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debate Is a mock website a waste of time for a domainer?

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I stumbled across this site: www.pink.com (not mine)

At first it looks like a developed website but upon further inspection it's nothing more than a website full of ads trying to look like a developed website.

Rick Schwartz had blogged about this and called it a complete waste of time. He said that unless your website generates an income a domain investor should not be implementing that type of scenario.

As much as I will agree with Rick I would probably add that if the site has an actual use it's still ok for a domain investor to publish a site. Personally unless you generate an income of some sorts I don't know why one would want to spend the time doing it but I guess there may be some legitimate reasons.

Basically though when I looked at pink.com it smells of futility to me. It looks like someone is trying hard to make it look like a developed website but I don't think the author is fooling anyone.

Question is.... Is the domain name worth more as a mock website?

Rick Schwartz says no, I tend to agree.

What's your opinion?
 
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The views expressed on this page by users and staff are their own, not those of NamePros.
I also understand the domainer will be generating some income from the links but that's probably adding up to pennies.
 
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if its pink.com who cares, wow, what a domain name. Incredible treasure.
 
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It does matter. Define income generating. Links? Ads? Selling the dream? A mock website is a good way to demo how your domain could be used if not immediately obvious.

Surelt the biggest income generation is from selling the domain? 😉
 
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I don't think it's there to increase the value, but to block certain legal claimants, namely Victorias Secret/Pink -- trying to demonstrate a legitimate use of the word.
 
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Well, actually not to demonstrate a use, but to establish that use for themselves, to carve it out. It's uncomfortably close to VS, though.
 
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I agree with @ultradog that the main purpose is to show a legitmate use of the domain to protect it against legal or UDRP challenge on the name by trying to show legitimate use. I don't have the legal background to comment on whether it works or helps but if so every penny of development is worth it to protect a name that is as valuable as pink. DNW recently mentioned that over $400k was spent on the legal defence to secure a 3L domain!
Bob
 
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I just checked, and the site is inside the Alexa 1M (barely) - not bad for a site with minimal focussed purpose (BTW it seems to me their stated purpose in about is somewhat incongruent with a number of the linked articles).

Since it has no This Domain May Be For Sale notice I presume the site is not mainly for promotion of the domain name, but rather to help in protection as noted previously.

The .net and .org are for sale, but the .com is not, at least as far as Dofo note. The name pink is registered in 235 extensions, for sale in 70, not surprisingly. It is clearly a 7 figure name, probably, right?

I know the main point was not the domain but idea of a 'dummy' site. It would be interesting to see links of some other such sites that are associated with high value domain names. I remember stumbling on one some time ago where it pretended to be a family photo album, but clearly someone was just showing use as it was very half-hearted. Unfortunately, can't remember the name.

Thanks for drawing the site and discussion re it to our attention, @MapleDots !

Bob
 
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I wouldn't say Pink.com is a mock website. It's a mainly hands off revenue generator. They likely get a lot of traffic, so it was definitely worth minimal investment in a few articles, but after initial set-up, from what I understand, there's software you can use to scrape content and a lot of the "lists" are just ads.

While the effort to maintain a bit of unique content is minimal, it looks like it might just be enough to keep Google happy .. or at least not angry .. lol

Does Victoria Secret have a line called "Pink"? Seems like that would be a really hard word to actually trademark alone as a single word for clothing. Just because they use it does not mean it's a trademark or that it's trademarkable. You generally can't trademark a term already in heavy use within an industry. Not sure if "Pink" alone would fall in that category within clothing/lingerie? (@jberryhill ?)

I'm pretty sure it's much like Geos. You can't really enforce some geo trademarks within that specific Geo if the combined term makes a generic/common-use local reference like say "Montreal Towing". You could certainly have a trademark for "Montreal Towing" anywhere else except Montreal .. like a "Montreal Towing" in New York for example. Or a "New York Towing" in Montreal. But you likely won't get away with being able to trademark "Montreal Towing" in Montreal, nor "New York Towing" in New York.

