Categories
News

After turning down low six-figure bids, Mike Berkens’ Worldwide Media sells VisitBerlin.com for $230,000

Worldwide Media Inc.

Popular domain investor and blogger Mike Berkens, launched his corproate web site Worldwide Media Inc. in December. 

Using the web address wwmi.com, the web site provides information on the company’s business, projects, consulting, and still one of the most interesting sections is the Domain Name Sales & Acquisitions section, which  describes a handful of the more than one hundred thousand domain transactions that Worldwide Media has been involved in since the nineties.

The last time I wrote about Worldwide Media, there were 13 offers listed in the Recently Rejected $10,000 and above section, including one offer for VisitBerlin.com for $100,000. 

Since then, at least one more offer of $150,000 for VisitBerlin.com was rejected, but now it appears the buyer and Worldwide Media have finally agreed on a number:  $230,000.

According to the most recent domain name sales section which are not subject to a NDA (Non-Disclosure Agreement), Worldwide Media has sold the domain name for nearly quarter of a million dollars.

Here’s a look at all the offers over $10,000 that were rejected by Mike Berkens’ WorldWide Media.  The ones in bold are new since my last story.

VisitBerlin.com $150,000
D.tv  $125,000
iBill.com $100,000
VisitBerlin.com  $100,000
345.com  $75,000
Stuff.com $75,000
MotorcycleHelmets.com $60,000
RestaurantSupply.com $50,000
Aili.com $40,000
TheTour.com $30,000
RugbyNews.com $20,000
Dirty.com $15,000
Kevin.me $10,000
Ayanna.com $10,000
woodmere.com $10,000
FreshPrints.com $10,000
BettertoKnow.com $10,000
BankAccounts.com $10,000

Categories
News

Reinvent Inc. issues press release on purchase of ThreeWords.me, the web app built by 18-year old Mark Bao

ThreeWords.me

Reinvent Inc. issued a press release on Wednesday, officially announcing the purchase of ThreeWords.me. 

“We are always looking for great ideas to nurture and develop,” said Dr. Kevin Ham, CEO, Reinvent. “ThreeWords.me is a simple application that has the potential to transform the way people express and track sentiment online. We are starting to make gradual improvements to the site with a full relaunch to feature an updated platform that will retain simplicity but boast deeper functionality.”

Though the official press release went out this week, news of the purchase by Reinvent had already been reported by Mashable on January 19th, shortly after Mark Bao, the 18-year-old technology entrepreneur, had put the website up for sale.

Check out the full press release below.

Vancouver, Canada, February 2, 2011 — Reinvent Inc., an emerging business incubator for innovative online start-ups, today announced the acquisition of popular web application, ThreeWords.me (http://threewords.me/). The application launched on December 22, 2010 and has since experienced rapid growth, approaching 5 million visitors and 17 million page views in just over a month.

“We are always looking for great ideas to nurture and develop,” said Dr. Kevin Ham, CEO, Reinvent. “ThreeWords.me is a simple application that has the potential to transform the way people express and track sentiment online. We are starting to make gradual improvements to the site with a full relaunch to feature an updated platform that will retain simplicity but boast deeper functionality.”

ThreeWords.me has been a labor of love and I’m excited to hand it over to the team at Reinvent,” said Mark Bao, 18 year-old creator of ThreeWords.me. “The company has an incredible vision matched by technical expertise. I believe that they will be able to take what I started and create a revolutionary new way for people to express their opinions online.”

Reinvent is an expanding incubation house for strategic, creative and passionate entrepreneurial businesses. The company’s portfolio currently includes socially conscious daily deal site, GoodNews.com and Black Friday resource site, BlackFriday.com. In addition to the incubator projects, Reinvent is also a pioneer of domain names and advertising networks with a massive online global network that currently receives 30 million unique visitors a month. Reinvent’s founder, Kevin Ham has garnered international attention and accolades for building one of the largest domain companies in the world. In 2008, Dr. Ham was the recipient of the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year award in Technology for the Pacific Region.

About Reinvent Inc.
Headquartered in Vancouver, Canada, Reinvent Inc., is a global Internet company founded more than ten years ago that specializes in business incubation, direct navigation, online advertising, syndication and domain ownership. The company also recently received the AlwaysOn Global Top 250 Private Companies in 2010 distinction. For more information about Reinvent Inc., visit http://www.reinvent.com/. For more information about GoodNews.com visit http://goodnews.com. For more information on BlackFriday.com visit http://blackfriday.com.

Categories
Disputes News Trademarks Video Games WIPO

Zynga goes after ZyngaGiftcards.com and ZyngaWorld.com domain names

Zynga Gift Cards

Zynga has filed two domain name complaints concerning zyngagiftcards.com and zyngaworld.com with WIPO, the World Intellectual Property Organization. 

The complaints were filed today for ZyngaWorld.com and yesterday for ZyngaGiftcards.com. 

Zynga’s Domain Dispute Track Record

Zynga has had no problem winning domain disputes filed using the Uniform Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy, better known as UDRP. 

In all previous cases, the domain names were transferred from the respondent back to Zynga.  The list of domain names includes zynga-chips.com, zynga.cc, zyngachips.com, zyngapoker.com, buyzyngachips.net, cheapzyngachips.net, chips4zynga.com, yourzyngachips.com, and zyngachips4sell.com.

