Because he’s smart, and a developer. Almost as soon as credit.club was registered, a great looking site went up on the formerly registry reserved domain name. If you have questions about how to increase your credit score, p2p lending or any other credit topics, it’s worth checking out.
If you haven’t already heard, the .Club registry made a mistake (or technical error) when moving the credit.club domain from the registry reserve status in order to register it as part of the .club’s Startup.club program. This allowed the domain to be hand registered at Name.com for normal regfee ($10.99). There was a huge fuss and folks demanding answers on NamePros thread and on other forums and blogs about how someone can just hand register this caliber of name when it was previously priced at $200,000.
I am not accusing anyone of any wrongdoing here or conspiracy and I certainly agree with the sentiment from most that .Club made a wise decision letting the registrant keep the domain. I am skeptical that if a pure domainer would have registered credit.club during that window and simply parked the name or left it undeveloped that they would have been able to keep it. Anyone else think it would have been taken back from the registry? The official response by Colin Campbell (CEO of .Club registry) on the Credit.club situation in Analysis Part B and C (bold below) indicate that if the site was not developed and launched that it likely would have executed its ‘right’ to take the domain back.
The facts about credit.club.
As promised below are the facts and analysis conducted by Jonathan Frost, our in-house attorney.
Facts:
· The Operations Department, which manages Company domain name registrations, planned a transfer of <CREDIT.CLUB>, along with 130 other domain names, on 2015-01-13 as part of the Company’s Startup.club promotional program.
· On 2015-01-13T20:11:40, the Operations Department removed <CREDIT.CLUB> from the registry-reserve in order to register it as part of the Company’s Startup.club promotional program.
· Between 2015-01-13T20:11:40 and 2015-01-14T21:51:25 (25 hours, 49 minutes, and 45 seconds), the status of <CREDIT.CLUB> was unregistered and unreserved. At that time, the Operations Department did not have knowledge that the registration had failed. It is not clear whether the failed registration was a result of human error or system error.
· At 2015-01-14T21:51:25, a registrant (the “Registrant”) using domain privacy, without the knowledge of the Company, registered the domain <CREDIT.CLUB> at Name.com.
Analysis:
a) Mistaken Registration
The Registrant’s registration of <CREDIT.CLUB> on January 14, 2015 was due to a mistake made by the registry. The mistaken nature of the registration is clear as the domain name was publicly advertised as being a premium domain name in the Startup.club program and the Operations Department documented its plan to register the domain name to a Company subsidiary for promotional purposes. However, on January 13, 2015, when the Operations Department attempted to register <CREDIT.CLUB>, the registration failed, and the failure was not detected at the time.
b) Right to Rescind
The Registration Agreement between Name.com and the Registrant, the RRA between Name.com and the Company, and the Registry Terms and Policies all contemplate registrations that occur as a result of a mistake by the registry, and the registry may rescind such registrations.
c) Conclusion
Thus, it is within the Company’s contractual rights to cancel the registration for <CREDIT.CLUB>.
Further to his analysis and conclusions I can personally state that no one in .CLUB had any conversations regarding credit.club with the registrant at or before the registration of credit.club.
The registry does not believe it is in our best interest nor the best interest of the registrant to pull the name back given the substantial investment in time and money he has invested to launch credit.club. I informed the registrant of such matters and wish him a continued success.
Again, I am more than happy for Bruce and congrats on the awesome domain and site. I’m a firm believer that you create your own luck and with quick action on the domain registration and launch of the site, he definitely deserves to keep the domain. We will never know what the .Club registry would have done if the name was registered by a domainer then sat undeveloped or parked. I’m just playing devils advocate here for all the folks singing praises of .Club for letting the registrant keep the name 😉
*For the record, I am a fan of .Club – it is a solid extension and they are doing a great job of showing other gTLDs how to successfully launch..
Thanks for the nice comments, I really want to do this marquee name proud. It is obviously a great name and I thought it would be a great idea to tie it in with all the talks Tiffany and I had at NamesCon about using WP for rapid development of sites on a domain investors key properties.
Thanks for the recognition. Lots more to come on this property, as you can imagine I plan to take it from a knowledge base to something even more.
You’re welcome Bruce. Keep up the good work!
Yeah Bruce is a good guy and even if he wasn’t you can’t get mad at someone getting lucky and regging a premium domain for non premium, I spent years writing about it and trying to do it with .tv. I regged LCD.tv on a drop which should have been $5,000 a year and regged it for $29.99 at Go Daddy back in 2004.
I think people are right to ask Dot Club how it happened ? That’s fine too, nothing should be directed at Bruce.
I do agree with you if that name resolved to a DNS parked page, accepting offers of $10,000 plus, then Dot Club would have used the 30 day window all registries have, including .com and taken the domain back.
I once tried to help someone with Pets.tv years ago, Verisign claimed it was a mistake and it was in first 30 days and took the domain back.
Sure, he’s nice, handsome, smart & wealthy, but the real reason he can keep it is because no one else is willing to pay for it since the gtls are such crap.
Haha Sonny! But people sure are .buzzing about them 😉
Looks like he installed a generic wordpress theme (https://wrapbootstrap.com/theme/nowknow-knowledge-base-wordpress-theme-WB0NKM7B4) and put up some articles and adwords ads.
Dear All
CC: Bruce Marler
My case recently as same as you – Bruce. What I did at EuroDNS registrar:
– Be member
– Search the available .host
– Found at some sites listing as premium about 5k-6k USD
– At EuroDNS: was 78 USD listing, carefully checked
– I did legally registered
– Been charged directly with that amount
– Had confirmation by email of purchase
– On deliver processing
However, after 02 days the registrar said: it is PREMIUM and quit to Deliver to me. Could anyone tell me, in this case:
– Am I wrong at the process? OR
– The registrar systematic problem
– Could I under lawful right, able to get the domain name???
Thanks for your support and thanks in advanced
Best regards,
Danny