Tag: moniker

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Social.com goes dark after failed auction

social.com

Although social.com received a $2.5 million bid at SnapNames by the time bidding closed online, it still fell far short of the $5 million+ price tag the owner Scott Carter was looking for.

Since the auction closed on June 15, the website has since gone offline.

Scott Carter who tweets under the username @Scott_Carter has been quiet on Twitter.

Who knows what’s to become of social.com now.  But the domain that TechCrunch said could very well end up being one of the most expensive domain sales of all time, has turned out to not be such a hot commodity after all.

No details on a closed-door deal have emerged, but it’s certainly within reason. 

Last year’s auction of the domain slots.com by Moniker did not reach its reserve price during its auction, but 11 minutes after the auction closed, Moniker received a bid for 5.5 million USD via an absentee proxy bid as reported by Jamie Zoch of DotWeekly.

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[UPDATED] $5 million and up reserve, Social.com receives no bids

social.com

With less than 12 hours left in bidding, the domain Social.com has received no offers at SnapNames, where the name is being auctioned as part of the Barcelona DOMAINfest Premium Auction.

SnapNames was forced to cancel the June 8th live auction in Barcelona due to technical problems with its website. 

The online auction includes other premium domains like autoracing.com and horseracing, but the featured name of the auction is social.com which even made headlines in publications like TechCrunch who chatted with its owner Scott Carter.

“Carter put the domain up for sale in 1997 for $50,000, but had no takers for two years. He tried using the site to promote different businesses, including a social networking directory from 2007 to 2009 and most recently his Twitter tool BigTweet.”

The lowest bid that can be offered online is $2.5 million USD. 

However, Scott Carter is looking for a price tag of anywhere between $5 million and up.

Interest in social networking names is increasing with the rumored IPOs of companies like Facebook, which is being valued as much as $100 billion.

Online auctions rarely get a lot of activity until the final hours, so it should be interesting to watch whether the domain is sold today or in dealings behind closed doors with Moniker after the auction.

[UPDATE June 15, 2011 03:23 PM EST:  The online auction has ended without the reserve being met.]

[UPDATE June 15, 2011 01:25 PM EST:  DNN’s Adam Strong is reporting that social.com has received a $2.5 million bid.]

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$38,000 domain sold in June at Moniker, now the most popular Facebook application

cityville

After selling for $38,225 in June at Moniker, CityVille is now bigger than FarmVille, Mashable is reporting.  

Referring to the latest statistics provided by Appdata, a site that tracks Facebook application metrics, Cityville surpassed Farmville and the Facebook game now has nearly 17 million daily users.  On Dec. 11, Cityville which had been online less than 2 weeks, had 6 million users and it has continued to grow at a phenomenal pace.

The top 10 Facebook apps on the leaderboard according to Appdata are:

1.  CityVille 
2.  FarmVille   
3.  Phrases   
4.  Texas HoldEm Poker  
5.  FrontierVille   
6.  Causes   
7.  Mafia Wars Game   
8.  Café World   
9.  Phrases (new)  
10.  My Year In Status

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News Video Games

Cityville at 6MM daily users in 8 days: It’s the kind of thing that makes some domain sellers kick themselves

cityville

You may remember the story I wrote back in November about Zynga ready to break ground with its biggest social game yet: Cityville. 

Well, today TechCrunch is reporting that Cityville, Zynga’s newest game is already at 6,000,000 daily users in just 8 days.

In early November when I wrote about Ville-domains, Cityville.com was parked.   The domain name had been purchased at Moniker in June for $38,225.

Less than a week later after the story ran, Zynga revealed it had plans for another Facebook game and an “Under Construction” page went online. 

Now, just 8 days into its launch, the domain name Cityville.com which now re-directs to its application page on Facebook, is the fastest-growing game in Zynga’s history.

 Do domain name sellers (like the seller of Cityville.com) kick themselves when they see this type of success?

Probably not, considering the seller got a $38,000 pay day for a name that probably only cost registration.  But you have to believe there is some level of regret, wondering if they had just held out a little longer what could’ve been.

In the last few weeks since my story on Ville domains ran, there have been a couple notable sales.

Dreamville.com sold at Sedo for $5,000 on Nov. 15 and SongVille.com sold for $550 a week later.

Neither name is registered to IP Cybercrime LLC, the company who is the registrant of Cityville.com.  IPCybercrime LLC’s slogan is “Your Guys for Undercover Buys”.