DomainFest Conference Opens Monday in Hollywood
DomainFest conference starts Monday, March 31st,2014 in Hollywood, California at the Loews Hollywood Hotel.The conference will be one of the most heavily attended events of the year.
For the ninth year in a row, the organisers continue to offer an incredible agenda, including numerous expers speakers, networking opportunities and fantastic entertainment.
The conference will be running three days of panels on the new gTLDs subject, because it continues to be a very hot topic.Some of the topics include :
The new gTLD Land Grab – Moderator: Daniel Schindler Co-Founder & EVP – Donuts Inc.
- Panelist 1 – Steve Banfield, SVP & GM, Registrar Services for Rightside
- Panelist 2 – Raymond King, CEO, Top Level Design LLC
- An overview of the gTLD landscape, and who the players are.
Winning Registry Strategies – Picking a Winning Horse In The gTLD Race
- Moderator: Karen Bernstein, Principal, Bernstein IP
- Panelist 1 – Colin Campbell, CEO, .CLUB Domains LLC
- Panelist 2 – Daniel Negari, CEO .XYZ and .College
- Panelist 3 – Daniel Schindler Co-Founder & EVP, Donuts Inc.
Rising Stars – Who’s Hot, Who’s Not and Who Has a Shot!
- We will discuss and debate which gTLDs are the clear winners in the market and which are the ones to watch and why.
- Moderator: Tina Dam, Co-founder, MyTLD
- Panelist 1 – Aaron Grego, CEO, Punto 2012
- Panelist 2 – Mohammad Salihie, Business Development Manager, 101domain.com
- Panelist 3 – Bret Fausett, Esq. General Counsel, Uniregistry
Untapped Opportunities for Promoting gTLDs – Using new business models to generate revenue.
- Moderator: Andrew Allemann, Editor, DomainNameWire.com
- Panelist 1 – Melissa Dafni, Marketing Strategist, Punto 2012
- Panelist 2 – Bob Mountain, Chief Revenue Officer, Afternic.com
You can see the entire agenda and find out more information about the conference here.
Delegation of 62 Domains Terminated in February 2014
Group-IB sent 86 notifications to authoirzed registrars regarding the removal of 62 domain names from delegation, in February 2014.
You can read the announcement after the jump:
” In February 2014, Group-IB, a leading Russian company in the incident response business, sent 86 notifications to authorized registrars regarding the removal of 62 domain names from delegation. Of the 24 domain names that remain delegated, nine were not blocked because their administrators promptly removed the shortcomings. Fourteen domain names were unblocked after their owners used the approved procedure to correct their shortcomings. They were unblocked upon application from CERT-GIB, the Computer Security Incident Response Team of Group-IB.
The majority of domain violators hosted malware (81%), while 8% were recognized as botnet command and control servers.
Group-IB partners search for and detect malicious domains under an agreement with the Coordination Center to combat malicious activities in .RU and .РФ Russian domains. Group-IB’s competencies include tackling criminal activities in Russian domains .RU and .РФ, such as phishing, unauthorized access, spreading malware and controlling botnets.
For detailed information on how to report cyber threats and other malicious activities, see the Coordination Center’s website.”
Sedo and TLD Registry Rase $182,000 in First Live Auction of New Chinese Domain Name Extensions
Sedo and TLD Registry Ltd announced that the first premium domain name auction of new Chinese character gTLDs has been a huge success .
The auction raised $182,000 from 33 auction lot sales.
You can read the press release after the jump :
” TLD Registry Ltd and Sedo, the world’s largest domain marketplace and monetization provider, today announced that the first premium domain name auction of new Chinese character gTLDs has raised US$182,000 from 33 auction lot sales. Bidders in the room and around the world paid between US$2,000 and US$25,388 for valuable Chinese character domain names in the Dot Chinese Online (.在线) and Dot Chinese Website (.中文网) TLDs.
The hybrid live and online auction was staged in the Galaxy Macau’s “China Rouge” private member’s club and was simultaneously held live on Sedo’s online auction platform.
