Increase the value of the domain name investment

[DomainNames]

http://www.auda.org.au/2010npp/2010npp-index/

May I suggest if you value your domain name assest ( s) you vote immediatel ly on this

The red tape, over restrictive AUDA policy rules have kept the australian economy behind the rest of the world online and if Australia wants to start seeing economic growth, more online entrepreneurs and investment some things need to change in Auda Policy. Its fairly easy...

1. Make AUDA .com.au and .net.au rules the same as .com rules and have same pricing and registration structure.

- anyone can register and sell a .com.au and .net.au domain name
- you can register for 1, 2, 5, 10 years
- the administration for registrant transfers is fast, online and free ( same as .com)
- Monetisation is allowed as, non use is allowed, leasing is allowed, parking is allowed... you can do whatever you want as its your assest you paid for ! ( same as .com)

2. Cut the AUDA red tape and deregulate the old rules that have hurt the online economy of Australia for too long.

3. More online Australian websites, entrepreneurs and investors is better for Australia... or people will just keep using .com names which are far cheaper and easier to register and sell.

4. Wouldnt Auda be better with 1 million extra .com.au .net.au names registered and renewed here instead of australians going for .com names instead due to the over restrictive current auda rules? ( auda gets a fee for every .com.au and .net domain name registered and renewed but they wont get anything if people keep going for the easier to register and sell for .com instead as in many cases they have)

 

[cherrytron]

I concur, sounds good.

I've always thought you should at least be able to just buy a .com.au as a regular Aussie without having to be a business/ABN etc too. Even if they open up .com.au to a valid drivers license number or just "Australian Presence" like a lot of other gTLDs that would be great.

Realistically it is not very well policed as it is so they may as well make it a free for all.

 

[DavidL]

I've always thought you should at least be able to just buy a .com.au as a regular Aussie without having to be a business/ABN etc too.

That's the biggest issue. Too many bloggers, students, special interest groups not catered fort in .AU and having to use gTLDs.

id.au just doesn't cut it (plus it has to be your name or a nickname not a generic word)

 

[cherrytron]

Yeah which is terrible. The challenge to get people to type ".com.au" vs ".com" is hard enough, let alone explaining that your website is on ".id.au" .. my Mum would think it was a virus - "it looks like some funny website virus thing". Haha

 

[djuqa]

Yeah which is terrible. The challenge to get people to type ".com.au" vs ".com" is hard enough, let alone explaining that your website is on ".id.au" .. my Mum would think it was a virus - "it looks like some funny website virus thing". Haha

Funny thing is "Domainers" are the ONLY ones that get humg-up on type-ins and ".Tlds".
Users tend to use search Engines.
Even when type in URLs they still use google / Bing search engine search box rather than directly into the Browser URL entry box.

Domainers need to actually watch, observe and collate more user experience data.

 

[Shane]

The only people who think that the AU rules should be relaxed are domainers.

I remember back in the late nineties and through the early part of the last decade when a .com.au domain instantly gave websites credibility over a .com domain. Buying something from a .com was always a little dicey, but you knew if was a .com.au that there was a legitimate Australian business behind the website.

Now though, people are going out and registering dozens (hundreds in some cases) of .com.au domains and throwing rubbish content on them in the chase for a big payday that will likely never happen for 99.9% of domains. It devalues the extension as a whole.

In my opinion it's bad enough already, but if the AU market was opened up completely it would be an absolute mess and would actually decrease the credibility of the extension. It would take away all the trust that AU domains have developed when compared to a .com or .net etc.

I stand by my earlier comments that the registration fees on AU domains should be increased. This will help to flush the scum out of the industry and leave us with domainers who actually build quality sites and are willing to invest properly in them, rather than those who register a hundred crap domains, stick zero-value-adding Wordpress sites on them and hold legitimate businesses to ransom by asking ridiculous prices for them when approached.

When I started my insurance business, I came up with plenty of good names that I wanted for my business that weren't used elsewhere, but often the domain was registered with either no site or a sh!t parking site on there. When I would contact the owners, I'd either get no response or they'd ask a ridiculous figure like $10k for a non-generic name. When I'd tell them they were kidding themselves, they'd refer me to some barely-relevant .com sale for a million bucks.

