Blogger Gives Confusing Domain Name Advice

gtldsI came across this article called “How to Dodge Domain Squatters”. It is written by someone that doesn’t really know a lot about domain names. Lisa should refrain from writing about technical stuff as I refrain from writing about things I don’t know anything about. She seems good at writing about women issues, children and home but domain names is not her strong suit.

Her advice might be confusing to a lot of people that don’t know anything about domain names.

Here are a few short comments on her post:

You need to give the definition of both domain investing and domain squatting. These are 2 different things. If I registered life.com 20 years ago would I be squatting on your website lifeblooming.com? NO!

“Often squatters will use software to trawl domain registrar searches – buying up potentially popular domains as soon as someone’s searched to see if the domain is available.”
There is not such software. Only the registrar has access to that data. If your registrar is buying your domains (which I doubt) then you should sue them.

“Squatters also use software to tell them domain registration has expired so they can snap a name up before the original owner has renewed it.”
There is no software. They use publicly available whois. You imply here that someone can steal your domain before you can renew it. Stop spreading fear. They don’t just steal a name before it is expired as you imply. Owners have about 30-45 days after the domain has expired to renew it. After that the domain is deleted and anyone can register it.

“Other squatters will use networks and google searches to find their competition and buy up domains for those businesses. This usually happens to newer businesses or ventures where someone hasn’t defined what they do as a ‘business’. Blogs and start-ups are particularly vulnerable in this scenario.”
I have no idea what you are talking about here. You mixed competitors with new ventures that have not defined what they do. What is this anyway: “someone hasn’t defined what they do as a ‘business’.”. It probably is a business that doesn’t exist.

“Don’t search a domain registrar’s database until you are ready to make the purchase.”
There is no registrar “database”. When you make a search the registrar contacts the registry for availability. So how do you get ready for purchase when you don’t know if your domain is available? Please stop these conspiracy theories and urban legends.

Good advice would be to register your domain for the maximum of 10 years.

Sold.Domains

About Konstantinos Zournas

I studied Computer Engineering and Computer Science in London, UK and I am now living in Athens, Greece. I went online in 1995, started coding in 1996 and began buying domain names and creating websites in 2000. I started the OnlineDomain.com blog in 2012.

20 comments

  1. Those soccer moms, tsk tsk. 😀

    I think the entire argument is based on what happens with a domain someone failed to renew drops, and someone grabs it. Well, don’t fail in the first place! That’s the only rule.

  2. Great post Konstantinos, I commented this on her blog, it is pending but it will probably never get posted:

    I am pretty sure most of what you wrote here is not accurate. Maybe you should write an article on bloggers that write about subjects they don’t fully understand…

  3. Poor Lisa didn’t know what hit her 🙂 Another reminder that anyone can type out an article and post it.

  4. hello everybody am new here can some body tell more about domain name sale

  5. My guess is that Lisa probably could not register lisa.com or lisa whatever her last name is because it was taken. She got upset wrote a quick article and posted it.
    Regardless of what you hear, I am the only one who has special software that tracks domain names and I can’t say what it is because I have never seen it myself but I know it works because it is special software that only certain people have.

  6. yeah it looks confusing to me too… it looks like that she doesn’t know much about domains, it can cofuse lots of other people too.

  7. On the last point, it is true that Godaddy and other registrars sometimes register domains that are searched but not immediately registered. I think the term they use is “sampling” or “tasting”. They use the grace period to offer the domain as a premium in case the person who originally searched comes back to register it. If that doesn’t happen, the registration is cancelled. It’s a shady practice..

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