Veteran and first-time domain name investors participated in and won auctions for domain names as diverse as “games.online” (游戏.在线) for $25,388, “casino.online” (赌场.在线) for 25,000, “realestate.online” (房地产.在线) for $16,000, “rent.online” (租赁.在线) for $15,500 and “bitcoin.online” (比特币.在线) for $14,388.
“The inaugural landrush auction for Dot Chinese Online and Dot Chinese Website was a complete success,” said Arto Isokoski, TLD Registry’s CEO. “We achieved everything that we said we would do. Our innovative hybrid auction was delivered fully and with great satisfaction for our 50 guests. We are very happy with the value which investors have placed on our TLDs.”
In addition to the domain names sold at the live auction, many investors requested access to additional premium domain names, with some requesting portfolios of hundreds of premium domains in the Dot Chinese Online and Dot Chinese Website registries. China’s central government is also backing the adoption of the new TLDs, introducing a new national policy on March 3, 2014 which mandates the use of Chinese domain names for all Chinese government websites.
“The interest we’ve seen in these new Chinese TLDs is reminiscent of the rush for dot com names in the 90s,” said Tobias Flaitz, Sedo’s CEO. “This auction has shown how strong the market is for Chinese character domains, and we look forward to seeing how their values will evolve as the market matures.”
The 30-day Landrush period of Dot Chinese Online and Dot Chinese Website concludes on April 24, 2014, with the TLDs’ General Availability beginning on April 28, 2014. Domain names in Dot Chinese Online and Dot Chinese Website are unrestricted and available from a worldwide registrar network.
The auction event was sponsored by .CLUB Domains and Afilias.”
Sedo Holding Released its Annual Report for 2013 : Revenue Up 5,5%
Sedo Holding AG just released its annual report for 2013. The report revealed that the company’s overall revenue is up 5,5 percent.However, the domain name segment revenue is down 12,6%.
In 2013, a total of €27.7 million of sales revenues was generated.down 12,6% compared to 2012,when a total of €31.7 million was generated.
Here is the Sedo Holding AG 2013 Annual Report :
In the 2013 fiscal year, the Sedo Holding Group grew its sales revenues by 5.5% to € 140.0 million (previous year: € 132.7 million). This growth was driven by the Affiliate Marketing segment, although it performed significantly more weakly than expected. In parallel, the Domain Marketing segment continued to face the challenges presented by the falling domain parking market accompanied by strong competition from aggressively-priced providers, which is why the drop in sales revenues continued, as expected.
In the Domain Marketing segment, a total of € 27.7 million of sales revenues was generated in the period under review, down 12.6% compared with the previous year‘s € 31.7 million. The number of domains tradable on the platform increased to 16.5 million as of December 31, 2013, following 14.9 million as of December 31, 2012. In the performance-based domain parking area, around 3.7 million domains were available for marketing as of the balance sheet date (December 31, 2012: 3.8 million). The drop in
sales revenue in Domain Marketing is primarily driven by the falling sales revenue trend in the domain parking market. In contrast to this, the Domain Trading area achieved good sales revenue growth. Here, international activities were further expanded, and sales activities were further optimized, as announced.
As a consequence, we succeeded in 2013 in entering into several agreements with different and important registries for the coming new top-level domains (gTLDs). Through these registries, currently more than 150 TLD‘s are under contract that will launch on the market over the next few years. The agreements with the registries generally contain the exclusive implementation of auctions during the brand protection phase (Sunrise) and the competitive phase (Landrush), and the sale of so-called premium domains through
various sales channels managed by Sedo, including brokers, the marketplace, the reseller network and auctions.