Thankfully I ended up with a business name that had the domain available, and now that I've developed it and built a strong business out of it, that domain is worth more to me than any other domain I could think of.

And that's the beauty of the AU space, or at least it was until a few years ago. People like me can still start a new business and register the corresponding domain without being held to ransom. If I wanted to start the same business in the UK, US or Germany, I would probably have some terrible business name and/or domain name because of their deregulated market.

So to all the domainers out there (and I class myself as one too) please stop thinking about yourself and your own personal gain, and think about the wider business community. Making the AU market a free-for-all may be great for the 0.001% percent of the population who make money from domains, but it is definitely not good for business, innovation and the general population in Australia.

Sorry about the rant, just sick of self-important domainers thinking the rules should be made purely to suit themselves.

 

[James]

I agree with what you are saying but I think if a business wanted to set up a website they have had more then enough time to do so. Sure opening up the .com.au space to Australians, I do not think will make huge waves of money for people but I am sure if they made it international then it would increase values.

I would disagree that if you have a Wordpress with quality content and well optimized for SEO, links ect which equates in ranking for related keywords will increase the domains overall value. But really any crappy website you make is probably never going to make money, I have a few sites which I am not too proud of and they are only say 5 pages long they do not create the revenue of a 500 pages site.

I think registration prices are already quite fair $20/ 2 years at Ventra, I mean they are not like .info domains which are 99 cents and they create a free for all for spammers to make 20 .info sites for the price of registering 1 .com.au!!

 

[Honan]

The only people who think that the AU rules should be relaxed are domainers.
.......snip...
Sorry about the rant, just sick of self-important domainers thinking the rules should be made purely to suit themselves.

one
Do you need to call people scum?
In my opinion, com.au domain names should be available for ALL Australians to register or buy
Does that make me scum?

 

[DavidL]

The only people who think that the AU rules should be relaxed are domainers.

Hmmm... what about students and bloggers etc? They all use gTLDs because the only option for them in .au is their name (or a nickname) in the unpopular id.au?

What about the 6 month rule? Does ANYONE have any idea what purpose it serves?

What about a website owner that registers in good faith a domain like acc.net.au, builds a website but then has it deleted because it's a misspelling of abc.net.au?

What about the innocent domain owner who get's a malicious complaint about their site simply because someone else covers their domain?

What about the business owner who wants to register their domain for 5 years instead of 2 so he doesn't have to remember to renew it every 2 years?

What about the event holder who's running an event for 1 month only and would rather register a name for less than 2 years?

What about auDA (yes auDA!) who lose money due to Australians registering gTLDs?

Believe me there are lots of people who want to see more relaxed regulations

 

[WG2010]

The only people who think that the AU rules should be relaxed are domainers.

This makes sense given that domainers are predominately the only ones aware of the rules for obvious reasons. Sure, relaxing the rules would make things better for domainers but that isn't a bad thing.

I remember back in the late nineties and through the early part of the last decade when a .com.au domain instantly gave websites credibility over a .com domain. Buying something from a .com was always a little dicey, but you knew if was a .com.au that there was a legitimate Australian business behind the website.

Credibility is no longer an issue, people are buying goods from overseas websites all the time. Most of these international retailers are on .coms and the lack of rules have not affected negatively at all.

Now though, people are going out and registering dozens (hundreds in some cases) of .com.au domains and throwing rubbish content on them in the chase for a big payday that will likely never happen for 99.9% of domains. It devalues the extension as a whole.

The people paying to register these domains must feel they have some value to part with their money. What you consider rubbish content may be of some value to someone else.

In my opinion it's bad enough already, but if the AU market was opened up completely it would be an absolute mess and would actually decrease the credibility of the extension. It would take away all the trust that AU domains have developed when compared to a .com or .net etc.

Trust is no longer an issue. Aussies are happy to shop online with local or international sites. Trust is based on a relationship between me and another site. It's not based on what other people are doing in the same webspace.