It's not so much about the "Geo", but since trademarks can often be Geo specific and often are specific to certain territories, the names of those regions can combine to make a term that is too generic/common-use at a regional level to be trademarked. Similarly, whether Pink+Lingerie or even Pink+Clothing, or effectively Pink on it's own within the TM class(es) that apply to clothing, would be considered allowable as a TM or not one of those fun "shades of grey" cases where a decision could go either way depending on how the judge or UDRP panellist views the specific term and/or TM class.

Similarly again .. generic / common usage is why if you were selling fruit, you could never trademark "Red Apple" or "Green Apple", because they are common properties and terms within the industry .. but you most certainly could trademark "Blue Apple" because the word "Blue" isn't commonly associated with Apples, and as such "Blue Apple" is not a generic industry term.

I'm very curious to see how right/wrong I am in my above assumptions .. lol .. we are so lucky to have someone like @jberryhill around to tell us when we're wrong! lol :)
 
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By the way I agree that it is not a MOCK website - I would define that as one that made fun of another, and don't see this as that.

In case interested, @EJS had a blog post on what color is the most valuable domain name. Interesting to read what people think in the comments. I am surprised how many of the basic colors are for sale and not in end hands. I think he has written on this more than once so there may be other posts on the topic. He has a nice personal profile of color names, as I recall.

The Whois has been under privacy protection for a long time for pink.

While the Google results for Pink have VS in first few places, the singer Pink, various unrelated clothing companies, some other products, the pink initiative for breast cancer support and awareness and various others all have listing in first 10 pages.

Bob
 
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By the way I agree that it is not a MOCK website - I would define that as one that made fun of another, and don't see this as that.

Pretty sure he didn't mean "Mock" as in "Mocking someone", but as "Mock-up" .. although I don't think Pink.com fits either definition .. lol:

mock-up (from Oxford)
/ˈmäk ˌəp/
noun
noun: mockup

  1. a model or replica of a machine or structure, used for instructional or experimental purposes.
    • an arrangement of text and pictures to be printed.
      "a mock-up of the following day's front page"
 
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Pink.com reminds me of those “mini-sites” that was quite popular a few years ago. I believe Google came out with an update and squished those real quick. I recall having a few of those mini-sites myself.

I’m kind of curious as to how much he/she makes from those ads. I think it’s risky with those ads. Pink is indeed very common with a famous lingerie place so having ads only adds to the risk of losing a UDRP.

If I owned pinked.com, I would just put a UDRP friendly for sale lander on there.
 
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Hi

Simon says.... sit down!

Simon says....stand up!

now clap your hands.

:)

imo...
 
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I often wonder how many domains I develop are taken off the market as people assume site is in use and not for sale. It might be okay to dabble in both but it is parked domains that actually sell.
 
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I don't think it's there to increase the value, but to block certain legal claimants, namely Victorias Secret/Pink -- trying to demonstrate a legitimate use of the word.

Exactly what I thought, Victoria's Secret and the artist Pink, avoid any potential for someone saying they don't have legitimate rights.
 
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I agree with @ultradog that the main purpose is to show a legitmate use of the domain to protect it against legal or UDRP challenge on the name by trying to show legitimate use. I don't have the legal background to comment on whether it works or helps but if so every penny of development is worth it to protect a name that is as valuable as pink. DNW recently mentioned that over $400k was spent on the legal defence to secure a 3L domain!
If just want to protect name, shouldn't it be safer to make a personal blog?
 
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If just want to protect name, shouldn't it be safer to make a personal blog?
It is an excellent point. I would think so.

When UDRP panels look at whether you use a domain name to offer products or services do they consider a blog as a service? I presume so if it is a genuine blog and not just pretending to be one with some minimal content.
Thanks,
Bob
 
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It is an excellent point. I would think so.

When UDRP panels look at whether you use a domain name to offer products or services do they consider a blog as a service?
OMG,If one day encountered a robber, we want to protect property too hard:(
 
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It is an excellent point. I would think so.

When UDRP panels look at whether you use a domain name to offer products or services do they consider a blog as a service? I presume so if it is a genuine blog and not just pretending to be one with some minimal content.
Thanks,
Bob

I think there have been cases that went both ways Bob. The other factors matter like did the "blogger" email someone asking $100,000?
 
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