Monday Linkfest
Elliot blogs about the 3 letter .com realm.
http://www.elliotsblog.com/index.php/2007/12/10/b-king-on-three-letter-com-sales/
***FS*** There are only 17,576 3 letters in .com .. This piece probably explains which a have gotten scores of spam sales offers for my three letter and 3 number domains over the past few days.
Google reduces the importance of sub domains in it’s ranking system.
Excerpt: “As eBay and others have aggressively used subdomains to dominate branded AND unbranded search results, and Google has improved their sitelinks technology, any relevancy gain by treating subdomains as a separate site will be going away. Google is going to start treating subdomains like subfolders, and limit the number of results from any site to just two.” http://www.domainnews.com/general/2007120823/google-changing-handling-of-sub-domains/#more-1905
***FS*** Enjoy getting google traffic. Don’t rely on it as the primarily source for traffic for your website/business. The best traffic is the traffic tha Google wants to “buy” and that traffic comes from generic type-in traffic producing domain names.
Microsoft introduces free Live.in email addresses to Indians.
http://www.domainnews.com/general/2007120817/microsoft-india-introduces-new-livein-e-mail-domain/
***FS*** I think many more folks would run email on their own proprietary domains (for email) if they understood how to go about it. There is a knowlege gap where getting email or getting a domain is not simple enough for regular folks. Domain values will have their next dramatic leg-up when an intermediary comes along that makes the registration, management and renewal of names and email easier for the average person… and once that application “takes off” in a significant mainstream way. Perhaps a mechanism that allows anyone to get an email on anyone else’s name or pays a fee for each email account to the name-holder.
Josh: Elliot Silver takes some of Jay W’s advice…
.. and thanks him for it. Elliot bought an existing site that google didn’t include in it’s results. By following Jay’s advice, his name was reincluded, now appears as the #1 listing, and he’s getting additional traffic. Even the experts learn something from time-to-time. There’s alot of learning from each other going on in the domain/development realm. http://www.elliotsblog.com/index.php/2007/12/08/thank-you-jay/
More from Elliot: Honesty and integrity critical when doing business in the domain realm. To be fair it’s critical everywhere http://www.elliotsblog.com/index.php/2007/12/08/domain-industry-lesson-1/
Sahar opens his blog wider,
..and hopes to spark discussions and learning in his new area call “Debates”. http://www.conceptualist.com/category/debates/
***FS*** Another great idea from Sahar
79.1 percent of marketers plan to increase their online budgets for 2008.
No surprise here, but good to see nonetheless.
http://www.btobonline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20071207/FREE/71207006
ParkingWhois.com
Smart idea that’s in beta. Tells you if a domain is parked or not, and where. Problem is i tried 5 examples. Two worked, and the other 3 said the domain is not parked,.. and it is. It was a bit slow on a couple of the searches. They need to make it more accurate or this service won’t get used.
Music business in Japan sees 1% rise in sales
…industry observers attribute this to mobile music downloads. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/click_online/7130596.stm
ConsumerReports.org
…Paid subscriptions, no ads. 3 million viewers who pay for web access. 4.5 million who buy the print vrsion. 208 million in revenue and operating margin of 28 million. http://www.news.com/Success-without-ads/2100-1038_3-6222063.html?tag=nefd.top
***FS*** Only 13% margins.. Sounds low for a publishing outfit.
Ad company installs tracking capabilities at the ISP level.
SP’s hold alot of power. With great ower comes great responsibility.. Without great responsibility, comes great regulation. http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20071209.wsniff1209/BNStory/Technology/home
“The Ultimate Domain Name Guide”
I think it’s from 2006. It’s relevant today.
The headline is over the top. That said, it’s a good overview, especially for people just getting started. The writer, Sebastian Robinson, thinks that the right domain name is critical for your business. Excerpt: “Domain names have become more than just an address on the web. Today they can make or break a business.”
Josh says: I don’t think a domain name can make a business. (Unless your business is buying and selling domains, or parking names that have type in traffic.) But, i agree with the basic sentiment that having the right name / domain name is important, if not very important. The writer is mistaken that the .XXX extension has been granted. http://www.micromart.co.uk/features/article/default.aspx?id=22516


Well if you buy a name like the one described above with organic, generic-intent type-in type-in traffic; 10, 20 or 50 thousand dollars is not a lot of money. Years ago I worked in marketing consumer electronics and we purchased full page magazine ad-space in “gamer” magazines for $15,000 for the month.. That’s one side of one page, for one-month… and that didn’t include artwork. It was just to build nebulous concepts like “mind-share” with the gaming public. You can’t put mindshare in the bank folks. Had we bought a great domain for $15,000 (and we could have gotten gaming.com or games.com for $15000 back then) we would have gotten millions of yearly visitors forever; for nothing more than the price of the renewal fees.
The other dynamic at-play is scarcity. With 100 million domain names registered how can they be seen as scarce? Well most registered domain-names are either “terrible” in quality or are specific to a certain branded product or service. On any given day, a random slice of the name-space expires for non-payment. 15,000, 20,000, 25000 names expire each day. I have watched these expiring name lists every day, for the better part of a decade. These lists are a virtual “boulevard of broken dreams” .. names which people bought with great hope, only to allow them to slip away after they had some emotional change of heart or after they forgot to renew them. 90-95% of these expiring names are complete and total crap. You could make-up better names in the unregistered available pool.
Floating/Anchored 5-700 feet offshore.. right in front of the
Training Day (the movie):

Quote: “”I was at a dinner party the other night when a friend started asking me if I knew anything about domaining. Here was a guy that works in a “real job” and knows nothing about Internet marketing, but he told me that he registered 10 domain names and had listed them on Sedo. When did mainstream folks start speculating in domain names? In any case, I was impressed that he managed to do what he did, even though he hasn’t yet made any money at it.”"
A CEO resigning.. Investor sentiment turning against it.. Big mortgage related losses announced and more to come, a nervous financial world. Those of you who’ve read the comments on my recent
***FS*** Like the butterfly that flaps its wings and starts a hurricane a world away, this is potentially huge for Citigroup. One simple little name that will be shared virally and typed in organically day after day, month after month, year after year. I understand the power of great domain names.. and I understand the domain name’s “place in the world” vs. one of the biggest companies in the world - but look at this commonsensically.. How much lower would C’s worst 2009 trading day be “without” the compound effect of an incredibly valuable generic domain name like this. This name is going to force millions of mortgage leads right to Citi’s front door.. It’s like owning the front door to every bank in the land relating to the search-term “mortgages” .. My family has typed this name in repeatedly over the years.. so has yours whether they can remember or care to admit it or not. Prince
PCs losing their relevance in Japan. Both for desktops and laptops. Overall PC shipments in Japan have fallen for five consecutive quarters, the first ever drawn-out decline in PC sales in a key market, according to IDC. The trend shows no signs of letting up: In the second quarter of 2007, desktops fell 4.8 percent and laptops 3.1 percent.