There are plenty of .com's that I don't trust, this has never stopped me trusting other .coms. The same applies to millions of other people.

I stand by my earlier comments that the registration fees on AU domains should be increased. This will help to flush the scum out of the industry and leave us with domainers who actually build quality sites and are willing to invest properly in them, rather than those who register a hundred crap domains, stick zero-value-adding Wordpress sites on them and hold legitimate businesses to ransom by asking ridiculous prices for them when approached.

Upping the rego fees will just stifle the growth of .com.au when people can pick up a .com for under $10. Again, the issues of investing in a domain and the quality of a site is subjective. If someone wants to stick a wordpress blog up on their site and post shit I don't find valuable, I don't have to read it or visit again.

When I started my insurance business, I came up with plenty of good names that I wanted for my business that weren't used elsewhere, but often the domain was registered with either no site or a sh!t parking site on there. When I would contact the owners, I'd either get no response or they'd ask a ridiculous figure like $10k for a non-generic name. When I'd tell them they were kidding themselves, they'd refer me to some barely-relevant .com sale for a million bucks.

When I started my insurance business, I came up with plenty of good names that many other people had thought of before. Often the domain was registered with either no site or shit parking on there because I wasn't the first to think of the name. When I woul contact owners, I'd either get no response (no surprises there with your attitude) or they'd ask what I felt was a ridiculous figure like $10k for a non-generic name. Instead of trying to think of another name, I'd tell them all about my self entitlement and why they should sell their domain to me at a price I dictate.

Thankfully I ended up with a business name that had the domain available, and now that I've developed it and built a strong business out of it, that domain is worth more to me than any other domain I could think of.

And that's the beauty of the AU space, or at least it was until a few years ago. People like me can still start a new business and register the corresponding domain without being held to ransom. If I wanted to start the same business in the UK, US or Germany, I would probably have some terrible business name and/or domain name because of their deregulated market.

Cool, so you finally thought up a name and the domain was available. Just imagine if someone else thinks of that name and decides they want to purchase it and low ball you or suggest your site is junk and has zero value.

So to all the domainers out there (and I class myself as one too) please stop thinking about yourself and your own personal gain, and think about the wider business community. Making the AU market a free-for-all may be great for the 0.001% percent of the population who make money from domains, but it is definitely not good for business, innovation and the general population in Australia.

Sorry about the rant, just sick of self-important domainers thinking the rules should be made purely to suit themselves.

Why would domainers and other people going into business think about anyone else aside their customers? Doesn't make good business sense at all.

Opening up .com.au would give us more competition which leads to a better quality sites for people to visit and increase the value of our domains.

 

[DomainNames]

The only people who think that the AU rules should be relaxed are domainers.

I remember back in the late nineties and through the early part of the last decade when a .com.au domain instantly gave websites credibility over a .com domain. Buying something from a .com was always a little dicey, but you knew if was a .com.au that there was a legitimate Australian business behind the website.

Now though, people are going out and registering dozens (hundreds in some cases) of .com.au domains and throwing rubbish content on them in the chase for a big payday that will likely never happen for 99.9% of domains. It devalues the extension as a whole.

In my opinion it's bad enough already, but if the AU market was opened up completely it would be an absolute mess and would actually decrease the credibility of the extension. It would take away all the trust that AU domains have developed when compared to a .com or .net etc.

I stand by my earlier comments that the registration fees on AU domains should be increased. This will help to flush the scum out of the industry and leave us with domainers who actually build quality sites and are willing to invest properly in them, rather than those who register a hundred crap domains, stick zero-value-adding Wordpress sites on them and hold legitimate businesses to ransom by asking ridiculous prices for them when approached.

When I started my insurance business, I came up with plenty of good names that I wanted for my business that weren't used elsewhere, but often the domain was registered with either no site or a sh!t parking site on there. When I would contact the owners, I'd either get no response or they'd ask a ridiculous figure like $10k for a non-generic name. When I'd tell them they were kidding themselves, they'd refer me to some barely-relevant .com sale for a million bucks.

Thankfully I ended up with a business name that had the domain available, and now that I've developed it and built a strong business out of it, that domain is worth more to me than any other domain I could think of.

