If you’re anywhere near the East Coast of the U.S. like we are at FairWinds, then you’re likely in the throes of Hurricane Sandy right now. We closed our Washington, DC office and had our employees work from home today – but that didn’t stop us from thinking about new gTLDs. Continue reading “Hurricane.Sandy: What Hurricane Preparations Can Teach Us about New gTLDs”
Month: October 2012
Presidential Pranks
The Democratic National Committee has turned to the Internet to take on Mitt Romney’s tax cut promises by launching RomneyTaxPlan.com. The interactive site appears, at first, to be an official Romney campaign site, but it quickly becomes apparent that the opposite is true.
The simple interface features Romney’s official campaign logo and slogan, “Believe in America” and text that urges visitors to “click the button below” to learn the details of the Romney-Ryan tax plan that proposes to cut taxes by $5 trillion. When a user tries to click the red button that reads, “Get the details,” the button keeps moving, impossible to click on, a clear jab at Romney’s tendency to evade details, as the Obama campaign alleges.
A few seconds later, an edit to the slogan changes it to “Believe in half of America,” referencing Romney’s much-maligned comment about “not caring about” 47 percent of the country. The site openly states that it was paid for by the Democratic National Committee and hosts a link for visitors to donate to the Democratic Party. While text at the bottom states, “This communication is not authorized by any candidate,” the site links to BarackObama.com for his campaign’s information on Romney’s proposed tax plan.
RomneyTaxPlan.com is the latest creative use of websites and domain names during this presidential race, following the Romney campaign’s highly publicized use of ObamaIsntWorking.com. WHOIS records for RomneyTaxPlan.com show that it was registered to Domains By Proxy, LLC in October 2011 but updated as recently as last week. The Democratic National Committee either had the foresight to register the domain nearly a year ahead of time, or the owner of the domain is allowing the group to use it. Regardless, the Committee openly claims responsibility for creating the site.
While not an explicit example of identity squatting (an issue CADNA reports on during election seasons), this site certainly takes some liberties in terms of using Romney’s campaign materials. With only about three weeks until the election, more sites are likely to pop up. Mere days after the most recent debate, there are already numerous sites and social media pages that have emerged around Romney’s “Binders Full of Women” gaffe. It will be interesting to see what other digital tricks the campaigns and their respective supporters have up their sleeves.
Just a Warning?
Last week in Toronto during ICANN’s 45th Public Meeting, members of the Governmental Advisory Committee, or GAC, discussed a variety of topics about both new gTLDs and other ICANN policy initiatives. Of those, the topic with arguably the highest stakes for new gTLD applicants was the GAC’s Early Warnings. Continue reading “Just a Warning?”
ICANN Toronto: A Slight Change in the Atmosphere
You know that first day at the end of summer, before the temperature drops and the foliage changes, when there’s just something in the air, something different that tells you autumn is just around the corner?
ICANN’s 45th Public Meeting here in Toronto, Canada, has a similar feeling to it – that something is just not quite the same as it was before. For example, senior government officials conducted a high-level meeting in conjunction with an ICANN public meeting for the first time ever today. ICANN’s new President and CEO, Fadi Chehadé, has appointed an array of new staff members and indicated during his remarks at this morning’s welcome ceremony that ICANN is on the precipice of an organizational shift. And hundreds of attendees here in Toronto are participating in an ICANN meeting for the first time. Continue reading “ICANN Toronto: A Slight Change in the Atmosphere”
ICANN’s New Batching Proposal: Back to Basics
The last time we wrote about new gTLD application batching (or metering or sequencing) here on the gTLD Strategy blog was over a month ago, when we discussed some of the comments applicants had submitted to ICANN on the matter. Now, according to an announcement made in the early hours of the morning, ICANN is proposing a new plan for prioritizing applications through the steps leading up to launch. And much to everyone’s surprise, it involves a lottery – and a surprisingly old school lottery, at that. Continue reading “ICANN’s New Batching Proposal: Back to Basics”
Nets Loss
At first glance, the Brooklyn Nets appear to have it all, from a shiny new arena to a solid starting five. The team can even count one of the biggest rap stars in the world among its owners. There is one thing that the Nets don’t have, though: the domain name of their dreams, Nets.com.
And the owner of Nets.com won’t let the team forget it. As of earlier this week, according to The Basketball Jones blog, the URL resolved to a sparse page featuring a picture of Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban, some text in Russian taunting Nets owner Mikhail Prokhorov, and English text that read, “Looking for the Brooklyn Nets? They’re not here…but they SHOULD be!” As of today, however, Nets.com redirects to the Mavericks NBA.com homepage.
The speculation that Cuban is behind the prank will only get stronger as the mystery remains unsolved, given the fact that the Dallas owner has made no attempt to hide his feelings about Prokhorov, especially after he lost out on star point guard Deron Williams to the Nets. The ongoing feud between Cuban and Prokhorov would seem to indicate that Cuban registered Nets.com with the sole purpose of taunting the Nets owner, but there is no record of Cuban ever registering the domain.
WHOIS data for Nets.com shows that Cyber Mesa Computer Systems of Santa Fe has owned the domain since 1994. As of earlier this year, Nets.com redirected to the Cyber Mesa homepage, and the company’s registration isn’t set to expire until 2014. So what happened? At this point, it’s anyone’s guess. Because the WHOIS record has not changed, there is no indication that anyone other than Cyber Mesa is currently operating the domain.
The prank may appear to be the work of Mark Cuban, but it could just as likely be the work of a Dallas fan with similarly strong feelings about Prokhorov and the Nets. The mystery adds a little more intrigue to the start of the NBA season at the end of the month, but fans will have to wait until March to see how the Nets and the Mavericks duke this one out on the court.
Playing the New Name Game
This week, a few members of the FairWinds team are off in London to meet with some clients and friends across the pond. Of course, no matter where we are, we’ve always got new gTLDs on the brain. That’s why this picture (below) got us thinking: Continue reading “Playing the New Name Game”