So who is behind that username or avatar?
One of the difficult things about domaining compared to most industries is that for the most part you don’t know much if anything about the person you are conversing with, getting advice from. There are exceptions of course, people get to meet people at domain conferences, (though no one has on their badge, I am broke or I am a scammer). There are also high profile domainers who share a lot and use their real name.
Opinions or advice without knowing anything behind the person giving them are pretty empty imo.
You get people who give opinions on names in appraisal sections and you have no idea if they know anything about the industry said name belongs to. Do they know anything about linguistics, branding? No?
The value of that opinion is reg fee, like so many domains are appraised at reg fee. The theory for some goes if someone paid $9 for it then it can’t be worthless, others would differ in their opinion. So the same goes for people, you have the right to speak and to give an opinion, but it equates to reg fee.
Same goes with negotiation advice, some people give very bad advice in forums and blog comments. For the person seeking negotiation advice, all they know is MetallicaFan has a sweet avatar but might not even know how to negotiate for an extra .50 an hour at their job.
The worst advice in my opinion, comes from those anonymous sources who are giving legal advice. “You tell that company to go f themselves!” “I would ignore it, you have every right to own a name with Instagram it.” Yeah might be better to contact Berryhill or Lieberman. The truth is most domainers who participate on forums and blogs know very little to nothing about TM law and intellectual property.
Another thing that happens with not knowing the people you interact with is there are many false narratives that get built up.
This is Domaining When The Legend Becomes Fact Print The Legend
One tidbit that surprised a lot of people came up in the CQD.com case on Namepros. James Booth had unknowingly bought a stolen domain, that belonged to a lady in Florida.
One of the hot takes of that thread was some people who never met or knew anything about Mr.Booth, declaring he was a millionaire and that he should just eat the loss, he can afford it.
To which Mr. Booth posted:
I had a couple people say to me they were flabbergasted that Booth was not a millionaire. I asked the one person if they ever met James or knew anything about him? They just figured that they saw him mentioned on Namepros and DNJournal so he was rich.
You have to do your homework in the business and verify from more than one source if you are going to spend money, or make a deal.
There was a recent thread on Namepros where someone was going to make a large purchase for a domain name because of a previous sale that they saw mentioned. The sale was not a sale but just an auction close that never got paid. You can read it here, it’s long and sometimes confusing.
The takeaway is not confusing though, you need to do your homework thoroughly, you need to be meticulous before making a decision that affects your domain business.
In this business no one really knows a lot about anyone. Hopefully you know yourself and go from there. Best of luck.
“…has a sweet avatar but might not even know how to negotiate for an extra .50 an hour at their job.”
That is a great quote there – So true.
As for that James Booth post, I am glad you posted that. We have talked about that before, yeah just because he moves 6 figure domain names often, everyone assumes he is a multi-millionaire. Not true at all based on his own quote. I was glad he wrote that because that is what happens some times when you are a mover and a shaker.
Back to avatar/username or knowing someone. It always comes back to these same 4 words,
Do your due diligence.
very well written, I myself sometimes find that I start to follow the opinion of a commenter. You have to remind yourself that you don’t know their credentials.
@Vito yes moving and shaking can mean a lot of things. good comment.