And that's the beauty of the AU space, or at least it was until a few years ago. People like me can still start a new business and register the corresponding domain without being held to ransom. If I wanted to start the same business in the UK, US or Germany, I would probably have some terrible business name and/or domain name because of their deregulated market.

So to all the domainers out there (and I class myself as one too) please stop thinking about yourself and your own personal gain, and think about the wider business community. Making the AU market a free-for-all may be great for the 0.001% percent of the population who make money from domains, but it is definitely not good for business, innovation and the general population in Australia.

Sorry about the rant, just sick of self-important domainers thinking the rules should be made purely to suit themselves.

This has to be one of the most stupid posts I have read on dntrade.

Wanting higher prices for domain names?? Are you working at Melbourne IT who still sells names for $140 and used to run the monopoly?

By the way I check out your domain name you are selling yourself . It makes you look like a total hypocrite doesnt it? Are you a " scum" domainer as you have called others here?

Even AUDA and Melbourne IT now understand their past mistakes and are trying to cut red tape and deregulate.. thats why AUDA now asks for submissions and does surveys... Years ago they never did!

Whats makes your website you are selling not Sh*t and why are you trying to charge so much for it when it looks like the crap you are complaining "scum domainers" are putting up ? Its a prime example of someone who says one thing and does another for personal gain. Pot calling the kettle black maybe?

Whats wrong with Wordpress?? Theirs heaps of great websites done using it including many wordpress sites that have sold for over $1 million and are now major new website blogs.

you want higher .com.au registration fees again ??? Are you crazy? As soon as I read that in your post I realised you have no clue and your opinion thankfully will never be listened to by AUDA policy makers.. Even they would think its stupid and insane

You are wrong its domainers who want rules relaxed only..Companies wanted the rules relaxed also actually... just see how many .com.au names are owned in addition to their own brand. Most IT departments now buy multiple generic word domains for SEO and marketing purposes. This is why the google adword and keyword tool came about etc. You can either pay for keywords etc or take the approach of buiying the generic keyword and trying to register it as an additional domain name

 

[Bacon Farmer]

I reckon there should be a limit on the number of domains you can register. Domain hoarding is not good for anyone but the hoarder.

I suggest we all get on to auDA to demand that there be a 2,000 domain limit and that anyone with more (cough *OMG*) have to give up excess domains.

Who's with me?

 

[DomainNames]

I reckon there should be a limit on the number of domains you can register. Domain hoarding is not good for anyone but the hoarder.

I suggest we all get on to auDA to demand that there be a 2,000 domain limit and that anyone with more (cough *OMG*) have to give up excess domains.

Who's with me?

Fairfax Media owns 30,000 domain names ( with OMG.com.au ) and most companies I know own heaps for SEO and marketing purposes in addition to their own brand name. Everyone has or had the opportunity to register them so no use complaining or whinging if you missed out! OMG spent a lot of money and took massive business risks so good luck to them and congratulations on their vision and now success! ( yes Im jealous but its stupid to complain against them and others who invest in domain names and building websites..anyone can do it if you want..what omg.com.au did is buy online realestate....bad online property.. domain names are online realestate.. some realestate ( and some domain names) is crap and a bad investment.. others invest, buy at the right time and make a profit
http://www.domainmarketplace.com.au...e-investing-in-premium-generic-comau-domains/

