So I have not been reading much within the industry over the last couple weeks. I see headlines on Domaining.com and use that as a point of reference.
I really don’t have interest in discussing the coronavirus with people who have no background in infectious disease, science or medicine so I have not been involved in much conversation. Personally I have been outside 3 times in 2020 so I was in self isolation and did not even realize it.
Now things have been busy a lot of emails coming in and a few small deals brokered.
I did get an email that came from left field, the sender was not someone I know or knew of it was an anonymous address. The sender sent me,
“Tell your buddy I will register and sell whatever I like, his opinion doesn’t mean zilch!!!” He included a link and it was to Andrew Allemann https://domainnamewire.com/2020/03/16/taking-advantage-of-covid-19/
Now getting all kinds of oddball emails is par for the course, I get some people that email almost everyday. One conspiracy theory after the next.
This obviously was not a conspiracy theory, it deals with something I think a lot of people don’t like. Over the years I have said it to friends all the time, people don’t like being told what to do by people they either:
- dislike
- don’t respect
- don’t feel they know better than them
I don’t dabble in anything health or crisis related, and have written about that in the past. Certainly I am far from perfect, it’s just not an area I want to be involved in, I am not here to judge anyone else, it’s not my business and just so long as it’s not illegal like ,malware, ransomware, etc..
I have pointed out heinous names like when rapekids.com or something similar was on GoDaddy auctions. That I believe is out of bounds, especially for GoDaddy to profit off the sale. As I remember back they did remove that one.
Now back to the email, first off Andrew Allemann is not my buddy, we have no relationship at all, never spoken to the man, never met him, so why this anonymous person thought he was my buddy? I don’t know.
I understand where Andrew was coming from. Jon Schulz replied back in that post:
Give us a break, Andrew. As I said in the other thread, you do more damage to society every time you drive for a non-essential purpose than anyone does buying any domain and putting any price on it. You cannot compare buying and selling domains to hoarding essential goods, they are two different animals.
Now of course Jon owns similar names. He sold Ebola.com and owns other disease related names. His business, not mine.
ForeignPolicy.com labeled the sale of Ebola.com as “Parasitic Capitalism”
Moving on
So I then was on Domaining.com and read an article by Konstantinos over at OnlineDomain.com. The headline on Domaining.com intrigued me because I was not sure what he meant?
“Anyone that buys a domain and tries to sell it is not a domainer”
I thought that is a domainer, so reading his article I saw it was about coronavirus type names and the ethics behind them.
There was a comment from Snoopy that was interesting, more than likely polarizing for the domain community.
He said:
As an industry we need to stop this constant “registration shaming”, yes each post casting moral judgment on what some guy registered gets eyeballs but it is doing nothing positive for the industry. I think in a lot of cases bloggers are just going through the whois looking for stuff to shame people on.
That got me wondering what hurts the perception of domain owners more? The name or the shame? Would many people not know about what some consider deplorable or unethical registrations if not for the posts? Does the shaming of the registrant leave a bigger black eye on domaining as a whole?
Taking into their own hands
Some countries are not going to give two licks about shaming or ethics. They are going to take what they want under the rules allowed.
According to a post today, the Spanish government has temporarily confiscated Coronavirus.es.
So give your opinion, which does more damage the regging or the shaming?
Fabulous article Raymond, a lot to think about here.
For me I would say the name but maybe it’s equal.
I like the person who sent the email, I sure as fuck wouldn’t listed to Allemann on what’s right and wrong, who is he to tell me?
If you have freedom use it, you are an adult be your own person.
I agree with Andrew. You don’t want to be that person. This is a bad situation, you want to sell a domain name for money?
I had not read the article you referenced from onlinedomain. good read the Carnival cruise smackdown was great. People like that should be ashamed.
to answer your question… the name over the shame.
What goes around comes around, eventually.