It's a bullshit story.
First, this is not an article in Forbes magazine. It’s a blog post on the Forbes site. Big difference.
But it is such a transparently stupid paid-for puff piece, that I really question the intelligence of those behind it.
Take a look at this crap written for gullible people:
“In the case of The Pontefract Group, I went straight to searching for a .com version. Thankfully it wasn’t taken—nor was anyone squatting on it—so I was able to capture it. But it sure would have been nice to have launched it with .inc at the end of it. My new business, after all, was incorporated.”
Uh-huh, sure. His news business was “incorporated” in 2018 as “The Pontefract Group”. So, did he register ThePontefractGroup.com at that time? Nope.
He registered PontefractGroup.com in 2016, two years before he was incorporated, and he simply uses it as a forward to his personal name domain at danpontefract.com.
And to cap it off, he goes on about how “.inc” shows one is “incorporated” and then he says he is moving to “leadership.inc” which is not the name of his corporation either.
But "leadership.inc" is registered to the registry, not him, so this is clearly a promotional advertisement masquerading as a blog post.
That sort of thing is illegal under FTC influencer/sponsor rules.
Dan Pontefract is a liar, and the .inc registry is clearly engaged in unethical and dishonest non-disclosure of consideration provided for promotion by him.