Premium .com.au domain owned by large Australian corporations include:
■happybanking.com.au now owned by BANKWEST bankwest.com.au
■bestbank.com.au now owned by St.George Bank stgeorge.com.au
■smartbanking.com.au now owned by National Australia Bank nab.com.au
■mortgage.com.au now owned by ING Bank ing.com.au
■businessbank.com.au now owned by Macquarie Bank macquarie.com.au
■privatebanking.com.au now owned by Commonwealth Bank cba.com.au
■photocopier.com.au now owned by Fuji Xerox fujixerox.com.au
■milk.com.au now owned by National Foods Milk natfoods.com.au
■vodka.com.au now owned by CARLTON AND UNITED BEVERAGES fosters.com.au
■rum.com.au now owned by Guinness United Distillers and Vintners Australia guinness.com.au
■beer.com.au now owned by CARLTON AND UNITED BEVERAGES fosters.com.au
■scotch.com.au now owned by 3M 3m.com.au
■tennis.com.au now owned by Tennis Australia tennisaustralia.com.au
■honey.com.au now owned by Honey Corp of Australia Ltd capilano.com.au
■cows.com.au now owned by George Weston Foods georgewestonfoods.com.au
■pigs.com.au now owned by George Weston Foods georgewestonfoods.com.au
■ham.com.au now owned by George Weston Foods georgewestonfoods.com.au
■itjobs.com.au now owned by FAIRFAX DIGITAL fxj.com.au
■bikini.com.au now owned by Tiger Lily Swimwear tigerlily.com.au
■kettles.com.au now owned by Sunbeam sunbeam.com.au
■toasters.com.au now owned by Sunbeam sunbeam.com.au
■oil.com.au now owned by Valvoline valvoline.com.au
■drinks.com.au now owned by CADBURY SCHWEPPES cadburyschweppes.com
■drink.com.au now owned by CADBURY SCHWEPPES cadburyschweppes.com
■chocolate.com.au now owned by CADBURY SCHWEPPES cadburyschweppes.com
■trucks.com.au now owned by Western Star Trucks westernstar.com
■batteries.com.au now owned by Bob Jane T-Marts bobjane.com.au
■actuaries.com.au now owned by KPMG kpmg.com.au
■fuel.com.au now owned by Caltex Australia Petroleum Pty Ltd
■Petrol.com.au now owned by Caltex Australia Petroleum Pty Ltd
■steel.com.au now owned by BHP
■metal.com.au now owned by Smorgon Steel Group Ltd
■interestfree.com.au now owned by GE Consumer Finance




Yes lets stop people buying more than 1 apartment, more than 1 house,more than 1 car, eating more than 1 meal a day, limit people to owning only 1 business or having only 1 job ( maybe someone else wants that job also) , having more than one kid...

The domain name system used to be 1 name only allowed, $140. is that really what makes sense to go back to again? How about companies like valvoline who own oil.com.au or energyaustralia.com.au who own energy.com.au and heaps of others..

red tape, manual registrations, manual transfers, high fees etc are all things of the past... technology changes and thank goodness auda and domain name policies in Australia have also

 

[Shane]

This has to be one of the most stupid posts I have read on dntrade.

Wanting higher prices for domain names?? Are you working at Melbourne IT who still sells names for $140 and used to run the monopoly?

No, I'm just saying that reducing the registration costs will devalue the AU brand. Look at .info domains, has reducing them to 99c helped? No, it has made the extension a joke and reduced its credibility to zero.

By the way I check out your domain name you are selling yourself . It makes you look like a total hypocrite doesnt it? Are you a " scum" domainer as you have called others here?

Whats makes your website you are selling not Sh*t and why are you trying to charge so much for it when it looks like the crap you are complaining "scum domainers" are putting up ? Its a prime example of someone who says one thing and does another for personal gain. Pot calling the kettle black maybe?

You're absolutely right. It was a crap site on a domain which I had no legitimate interest in owning. I'm happy to cop that.

The difference is that I'm not asking a million dollars for it. I asked a reasonable price and had three offers to purchase it within a day or two. I don't think any business has a problem with paying a fair price for an asset, whether it's a domain or otherwise, but we won't be held to ransom by dreamers.

And I never used the words "scum domainers" as you incorrectly pointed out, nor did I say that all domainers were scum. I simply referred to cleaning the scum out of the industry.

I work as a financial adviser, and I don't think there is another industry in Australia right now that cops more calls of "cleaning the scum out of the industry" or "getting rid of the cowboys". It's just a generalisation, don't take it personally.

Whats wrong with Wordpress?? Theirs heaps of great websites done using it including many wordpress sites that have sold for over $1 million and are now major new website blogs.

I didn't say there was anything wrong with Wordpress, I simply said there are a lot of sh!t Wordpress sites out there. Big difference!