As TechCrunch reported in March 2010, Zynga rolled out gift cards at a number of major retailers in the U.S.  Though Zynga refers to them as “game cards“, they are essentially gift cards which can be used  for in-game currency to buy the items you want.

Zyngagiftcards.com is currently registered to Joanna Hewett according to Whois Records, and has been registered since December 2009.  Zyngaworld.com is registered to David Cahill of Australia. 

Oddly enough, Zynga doesn’t own zyngagamecards.com and hasn’t filed a dispute over the domain as of yet, even though it refers to its “gift cards” as “game cards”. 

The company also doesn’t own zyngaecards.com, online “game cards” that can be purchased and sent to users with a personal message.  What’s even stranger, is the domain name isn’t even registered at the time of this story, despite the number of abusive registrations the company regularly encounters.  But given Zynga’s success at WIPO, hopefully people will learn some lessons, and avoid these types of registrations.

Though the company will likely win these domain disputes and have the names transferred, they might not be as lucky with the trademark dispute over Blingville, which so far has backfired after Blingville responded with a lawsuit, and thousands have lined up to test and play the soon-to-be released Facebook game.

[Update 1: On March 21, 2011, the WIPO panel ordered the domain name zyngaworld.com transferred to Zynga.  The dispute for zyngagiftcards.com was terminated, after the owner agreed to turn over the name to Zynga.]

Categories
News

Octopus.com, one of the oldest registered .com domains, goes up for sale on Flippa for just $20,000

Octopus.com

Octopus.com, #46 in the top 100 list of oldest registered .com domains, has just been listed for sale at Flippa. 

According to The Next Web’s list of the hundred oldest domain names, Octopus.com was registered on November 17, 1986, the same day as Adobe.com, Amd.com, Das.com, Data-io.com, Portal.com, and Teltone.com.

The auction, which has an oddly low reserve price of only $20,000, ends March 5, 2011.

Flippa has placed a minor warning on the listing because the seller has provided estimates for the claimed financials.  Flippa says, “Estimates can hide many issues, such as fluctuating revenues and inconsistent profitability”.

According to Whois records, the registration is privacy marked.

Registrar: DOTSTER
Domain Name: OCTOPUS.COM
Created on: 17-NOV-86
Expires on: 15-OCT-11
Last Updated on: 30-JAN-11

Why is the owner selling?

According the description on Flippa, “We have purchased this site not so long ago for the value of its domain name alone to start major project. We haven’t been able to proceed with our project and so have recently decided to sell this site. The revenue was never of any concern to us since we bought this site for the value of the domain name. We haven’t actually changed anything since we bought it and we think that the previous owners have also not optimized it for revenue at all. However, it does make some little money in Adsense worth $1200 for the last 12 months”.

Readers, does the reserve price seem low to you?

Updated:  Octopus.com isn’t the only notable domain to go up for sale this week.  As one reader who goes by “Gnanes” pointed out in the comments, Registrar.com has also been put up for auction, with a reserve price of $3MM or buy-it-now of $14MM.

Categories
News

Two-letter .com domain AY.com receives $100,000 bid on Flippa in no-reserve auction

AY.com

A couple weeks ago, domain blogger Mike Berkens over at The Domains wrote about the auction of the two-letter .com domain AY.com at Flippa, after the owner issued a press release announcing the sale. 

The auction followed the buzz created by news of Facebook purchasing the domain FB.com for $8.5 million. 

Today, the seller of AY.com has issued another slightly different press release, in which he notes that the domain has received 1 bid, for $100,000 in the no-reserve auction which ends 17 days from now, that is, unless the domain sells for the buy-it-now price of $2 million.

Here’s a look at the new press release.

(US NEWS SOURCE) January 31, 2011 – This month, an extremely rare LL.com domain name is up for auction on Flippa.com. The domain name, “AY.com” has a current bid of $100,000, and many domain appraisers feels it’s worth a lot more.

“It could be worth over $1 million if the right entities became interested,” said one domain name appraiser in an email reply. “The value on a domain name as rare as AY.com is based solely on what someone is willing to pay for it.”

So far, one bid has been placed on the LL.com (Letter – Letter .com) internet property for $100,000. The current owner, who purchased AY.com over 2 years ago has set no reserve on the auction.

The auction which can be seen at: https://flippa.com/auctions/120091/AY-com—Rare-Premium-2-Letter-Pronounceable-LL-com-Domain-Name is set to end on the night of February 17th, and will sell to the highest bidder, no matter what the price may be.

There are only 676 possible LL.com possible combinations on the internet for domain names, so this makes 2-letter domains like AY.com extremely rare. So far, according to the current owner, the auction has received over 2,400 views and has been added to 13 different users’ watch lists.

How much will the final sale price be?

“I have no idea,” said Eddie Krassenstein, the current owner. “I feel it is extremely valuable, so we will let the market decide.”

The owner of AY.com is heavily marketing the domain name, taking out a number of press releases and even changing the homepage of AY.com to plug the auction over at Flippa.

When AY.com sells at Flippa, it could be the company’s biggest sale in 2011.  And it could be the site’s all-time top sale to date.  While 2010 had a number of six-figure sales for the marketplace, S9.com at $400,000 was the biggest reported sale, confirmed by Flippa.