from technology, send and receive video e-mail and battle their favorite monsters online while chatting live with a friend or family member on the "virtual" home front.