Verisign rapes us. ".COM's" just got a little more expensive
 

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060301/...icann_verisign

NEW YORK - The board of the Internet's main oversight agency has approved a deal under which VeriSign Inc. must meet some conditions in order to raise fees for ".com" domain names.

VeriSign, which is based in Mountain View, Calif., operates the servers that constitute the Internet's core address book for ".com" Web sites, making sure that people find Web sites. The company sells ".com" addresses for $6 each to registrars who then sell them to the public.

Under the deal approved Tuesday by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, or ICANN, VeriSign is allowed to raise its annual fee for domain names, which registrars could then pass along to customers.

The deal limits VeriSign's annual price increases to 7 percent in four of the next six years. In two of the years, VeriSign could raise fees by the same percentage only in response to a security threat or to comply with an ICANN mandate.

The ICANN board was divided on the issue, voting 9 to 5 for approval, with one abstention. Statements by the board members were not immediately available.

The deal has faced opposition from some registrars, who have complained about the price increases and the fact that like previous contracts, it gives VeriSign the first right to renew the contract with ICANN when it expires in 2012.

"We are disappointed that after hearing from so many Internet stakeholders about why this proposal is anticompetitive, the ICANN board still approved a known bad deal," said Champ Mitchell, chief executive of Network Solutions Inc., a registrar that was sold off by VeriSign in 2003.

The deal needs final approval by the U.S. Department of Commerce. Mitchell urged the government to reject it.

VeriSign said it was "pleased" with ICANN's approval, and noted that it was similar to a deal reached last year over ".net" domain names, which the company also administers.

In afternoon trading on the Nasdaq Stock Market, shares of VeriSign rose 4 cents to $23.70.

What a bunch of weasles.

fucking c*nts

In all fairness, the price of domains has dropped tremendously since I started. The first domains I bought were $100. I'm paying around $12 now. A 7% increase a year isn't going to make or break anyone who's seriously in the biz.

That is a terrible way to think. In fact, if your thinking was applied to the entire world, we would self destruct in exactly 1 nanosecond.

for fucks sake

true but you cant compare 1 inflated price to another inflated price.. :)

Well you can but it doesnt make either of them less inflated..heh

I wonder how many domains (.com's) there are ?

Multiply that by $6 = verisgin's operating costs ? heh, i doubt it.. why the monopoly

Stamps cost almost fifty cents now.

That's because of competition. When NSI was the sole registrar, they had a complete monopoly.
WG

What's the problem? Prices go up over time...

Ass wipes...But i'll still just buy as many as ever:)

In the internet and computer world, prices go down.

Higher domain prices will loosen up some of the huge domain portfolios out there. Good or bad, I don't know. Some portfolio companies might have to raise premium prices to offset costs. On the other hand, it could make it easier to find domains.

price gouging lol

they just raised them to .51 here, i had to go buy a roll of 1 centers.

I'm happy it's going up. I wish it would go back to $100 a domain. Raise the cost of entry to a point where you have to be a bit more serious to get in.

you have to be kidding. a 7% increase on overhead sucks big time.

not that much on already inflated prices

core inflation is around 1.9% per year
Personal income is around 0.9% per year

Verisgin wants/got 7%

Keep this up and we will be paying more for domains than we earn..:1orglaugh

And why should you have to be serious "to get in"?

Ths is kind of true in a way ..not gonna happen but it would be interesting because companies wouldnt just be buying up expired domains and such "en masse" like they do now

once one owns the domains no 7% bump in renewal prices is going to loosen anything up at all. btw- i pay $6.75 per year on .com/.net and other people in the thread report paying $12 - so it ain't going to matter in the portfolio world at all. it will matter in other ways potentially.

well i dont know about that , the bottom feeders require massive amounts of domains because the profit is so small..

like lets say i have found a cool market to buy domains for 6.95 and on average they make me 7.35 per year , so i buy 5 million of them and im making some good cash ( lets just assume i have no other costs ) , this will obviously concern me alot , because my registrar will likely raise my fee. If they raise it above 7.35 i no longer make profit..

true, but usually you can see right away whether the domain is self-funding/profitable (without flips). if the domain cuts it that close then all i can say is each domain will have to be evaluated on a case by case basis for those domainers.

This is true, but it also does it's part to loosen the grip that billions of spam pages have on the engines. I'd say for every 7% raise .007% of those pages dissappear. It would take a much larger increase to make a dent.

I hate agree with right wing Peaches but she has a point lol

Agreed.

It would certainly weed out the hobbyists that are killing the biz.

Regards,

Lee

Like YOU perhaps? Get the fuck on outta here...We don't need you in this biz ruining it...

And people use domains for other things besides pornography moron.

Why the heck are you paying $12????

The wholesale cost to registrars is $6 and the better firms are only marking up .75 cents to $6.75.

why do they do this kind of things?
heheheh

its all about service/support quality.

I pay $15 for alot of my domains because i use directnic and its expensive , but i go with whom i trust/like :thumbsup if i buy a bunch at a time i use others..

Put it this way i bought a domain for 2.99 and switched to a 15 dollar registrar because the srvice at the first one sucked so bad

Yeah, I did that with a Yahoo domain as well.

1&1 offers em for $5.99 but I still pay more and use Namecheap's $8.88 service.

The control panel does everything I need it to efficiently, privacy whois is free, propagation is the fastest of all the registrars I've used and there has never been one problem with the hundreds of domains I've reged there. :thumbsup

Bingo. I use Directnic also. I pay less because of their quantity discounts, but when I can pick up the phone and call one of the owners, I know my domains are in good hands. :)