Check Your "Under Review" Section at Afternic!

[DomainRecap]

I just checked my account this morning, and a pile of already-listed domains (at both Afternic and previously on GD) are suddenly in "Under Review" and my feeling is that this is GD's method of backdating their expansive (including lots of generic dictionary words, places and personal/last names) and ever-growing list of "TM Exclusions" and applying those again to old domain listings.

And this isn't a case of real TM misuse like GoogleSearch.com or IBMHardware.com, but popular dictionary words, first names, last names, place names, LLLs, etc. that companies have sent GD to arbitrarily exclude from their listings. Next up, some company is going to claim "a", "the", "at", "of" and few more as their "intellectual property" simply because their company name is At The Top Of A Town.

It might just be that my account was given special treatment due to the technical issues in exporting my Afternic domains to GD, but it never hurts to check your Afternic account to make sure your "In Review" tab hasn't grown, and keep checking it, as this might be an ongoing process.

 

[LoveCatchyDomains]

It might just be that my account was given special treatment due to the technical issues in exporting my Afternic domains to GD, but it never hurts to check your Afternic account to make sure your "In Review" tab hasn't grown, and keep checking it, as this might be an ongoing process.

This may have been a technical glitch. When I uploaded to Afternic recently, there were several new "in review" domains. This was quickly resolved within a few days, after contacting customer support.

And, incidentally, the Afternic support call was absolutely delightful. I'm in the Boston area, so I was surprised, especially on a weekend, to get live phone support routed from the UK! And this support agent, with an irish accent, was clearly knowledgeable and efficient addressing this.

So don't lose hope. It may simply take a little longer to resolve.

 

[DomainRecap]

This may have been a technical glitch. When I uploaded to Afternic recently, there were several new "in review" domains. This was quickly resolved within a few days, after contacting customer support.

But these are old domains I've had listed at Afternic and GoDaddy for years, and I know all about "new listings" running into this issue.

But a pile of domains I've had at Afternic (and previously GD) for 5+ years suddenly all going "In Review"... hmmm

 

[LoveCatchyDomains]

But these are old domains I've had listed at Afternic and GoDaddy for years, and I know all about "new listing" running into this issue.

These were old domains as well, previously listed there periodically without difficulty. The "in review" standards seem a bit more stringent nowadays. So more may get flagged nowadays, but, at least for me, the manual rechecks didn't end up revealing any issues.

 

[DomainRecap]

These were old domains as well, previously listed there periodically without difficulty. The "in review" standards seem a bit more stringent nowadays. So more may get flagged nowadays, but, at least for me, the manual rechecks didn't end up revealing any issues.

Were there hundreds of them transferred into "In Review", or about 10% of my/your Afternic portfolio, with lots of 1-words, first/last names, LLLs, place names, etc.?

What's happening here doesn't make any sense to me, other than the old "GoDaddy TM List" is being mass abused by various companies and due to my account difficulties getting listings exported to GoDaddy, I'm first in line.

 

[LoveCatchyDomains]

Were there hundreds of them transferred into "In Review", or about 10% of my/your Afternic portfolio, with lots of 1-words, first/last names, LLLs, place names, etc.?

I think, this last time, approximately 5% of the portfolio was affected with my "older domains." There were no issues with a bunch of the more recently acquired .online domains (from the Dynadot special earlier this year).

Admittedly, my domains sound far less "fancy" compared to yours. Perhaps they are doing more review, but hopefully, like my experience, you'll find that their rechecks provide added reassurance that you are "good to go!"

 

[DomainRecap]

I contacted Afternic and according to the email I just received, they reran their compliance testing and now only 11 domains remain in the "In Review" area, and those are being sent to compliance. None of the 11 is an egregious TM issue, but are words, last names and common terms that companies do use, but certainly don't have a full TM on them. I also think a few are being flagged because they include smaller TMs within - like the word Metabolism being incorrectly flagged for starting with Meta.

But hey, at least it's only 11 now, so that's something.

I'll check tomorrow to see if my pile of now-compliant Afternic domains are active on GoDaddy.

 

[GoDaddy]

Hi @DomainRecap
Domain names listed on Afternic may enter the "In Review" status for various reasons, such as changes to Whois information, trademark compliance checks, status updates, and more. This process helps maintain the integrity of listings on Afternic. For domain names in review, reaching out to Afternic's support team via afternic.com/contact to initiate a review of your listings is the recommended action, which looks like the action you have already taken!

 

[DomainRecap]

Hi @DomainRecap
Domain names listed on Afternic may enter the "In Review" status for various reasons, such as changes to Whois information, trademark compliance checks, status updates, and more.

Thanks for the help and in my case it seems to be TM compliance checks, but on the plus side, my list of "In Review" domains just dropped to 4.

 

[LoveCatchyDomains]

Thanks for the help and in my case it seems to be TM compliance checks, but on the plus side, my list of "In Review" domains just dropped to 4.

Great!

Patience is key.

Now you have the added reassurance that almost all your domains have passed a compliance check. And hopefully the others will do fine, too.