The Sinking of Tuvalu, by Kevin Maney. The bizarre story of an island nations sinking fortunes.
posted by stbalbach on Apr 28, 2004 - 9 comments

It's What Comes After The Dot, My Dear, that really matters in Internet addresses, don't you know? A useful list of TLDs (that's Top Level Domain names to you, kiddo) is also a reminder of the incredible variety of cool ISO country codes. If there are personalized license plates, why not e-mail addresses? I, for instance, am definitely looking into acquiring a prestigious .mc address. Unless it means actually having to move to Monaco, God forbid. [Via Bifurcated Rivets.]
posted by MiguelCardoso on May 27, 2003 - 34 comments

Have you ever wondered how many Am I X Or Not? sites there are? Check your names here. And if you're looking for inspiration for a new domain name look no further than this nifty tool that they have.
posted by ajbattrick on Jul 22, 2002 - 2 comments

Today's brain teaser: a pro-life activist buys up a bunch of domains (full list at the bottom of this page) similar to organizations (and their directors), newspapers, and products.

Free speech or deceptive domain squatting?
posted by mathowie on Jul 16, 2002 - 40 comments

University of Colombia, registrar of the ".co" ccTLD, wants to sell the new dot com
The University of Columbia is in charge of assigning names to Columbian domains, and it wants to get in on the same act as Tuvalu, Togo, and the US. Dissenters say its a public trust. Of course, much like newly minted TLDs like .biz etc., yahoo.com will of course want yahoo.co, and so on. Is there no solution?
posted by rschram on Jul 24, 2001 - 13 comments

Domain name game to get hot this summer... Kent Jordan, who represented .info registry Afilias, said the process has been challenged by people who believe that trademark holders should not have first crack at domain names containing their names. "We reject that," he told the audience. Interesting...
posted by canoeguide on May 8, 2001 - 5 comments

New.net lauched today, with their attempt to create their own TLD registrar that seems like a bastardization of DNS. Most people will need to download a plugin, is there any chance this could be successful? Is ICANN doing anything to stop them or will they just die on their own?
posted by mathowie on Mar 5, 2001 - 8 comments

Hasbro loses fight to steal Clue.com from Clue Computing. Finding that there was no significant evidence to establish the likelihood of confusion necessary for conventional trademark infringement and no evidence of "dilution", The US Court of Appeals rejected the claim that the "clue.com" violates Hasbro's trademark on the board game "Clue". Score one for the little guy
posted by Outlawyr on Nov 10, 2000 - 9 comments

Divas Defeat Goliath! The Digital Divas have been successful in their effort to get Microsoft to cease and desist use of the Digital Diva name.
posted by netbros on Oct 2, 2000 - 4 comments

Oh shit, oh piss, oh dear. Judge rules domain names are not property. We had enough problems with this in the last decade with 800-numbers. <sigh>
posted by baylink on Aug 25, 2000 - 12 comments

www.excite@home.com Anyone know how they got that domain? Which NICs are allowing "unusual" characters, and how widespread is the standard?
posted by owillis on Jul 3, 2000 - 16 comments

Yet Another Domain Name Dispute Develops (YADNDD): chunkymunky.com gets a Cease & Desist from chunkymonkey.com. One is a windows software site, the other a fan site about a cartoon character. Is there any cause for confusion on the part of users wanting to visit either site (actually, one would have to misspell "monkey" in order to get to the windows site)? Should the chunkymunky.com site owner have taken down his/her site? Who is going to protect domain owners from future things like this happening?
posted by mathowie on May 23, 2000 - 21 comments

interNIC lost my business!!! To take the heat (and any possible lawsuits) off of them, they have now changed thier policy to revoke anyone's domain name at their discretion.

Phil Sbarbaro, NSI's legal counsel, offered a parallel to summarize prevailing law: "You don't own a domain name any more than you own your phone number."

I don't know about you guys, but I am definitely finding another registrar to transfer my domain names to...ASAP!
posted by EricBrooksDotCom on May 12, 2000 - 14 comments

To continue the theme, Yahoo starts going after "sound-alike" domains with a little help from ICANN.
posted by Mick on May 9, 2000 - 2 comments

I don't believe it... I actually agree with something Network Solutions has done. They've apparently changed their policy to make domain name squatting more difficult. The story sounds sympathetic to the two ladies in question, but I'm not. Ok, maybe they should have been a touch more careful in how they *rolled out* the new policy, but the policy itself is about 5 years overdue.

Now, if we could just get them to *do what we tell them to*...

Cheers,
-- jra
posted by baylink on Apr 13, 2000 - 10 comments

I was thinking buying some new URLs, and I was suprised to see WebDork.com was not only taken, but the owner has a kind of cool site up. Hmm...I wonder if HTMLackey.com or SlaveToTheWeb.com is taken? If you're looking for good unused domains, check Grant's Domain Name of the Week page.
posted by mathowie on Mar 5, 2000 - 2 comments

Slashdot has some good discussion about purchasing domain names. As always, there's a lot of crap in the discussion, but a few informative posts.
posted by fil! on Feb 27, 2000 - 2 comments

Page 33 of the latest Red Herring is a full-page ad for Morrison and Forrestor, attorrneys at law. What's great is that in big, yellow print is the firm's URL: mofo.com. Now, they have to be aware of the multiple meanings here, but they appear to be playing it straight, and the site is full of MoFo news and MoFo history.
posted by luke on Feb 8, 2000 - 5 comments

The owners of the i.am domain for a long time gave out free redirects. My home page was i.am/so_smrt, and my resume was i.am/for_hire. Now it appears the domain is under new ownership, or it has been hacked. Either way, I have to change my .sig.
posted by luke on Feb 6, 2000 - 3 comments

I smell a lawsuit.
posted by tomcosgrave on Jan 21, 2000 - 0 comments

Well, the eToys/ETOY fiasco may be over. Although, I don't like it when their lawyers say they're not pushing the case any longer, and specifically saying they're not dropping the case. As if the threat will always be there or something.
posted by mathowie on Dec 29, 1999 - 0 comments

Thanks to the scarcity of good domain names, we're stuck with stupid ideas like piiq.com. Here's their deal: you put the letter 'p' and 'q' around anything you want, and their site will come up, like pbookq.com, ptoysq.com, and pfoodq.com. Stupid, stupid, stupid.
posted by mathowie on Nov 28, 1999 - 1 comment