In the Affiliate Marketing segment, sales revenues were up by 11.2% to € 112.3 million in the 2013 fiscal year, compared with € 101.0 million in the previous year. Reporting this growth, affilinet significantly outstripped the growth of the overall affiliate market (5-7%). The number of partner programs increased by more than 16.8% to 3,356 over the same period, and the number of participating websites by 7.0% to 600,000. Despite this revenue growth, this segment overall significantly lagged our planning due to the particularly weak summer quarter in the German affiliate marketing business, as well as structural
changes to the way that partner programs are invoiced in our business with major customers, which is also accompanied with negative revenue and earnings effects that are expected to be long-term. In addition, in the fourth quarter 2013 the expectations for affilinet Netherlands were reassessed due to a deterioration in its operating business, resulting in a € 0.3 million impairment loss being applied to the goodwill recognized
in this business unit arising from the takeover of Cleafs B.V. in 2012.
Overall, the Group reported earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, amortization and writedowns on domains (EBITDA) of € 6.0 million in the 2013 fiscal year, after € 5.0 million in the previous year. Correspondingly, earnings before taxes (EBT) increased from € 3.7 million in the prior-year period (excluding € -60.3 million of one-offs arising from impairment losses) to € 4.6 million excluding € -0.3 million of one-offs arising from impairment losses). Earnings per share (EPS) amounted to € 0.07 in the period
under review – compared with € -1.93 of EPS in the previous-year period, which was
impacted by the aforementioned impairment losses.
For the 2014 fiscal year, the Management Board expects sales revenue to grow by around 10% compared with the 2013 fiscal year (2013 sales revenue: € 140.0 million), driven primarily by growth in the Affiliate Marketing segment. As more is to be invested in marketing in the 2014 fiscal year, and the personnel base is to be expanded, earnings before taxes of around € 4.0 million are anticipated.
GAC At War At ICANN 49 Over Wine
The Governmental Advisory Committee is at loggerheads at the ICANN meeting here in Singapore, seemingly unable to come to a consensus over the Communique it releases at the end of the meeting. Although, the GAC meeting has finished with some form of consensus reached, but not yet public.
The main issue appears to be over .wine/.vin, which ICANN has received legal advice to say they should let the application proceed. There are currently three applications for .wine, and one for .vin, with Donuts applying for both.
The dispute over the two gTLDs is over safeguarding the protection of geographical names such as “Champagne” and “Bordeaux”. And something European governments, and the French government and European Commission in particular, having expressed concerns over. The GAC has been unable to come to a decision on the issue at previous Berlin and then Durban meetings.
One exasperated GAC member left the closed GAC meeting here in Singapore, head in hands, exasperated saying they would give anything to swap places with anyone. Clearly the GAC is unable to come to a decision on at least one issue.
The most recent issue has arisen since a decision by the NGPC on 22 March, that was released on 26 March, and has now sent the GAC into overdrive. Governments including the US, Australia and New Zealand have supported allowing the applications to continue through the normal application process. And is consistent with legal advice that ICANN has received. The GAC is apparently disputing some aspects of the legal advice.
The advice [pdf] has been based on “whether, on strictly legal grounds in the field of international intellectual property law relating, in particular to the rules of international law or fundamental principles, ICANN would be bound to assign or not the gTLDs “in order to protect prior rights”
At issue is the whether “various geographical indications [or regions] around the world, particularly but not exclusively in Europe” may be used in domain names either as similar terms to existing protected regions and that the person registering a domain name in the disputed gTLDs may register domains the same as or close to a region’s name, or “geographical indication”, who may have no connection to the region and have no right to the domains.
The legal advice says that on these grounds ICANN is “obliged to assign the gTLDs”. The advice goes on to say “only a geographical name which constitutes a geographical indication within the meaning of intellectual property law could be protected. But this is not the case here.”
The advice concludes “there is no rule of law of geographical indications, nor any principle which obliges ICANN to reject the applications or accept the applications under certain specific conditions”.
It is curious though, if true, that the release of the approved NGPC resolutions from their 22 March meeting four days later should cause such an uproar when the GAC Chair, Heather Dryden is a non-voting member of the NGPC as well as an ICANN Board member.
Somehow the contentious decision on .wine/.vin apparently took four days to come to the notice of the GAC.
