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League of Legends Fantasy League? Tencent owned ZAM registers domains

Taipei Assassins

The idea of launching a fantasy league for online battle arena game “League of Legends” has been the subject of many forum messages on LeagueofLegends.com, so the idea is nothing new.

But now it looks like a fantasy league is being developed by ZAM Network, a Tencent owned company that operates a number of gaming and addon sites like Wowhead, LolKing and D3DB.

According to WHOIS records, on November 1, 2012, ZAM Network registered the domain names LeagueofLegendsFantasy.com (WHOIS), LeagueofLegendsFantasy.net (WHOIS), LeagueofLegendsFantasyLeague.com (WHOIS), and LeagueofLegendsFantasyLeague.net (WHOIS).

ZAM didn’t stop there.  It also registered LoLFantasyLeague.com (WHOIS) and LoLFantasyLeague.net (WHOIS).

Here’s a look at the WHOIS record for LeagueofLegendsFantasyLeague.com:

LeagueofLegendsFantasyLeague.com WHOIS record

Tencent, which also has a majority stake in Riot Games, acquired ZAM earlier this year.  Because ZAM is being backed by one of the largest internet companies, you can bet they will have the budget and resources to successfully run a fantasy league.

As of right now, ZAM hasn’t made any official announcement.  Nor do any of the domain names direct visitors to a gaming site.

At the time of this story being published, each of the names sends visitors to a parked web page at Go Daddy, where they were registered.

In May 2012, ZAM acquired LoLKing, an online summoner database that boasts over 50,000 users per month according to a rough traffic estimate by Compete.

LoL King

I’ve reached out to ZAM for more information about the ‘League of Legends Fantasy League’, and will update this post if I hear back.

Talking about this story: Kotaku

(Image of Season 2 World Champions Taipei Assassins via leagueoflegends.com)

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News Technology

No EarPods.com for Apple, but company acquires TheEarPod.com, EarPod.net

EarPods

Apple has a poor track record when it comes to owning the matching domain names to new products that it announces.

As pointed out by Michael Berkens of The Domains back in September, Apple missed out on acquiring EarPod.com and EarPods.com, nor did the company get AppleEarPods.com which was put up for sale on eBay.

The company has, however, been able to acquire two related names:  EarPod.net and TheEarPod.com.

According to WHOIS records, Apple is now the owner of the domains EarPod.net (WHOIS) and TheEarPod.com (WHOIS), both of which were under Domains By Proxy, Go Daddy’s privacy service, up until this week.

While the price paid for Apple’s latest acquisitions is unknown, can you guess how much it would cost for Apple to acquire EarPods.com?

Business Insider thinks the current owner could net $2 million.

Talking about this story: @RobinWauters

(Image of EarPod via Apple.com)

Categories
News Video Games

PopCap’s parent Electronic Arts registers ‘Bookworm Heroes’ domain names

Bookworm Heroes

It’s been a few years since PopCap Games has released a new Bookworms title, but it looks like something new may be on the way for the word-forming computer puzzle game, according to new domain registrations by PopCap’s parent EA.

On November 1, 2012, Electronic Arts registered several names like BookwormHeroes.com, BookwormHeroes.org, and even BookwormHeroes.co.uk.

All of the names were acquired through the internet brand protection company MarkMonitor.

Below is a list of some of the names the company registered:

http://whois.domaintools.com/bookwormheroes.co.uk
http://whois.domaintools.com/bookwormheroes.com
http://whois.domaintools.com/bookwormheroes.net
http://whois.domaintools.com/bookwormheroes.org
http://whois.domaintools.com/bookwormheroes.ca
http://whois.domaintools.com/bookwormheroes.eu

An empty Twitter account is also online at twitter.com/bookwormheroes, but it’s unknown whether PopCap grabbed the social network name.

Not much is known beyond the domain names.

At the time of this story being published, none of the domains resolve to a web page.

Talking about this story: HardGamers

(Image of Lex the Bookworm via PopCap.com)

Categories
News Video Games

ZeniMax to launch new online store for games like Doom? (Domains registered)

Elder Scrolls store

ZeniMax Media registered several domains this week around the name “store” through the brand protection agency Corporation Service Company.

According to WHOIS records, Bethesda Softworks’ parent company ZeniMax picked up names like Bethsoftstore.com, Doomstore.net, ElderScrollsstore.com and FalloutStore.com.

So, could ZeniMax be planning to announce a new online store?  In the past, it had a store at orders.bethsoft.com, which is now home to The Elder Scrolls Construction Set Wiki.  As of today, the company has yet to announce anything official, but with the holidays fast approaching, it is possible there could be some news soon.

Here’s a look at the list of domain names, all registered on October 30, 2012.

http://whois.domaintools.com/bethesdastore.net
http://whois.domaintools.com/bethesdastore.org
http://whois.domaintools.com/bethsoftstore.com
http://whois.domaintools.com/bethsoftstore.net
http://whois.domaintools.com/bethsoftstore.org
http://whois.domaintools.com/doomstore.net
http://whois.domaintools.com/doomstore.org
http://whois.domaintools.com/elderscrollssstore.com
http://whois.domaintools.com/elderscrollssstore.net
http://whois.domaintools.com/elderscrollssstore.org
http://whois.domaintools.com/falloutstore.com
http://whois.domaintools.com/falloutstore.net
http://whois.domaintools.com/falloutstore.org

Currently, none of the domain names resolve to a web page.

Talking about this story: PC Games

Categories
News Video Games

Microsoft registers HaloExchange.com, UNSCExchange.com domain names

Halo Exchange

If domain names are any indication of Microsoft’s plans for its biggest Xbox franchise, the company may be opening some type of new store with the launch of Halo 4.

On October 17, Microsoft registered the names HaloExchange.com (Whois), HaloExchange.net (Whois), HaloWaypointStore.com (Whois), HaloWaypointstore.net (Whois), UNSCExchange.com (Whois), and UNSCExchange.net (Whois) through the brand protection company MarkMonitor.

While it could be nothing more than Microsoft protecting its Halo brand, the registration of both the dotcom and dotnet may signal bigger plans.

In the U.S. military, the term “Base Exchange” is a common name for a type of retail store, originally akin to trading posts.

At the time of this story being published, the domain names redirect visitors to Bing.