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Bidding on your own names at NameJet...?

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Once in awhile I see people bidding on their own domains at NJ. I would think it would be frowned upon.

Today's seems more obvious than normal. Or am I missing something here?

Airlinejobs.com owned by Andy Booth at Booth.com and high bidder is BQDNcom (James Booth).

3 bids down we see Boothcom as a bidder.

Same thing with MovieZone.com. Owned by Andy Booth in which he currently appears to be the high bidder.

High Bid: $2,475 USD by boothcom

They actually won their own domain airplanesforsale.com. Im guessing it didnt get as high as they wanted so needed to protect it.

Bidder Amount Date
bqdncom $2,001 7/17/2017 12:23 PM
boothcom $1,950 7/17/2017 12:23 PM
 
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The views expressed on this page by users and staff are their own, not those of NamePros.
Guess they should have done that a while back - and none of us would be the wiser about what has been going on...

Well, at least now they can continue forward like nothing ever happened. No evidence, no proof. Nothing to see here. :bag:
 
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Wow... It appears NJ has erased all auction history on their website?!

What would be a legitimate reason for this?

I believe that is the opposite of transparent - right?
That would be very demeaning to the term
Transparency, a class action suit requires $5M in damages to move forward. I'm not sure how many were bid up, or Schilled or what not, but they are protecting themselves from something, right Jonathan?

I'll answer for you since Ms.Lee has your tongue!

Right!
 
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Strange, why didn't they hide auctions history on July 18th (the date this thread was started)?
 
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Strange, why didn't they hide auctions history on July 18th (the date this thread was started)?

Actually they have from the best of my knowledge. Here is the first link I see on this thread which is from July 18th, and the information is hidden.

...
And there are other auctions with the same kind of bidding. When you click the More Domains link -
http://www.namejet.com/Pages/Auctions/StandardDetails.aspx?auctionid=3955604

Need to hear from somebody at Namejet and the bidders to get their side.
 
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NJ_datagone.jpg
 
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Strange, why didn't they hide auctions history on July 18th (the date this thread was started)?
I may have misunderstood your question the first read, and I apologize.

I took it as you meant that they did not delete history back to July 18th.

I think maybe you meant why didn't they hide it in the first place?

None-the-less... My main point was that it appears NJ has hidden the history of all auctions that ended over 7 days ago, and they just did this very recently.

My apologies if I got off track by misunderstanding your post.
 
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No problems Michael, indeed I meant that it is illogical for NJ to wait 4 months to change a single line in their server scripts.

My best guess that it is either:

- Investigations posted here and in related media options thread became so deep that they elected to hide all the evidence as a part of "harm control"

OR

- They noticed increased number of requests in their server logs, so somebody might be grabbing all
the history DB for some unknown purposes
 
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Wow... It appears NJ has erased all auction history on their website?!

What would be a legitimate reason for this?

I believe that is the opposite of transparent - right?
As far as I can tell they made a change so that public auction history disappears once it is more than a week past close, even if you had a back order in the auction. Private auction history was unaffected, but you need to have been in the auction to see it.

Unless it was a glitch that will be corrected, there is no legitimate reason to do this, and they are moving towards less transparency in response to calls for more transparency.
 
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Maybe we need a thread merge now, but here is a post from Elliot Silver with an explanation:

https://domaininvesting.com/namejet-addresses-missing-public-auction-history/

Thank you for providing that information.

Here is a direct link to their press release for anyone who is interested: http://www.namejet.com/Pages/press-releases/default.aspx

I agree another post devoted to this press release/decision may be warranted, but I believe the move away from transparency also needs to remain in this thread as it is relevant to the topic at hand.
 
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It would be an extremely regressive move on their part. Anyone know when exactly did the history disappear?

I'm going to apply Hanlon's razor and attribute this to a bug or a misconfiguration. If this persists for a longer time, then I guess it was a deliberate change.

Edit: Just read the blog post linked to by @Beezy and @Michael M . I Stand corrected. It is intentional but not out of malice instead more to do with GPDR (at least on the face of it). This sucks but it is what it is
 
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NameJet said:
Due to upcoming privacy regulations such as the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), and in an effort to better safeguard our customers’ information, we are making certain changes to our processes and platform. Therefore, as of now, we plan to only make auction history for public auctions available to non-participants for a period of 7 days following an auction.
This is an excuse to be less transparent and hoodwinks their customers.