You are wrong its domainers who want rules relaxed only..Companies wanted the rules relaxed also actually... just see how many .com.au names are owned in addition to their own brand. Most IT departments now buy multiple generic word domains for SEO and marketing purposes. This is why the google adword and keyword tool came about etc. You can either pay for keywords etc or take the approach of buiying the generic keyword and trying to register it as an additional domain name

Where did I say that companies shouldn't be able to buy multiple domains? I certainly have no issue with Valvoline owning oil.com.au or ING owning mortgage.com.au.

I just think that if someone wants to start a business with a non-generic name, it should be reasonable for them to expect that they could register the corresponding .com.au domain without having to pay an exorbitant fee to a domainer.

PS. All of my comments in this thread relate to AU domains only. I have over a hundred .coms and many of them are parked or have sh!tty websites. My issue is not with domainers, it's about preserving the integrity of the AU brand.

 

[Shane]

Cool, so you finally thought up a name and the domain was available. Just imagine if someone else thinks of that name and decides they want to purchase it and low ball you or suggest your site is junk and has zero value.

But the difference is that mine is a business. Why would someone want to buy my domain? They would then have to buy my company name and trademark. It just doesn't make sense and you can't compare it to a one page Wordpress site.

Opening up .com.au would give us more competition which leads to a better quality sites for people to visit and increase the value of our domains.

It may well increase the value of domains, but I don't know how you could argue that it would increase the quality of websites?

 

[Bacon Farmer]

Yeah nothing against omg but the domains are a community resource and omg is is probably an unintended consequence of previous rules. The buying land analogy is fine just as long as you understand that there are laws and regulations in place to protect the public. Can't imagine any council approving any entity buying swathes of newly released property without proper community consultation. Small amounts yes but nothing on omg scale. Nobody needs 2,000 domains for an ordinary company even for seo purposes.

90% of omg domains are crap anyway.

 

[DomainNames]

dont forget another asx listed company .. Dark Blue Sea ... Domain Active etc who own over 400,000 domain names..

So basically the 2 biggest domainers in Australia are both listed on the australian stock exchange. Fairfax and Dark Blue Sea.. ( Photon Group)

The fact is buying selling domain names and domain portfolios is alegal business. Like it or not its a reality and legal business. You can do it to if you get the investors to back you and your business plan. In fact anyone can buy them so no use anyone complaining.

http://www.darkbluesea.com/announce...s_draft_290909_Allier_mark_up_version_3-1.pdf

"Dark Blue Sea currently owns a portfolio of approximately 400,000 internet domain
names."

The good change in auda policy was they alowed names to be resold.. this finally did open up the market so if you want a name you can register it or buy it from somone who owns it. Nothing unfair about that!

Everyone had the change to buy the generic names at the auda 2002 auction ( subject to eligibility rules) so no use anyone complaining they missed the boat .. Its no different to a new land area or housing estate being sold and developed off.,,, The good news is if you want any name bad enough chances are you can buy it for yourself now... you just have to get the money to do it but the opportunity is there for you and anyone ( within eligibility policy of course)

Domain names are not a community resource.. and neither is my house or my car.. I dont know where you got the idea they are a community resource?

I agree with you 90% of OMG's names are questionable.. but maybe that been good for auda as they get a fee for every name registered.. even if the name is crap.. the tax office also gets 10% so australia does benefit from them buying thousands of crappy ones when no one else would have

 

[Bacon Farmer]

Is DBS listed anymore? I thought we were talking about .au? Carrying 400k of domain stock at an annual cost of $8 per domain or whatever is an interesting strategy in this economic environment. I wonder if it will survive Photon's current troubles.

I'm just saying that the needs of our society to a half decent domain should be a higher priority than the wants of domainers.

 

[cherrytron]

Gees Bacon you're starting to sound like Gerry Harvey.

It's just un-Australian to own more than 2,000 domain names!

 

[cherrytron]

Realistically, there is no way to police it. "Who" can own 2,000 names? A person, a business? They will just register 15 more business names - silly things like limits won't stop a domainer with courage and coins.