Domain tasting is when an entity or person registers a bunch of new domain names and monitors them all for traffic and revenue for the first five days. Under the ‘add grace period’ a registrant can return the domain name for nearly a free refund. ‘Tasters’ return the domains they do not deem profitable before the add grace period ends.
Last June, ICANN tried to halt domain tasting by implementing a $.20 per domain returned during the grace period. This small amount was not enough to stop domain tasters. This year ICANN got tougher, much tougher. Now registrars are charged $6.75/domain deleted during the grace period. This is bad news for tasters, hardly making it a worthwhile practice.
It’s sad that these ‘tasters’ ruined the ‘add grace period’ for domain name owners. I have never practiced domain ‘tasting’ and I don’t see it as an ethical business practice. Finally, ICANN has improved the industry! Domain owners used to legitimately used the ‘add grace period’ without abusing it. I have returned a domain before during the grace period before when I realized my registration was a typo error. Now we won’t have that luxury anymore.
I used add-grace period before. Now I will be double checking very carefully every new domain I register.