GDPR only applies to auctions of their customers within the European Union (EU), but they are applying it to all of their customers, because they want to hide as much information as possible, including hiding of data they don't have to hide according to GDPR.

Tragic for NameJet to needlessly become less transparent, while their customers are demanding more transparency. Anywise, I fathom that it's a Herculean task to win against shill bidders, and I don't covet their burden, but trying to hide shill bidding is not the answer.

Godspeed, NameJet. :blackeye:
 
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None-the-less... My main point was that it appears NJ has hidden the history of all auctions that ended over 7 days ago, and they just did this very recently.

Recently = yesterday afternoon sometime between and the evening when they were observed and duly noted as lurking. I know first hand attempted to look something up yesterday after the comments of this thread being observed by people named in the comments above.
 
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Recently = yesterday afternoon, sometime after the comments of this thread being observed by people named in the comments above.

? Can you explain this.
 
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From elliots blog

I reached out to NameJet GM Jonathan Tenenbaum to see what was happening, and he followed up shortly thereafter.

He responds quite promptly to Elliot but cant come here and explain things.
 
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The Federal Trade Commission works for the consumer to prevent fraudulent, deceptive, and unfair business practices in the marketplace and to provide informa- tion to help consumers spot, stop, and avoid them. To file a complaint or to get free information on consumer issues, visit www.ftc.gov or call toll-free, 1-877- FTC-HELP (1-877-382-4357); TTY: 1-866-653-4261. The FTC enters Internet, telemarketing, identity theft, and other fraud-related complaints into Consumer Sentinel, a secure, online database available to hundreds of civil and criminal law enforcement agencies in the U.S. and abroad.

https://publications.usa.gov/epublications/internet-auction/auctions.pdf
 
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This is an excuse to be less transparent and hoodwinks their customers.

GDPR only applies to auctions of their customers within the European Union (EU), but they are applying it to all of their customers, because they want to hide as much information as possible, including hiding of data they don't have to hide according to GDPR.

Tragic for NameJet to needlessly become less transparent, while their customers are demanding more transparency. Anywise, I fathom that it's a Herculean task to win against shill bidders, and I don't covet their burden, but trying to hide shill bidding is not the answer.

Godspeed, NameJet. :blackeye:
Agreed. I also realized that this is a BS reason as Namejet does not display or disclose any personal information of the users. Since users are free to use an anonymous nickname which is not tied to any publicly accessible personal information, GPDR should not apply. I'm also now calling BS on this reason
 
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https://www.justice.gov/atr/price-fixing-bid-rigging-and-market-allocation-schemes

American consumers have the right to expect the benefits of free and open competition — the best goods and services at the lowest prices. Public and private organizations often rely on a competitive bidding process to achieve that end. The competitive process only works, however, when competitors set prices honestly and independently. When competitors collude, prices are inflated and the customer is cheated. Price fixing, bid rigging, and other forms of collusion are illegal and are subject to criminal prosecution by the Antitrust Division of the United States Department of Justice.

Step 2: Submit the Concern to the Citizen Complaint Center
You may submit your concern by e-mail, regular mail, or phone.

E-mail [email protected](link sends e-mail)
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or 202-307-2040

Confidentiality is a common concern among those who bring potential violations to our attention. We are experienced in handling this important concern and will use the information you provide only for legitimate law enforcement purposes. We protect the identity of complainants and the information they provide to the full extent of the law. If you have specific concerns regarding confidentiality, please discuss them with us.

the Supreme Court was concerned with the government's attempts to lengthen indefinitely the duration of a conspiracy by simply showing that the conspirators took steps to cover their tracks in order to avoid detection and punishment after the central criminal purpose had been accomplished. The Court stressed that a "distinction must be made between acts of concealment done in furtherance of the main criminal objectives of the conspiracy, and acts of concealment done after these central objectives have been obtained, for the purpose only of covering up after the crime."
 
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