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Surprises

by Mike Masnick

Fri, Dec 26th 2003 11:12am





Domain Names Selling For Ridiculous Prices Again

from the hello-1999 dept

More evidence that we're approaching a rehash of 1999. We've seen dot com stock prices going up, IPOs from tech companies that actually do well, traffic increase in Silicon Valley and VC money that is being invested in dot coms with no revenue and no business model. Now, the latest sign of a returning dot com era is that domain names are beginning to fetch high prices again. Someone just sold men.com for $1.3 million, and others believe that the latest land rush for domain names is about to start again. While many of the original domain name speculators went out of business over the past few years, now they're coming back, and buying up as many domain names as possible.

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  1.  

    I don't think so

    identicon
    Mikester, Dec 26th, 2003 @ 11:35am

    This is an interesting thing to see happening again, though I don't think it's going to be as much of an issue as it was in the boom days.
    For one, there are a lot more TLD's available, so these domain name squatters are going to go broke sooner, if they try and buy as many of one domain name as they can.
    Secondly, there are now numerous instances of legal cases where judges have ruled against domain squatters where the domain is anything close to a trademark or copyright.
    Of course this doesn't apply to something generic like 'men.com', but I don't think we'll see the same amount of cyber-squatting as before.

    [ reply to this | link to this | view in thread ]

  2.  

    Squatting-a-go-go

    identicon
    Dan Z., Dec 27th, 2003 @ 11:57pm

    Domain squatters are going to be in a losing business this time around. The trend has shifted away from generic names (like men.com) and towards unique branded names. Better to be a Google than a Search.com. And since one made up word is often as good as another, buying up these domains and holding them doesn't necessarily make them any more valuable.
    I think we're in for another online boomlet, too, but I also thought the crash was an overcorrection that threw the baby out with the bathwater. Plenty of good companies with great ideas and solid business plans were destroyed in the crash because investors went from believing dotcoms could do no wrong to dotcoms could do no right.

    [ reply to this | link to this | view in thread ]


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