When Rick Schwartz met Mark Cuban

Rick Schwartz talked today about the time he met Mark Cuban.

11 years ago Rick Schwartz won an auction for Make a Wish Foundation Children’s Charity on Ebay. The winning bidder ($6500) got to have lunch with Mark Cuban in Orlando.

I asked Rick if he talked with Mark about domain names and he said “of course”.

“So I tried many times to get @mcuban to speak at TRAFFIC but it was always basketball season! Last night I had a dream about our meeting. I was not really prepared well. I went with Roy Messer. He was unprepared as well. I could use a mulligan! lol”

Rick Schwartz talked about what many people, domainers and otherwise, are missing: focus.

“Last night in my dream I had a convo w/ @mcuban as he was staying at my home for a night. I was able to pinpoint my failure on the last conversation we had. It came to one word: ‘Focus’. 7000+ names and I can’t focus on ONE. I have not ever sat down and asked WHICH ONE?”

Rick also talked about the TRAFFIC conference:

“I never produced TRAFFIC 2 make $$. The purpose was 2 expose, circulate & accelerate the importance & understanding of #Domains. It was never intended 2 be run by sponsors for THEIR benefit. They of course benefitted greatly! But as #Domainers working alone, we needed FUEL.”

“The cost of admission was high. But that was the main ingredient to keep out the noise, focus on #Domains and attract the most serious and successful #Domainers. Breaking bread with like minded people is very enriching and educational. So we based much of the show around food.”

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.

11 comments

  1. Very cool that Rick and Mark were supporting the kids!…The picture was clearly taken before Mark Cuban passed on drafting the Greek Freak (best basketball player in NBA), because he is smiling… 🙂

    • 14 teams passed on Giannis. To be fair he was very young, had never played on high level and was a big bet.
      He was playing on the 2nd level in Greece and was not even the best player there. And he had played international basketball.

    • He sold brocastcast.com for 5.7 billion almost 20 years ago. I would take that correct choice over a basketball player!

      Don

    • Giannis owes it to Nikos Galis, the man who revolutionized Greek basketball. Galis was dropped by the Boston Celtics, and moved to Greece. The rest, as they say, is history. 😀

      Mark Cuban is not only sharp and kind, he’s also grateful. I assisted with the recovery of a stolen LLL .com domain owned by his company a few years ago, and received a basketball signed by the Dallas Mavericks team as a gift. The team went on to win the NBA title that year!

  2. Mark Cuban actually reports this the other way around, as the time he met Rick Schwartz. His way of doing some name dropping.

  3. “I never produced TRAFFIC 2 make $$. The purpose was 2 expose, circulate & accelerate the importance & understanding of #Domains. It was never intended 2 be run by sponsors for THEIR benefit. They of course benefitted greatly! But as #Domainers working alone, we needed FUEL.”

    This 100% correct. Schwartz is a pioneering, caring genius for the ‘Domain Investment Industry’. He is forthright, outspoken, and honest. I agree with him on everything except two, and if he cares to comment here, it’s okay with me; the two things were:

    1. The upcoming newgTLD .WEB is not going to be a blockbuster far more than the released ones to date because, what binds all TLDs together and that is inhibiting their success is applicable to all of them; if one succeeds, they all succeed.

    2. On a more serious note, I disagreed with Schwartz on the price of the T.R.A.F.F.I.C Domain Industry’s Conference, ranging between $999 to $1799, or there about. It was too costly, as now acknowledged by the man himself here, “The cost of admission was high. But that was the main ingredient to keep out the noise, focus on #Domains and attract the most serious and successful #Domainers. Breaking bread with like minded people is very enriching and educational. So we based much of the show around food.” I wrote many comments on his Blog, and others to get him to drop this “Elitist” approach. And possibly made some enemies from my comments. I was aggressive in my campaign to get him to reduce this price, so many Domainers can per-take in the industry’s flagship Conference. As a matter of fact, it was on one of these heated “arguments” on Rick’s blog that Richard Lau got the idea to launch his Namescon stuff. So, Lau chimed in with his comment announcing the $199 price, which was what I had recommended to Schwartz.

    Aside from the aforementioned items, I agree with the Domain King 100% of the time.

    This comment is not to brag, or take credit, but to keep the record straight.

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