
The “.ro” Gold Rush (2018) - kioleanu
http://viorel.me/2018/the-dot-ro-gold-rush/
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RankingMember
> Because that’s not quite sustainable (hindsight is 20/20), they decided to
> switch all the domains they already sold for life to yearly subscriptions.

What? At least in the U.S., if you sell something with a lifetime ownership
term, you can't just renege and change the terms after the fact (well you can
try, but you're asking to be sued).

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kokokokoko
Almost everything at this level of consumer has a TOS that allows the larger
company/organization to basically change anything. And if it didn't most
customers still wouldn't have the legal resources to challenge it. One of
those interesting quirks of consumer free markets.

~~~
Florin_Andrei
> _most customers still wouldn 't have the legal resources to challenge it_

The weaponization of the legal process. Those with the biggest armies win.

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jchw
It's amazing how weirdly managed some TLDs are. There was the controversy with
.io, but my favorite experience was .pn (Pitcairn Islands apparently.) I had a
.pn domain for a year, that I bought directly from their nic. The trouble is,
it's practically all managed manually. Luckily I didn't really need to, but I
was not sure at all how to renew a .pn domain because I purchased it from a
form that let me specify nameservers and a domain - that's it.

Some registars support it but generally only with business subscriptions like
Gandi's - so it's actually cheaper to buy it directly. But I still find it
fascinating how not-automated it all was.

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Scarblac
Pitcairn only has 50 inhabitants according to Wikipedia! Apparently there was
a conflict between the islander who had management of the domain and the
island's Council (source:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/.pn](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/.pn)).

~~~
Rebelgecko
Pitcairn Island is (was?) a bit of a mess. It probably sets records for the
ISO region with:

* most people with wikipedia articles per capita

* the most sex offenders per capita

* least variety of last names (something like half the people there have the last name Christian)

Tom Christian, the previous .pn administrator, and his wife were apparently
both shunned by the community when they spoke out against the sexual abuse of
children and the claims of some of the men on the island that it was part of
their traditional way of life. Most of the men convicted got off with slaps on
the wrist because the island doesn't have the resources to support locking up
a substantial part of its adult population.

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ohashi
This just sounds like the old drop days, companies like snapnames, pool,
namejet, godaddy have had backorders and snapping up as fast possible over
APIs for ages. Only interesting bit is the policy change that caused it.

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jaysonelliot
You'd think by now that people would have learned the only TLD with real value
is .com, and to avoid "gold rush" mentality on country codes or newly minted
TLDs.

And if they didn't learn that, at least learn not to trust an entity that was
willing to break contracts or change the terms whenever it was in their
financial interest to do so.

What's even attractive about the letters .ro? That's not a common suffix for
English words, and it's not particularly memorable.

~~~
yesenadam
Well, -ero is an extremely common word ending in Spanish, for one,
corresponding to the -er in Hacker. Portuguese has -eiro. (Even in English a
lot of businesses/products are called "[something] Hero".)

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charlesdm
3,000 EUR to potentially get access to a ton of good domains doesn't seem like
a big deal?

If I knew I could register 100 interesting domains, I would totally be willing
to pay that price.

~~~
StavrosK
Was it total, or per domain? The article doesn't clarify.

3000 total sounds super duper cheap.

~~~
i_cant_speel
It sounds like the license to be a reseller was just a single 3000 EUR upfront
cost.

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lixtra
> If you want a really good domain, you can end up paying 500EUR per year for
> it.

Can't you transfer it to a different reseller in the first year? You should be
able to switch resellers with your domain. In worst case, you can start your
own reseller.

~~~
ilogik
I'm from Romania, and my firstname.ro was available late last year, but
someone else bought it...I don't have a problem with that...I was willing to
pay 50 euros, since it's a common name, I assume it went for a lot more.

I don't understand why it would be 500 euros/year. Once you bought it, it's
yours, you can renew it for 9/year.

~~~
charlesdm
I got firstname.be a while back, and I did pay more for it than 50 euros.
Guess it depends on how much you want it -- I'd been waiting nearly 16 years
until the domain finally expired. Didn't really feel like waiting another 16
years... :)

~~~
hycaria
All this and not even a drop of css!

~~~
charlesdm
Hey, it's in development !

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lgeorget
I wonder if domain names are not overvalued... I know your domain name is part
of a brand but isn't it better to pick an original name than a common name to
have people remember you? Especially now that the URL bar is also a search bar
in most browsers.

How many books a year are sold books.com? How many requests does search.com
serves daily?

~~~
pryelluw
.com domains are in a similar space as 1-800 numbers in terms of branding.

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willsr
This has been happening in the .au for years. One example:
[https://www.drop.com.au/](https://www.drop.com.au/)

Registrars that run drop catch auction sites increase their odds by acquiring
more connections to the Registry.

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pete23
I’d go for Moloch rather than Hanlon. This kind of zero-value race for the
bottom feeders is too wasteful and tragic.

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tantalor
It's "unfair" to pay auction rates? How?

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brohee
It's a private entity that reaps the benefits of what is a public good
presumably...

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oftenwrong
A domain name is a private good, not a public good.

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tlholaday
The exclusivity of the domain name is a public good. The right to use the
domain name is a private, transferable good.

Were the auction site operated by Romania, the value of courses.ro would be
determined by auction, paid by a willing buyer, and received by the Romanian
polity. Instead, the Romanian polity receives 300EUR as an entrance fee to a
race-track where luck is significant in determining the winner. There is
nothing in the linked article suggesting that the number of entrants is
limited.

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sadris
I remember getting a .store domain one time. But I couldn't sign up for
Alibaba with that tld. So I decided that only .com/net will be acceptable from
now on.

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gruez
isn't this the case for other tlds as well? pool.com does the same for all of
the "main" tlds (.com, .net, .org, etc.)

