new gtlds Domain Name News That Will Spook You!

[eenmakkie]

Imagine registering a new domain, at he moment you registered the new domain, it was not a premium top level domain. So you pay a fair price for it.
You think it is yours and every year you have to pay the same renewal price.

That is what I did by godaddy.com
I bought a new TLD domain when they came on the market.

started offering it for sale.

Now when the next renewal is coming close, I went to my godaddy.com account and suddenly they wanted 499.99$ to renew the domain for a year. A huge multiple increase compare to the price I paid to register the name.
I called help desk and they told that the domain has become top level domain name as they have seen the value of it.

what?!!!!!

So you buy a domain, spent a lot of money and work on the website, make a business around it, it becomes big on the market, you start to earn millions and suddenly the registrars can ask you what ever they want to renew your domain as they have seen the value of your domain now?

And if you do not pay the extravagant renewal price they ask, it becomes there's? So then they can sell your hard work?

Is this legal?

So what google.com or facebook.com they bought there domains for 1000 years upfront to avoid that the registrar can ask them a couple of billions to renew their domains?

 

[Wannabean]

Yes your right. O.co showed it was 61%. Imagine over half of your customers going to .com and you don't have the .com. Ouch.

Yeah right now but forever? Not sure. Oh and big ouch

 

[candomain]

Probably not forever but making new gtld's as expensive or more expensive than the .com equivalent won't help the new gtld uptake at all.

 

[eenmakkie]

It's called price gouging!
See, registrars will always be the winner and the investors will be shafted. Very sad.
This will keep happening with all these ngtlds.
Bottom line is: just stick with dotcom!

it is scary they can do that. I invested heavy in the new TLDs and have for thousands of dollars renewals each year. If the can increase the renewals at there will or because there robot crawlers have found out that the domain has a higher value as they thought it was "because it is on the market for sale" , an investor in the new TLD's can co bankrupt very fast.

 

[eenmakkie]

Everyone says they have to give you notice of the price hike and that you can renew at current price, but I don't think they will honor the original price!

This is going to be a big problem dealing with greedy registries. What extension was it? We need to get this out in the open right now!

the extension was .villas

but have seen it before also with .blue and .red

I have a print screen of it. The Godaddy representative told me they have the right to do that because I am just renting the domain and if I have not rented it for a long time 'many years" I choose to take that risk.

 

[eenmakkie]

thanks for the links, but the most important for me is to know the law, do they have the right to do that? I invested heavy in the new TLDs, and still need to price them on the market for sale. So if there robot crawlers find out about the price I am asking, and I have not sold them before the next renewal, they could increase the renewal a lot and " take over my domains" if I don't pay there new price.

One domain, is just one domain and can be given up, but knowing the risk is there for all the new TLD domain is just a to big risk to take and invest in those.[/QUOTE]

 

[eenmakkie]

I have never heard any seasoned namePros members report this before and this is @eenmakkie's first post, kind of hard to believe.

Yes it is, I posted it because I am spooked and want to find out the law around this, as I am big invested in the new TLDs.
Anyway, I have a print screen of the price they asked me to renew it.
and Godaddy records the conversations.
Eventually I found a way around it via all my other accounts by other registrars to find one that wanted to renew it for less.
101domain did offered me the old price, so directly I renewed for 2 years. But Godaddy had blocked the domain as I moved it from other account recently, so could not transfer the domain for the next 2 months. Close to expiration. A 2nd phone call with Godaddy after the intend to transfer it and they offered me back the normal price.
I do not want to do this hassle for each domain every year.

The point of all this is: the law, can the registries do that or is it against the law.
I have no problem dropping just one domain, yes it will hurt, but before I invest more, I want to know my rights and what can happen or not. As all my domains investment in the new TLD's over all the accounts is a number with 3 digits. That is a lot of renewal dollars to pay each year at those prices. Most are above the 50$.

Yes I am new to namepros and do not know the rules here. A representative of Donut did wrote me, (I believe it is a personal message" . I do not know if i can quote or not)

Knowing it is not a normal practice of the newTLD registries does not give me comfort. I only need to know if I am protected by the law at the moment I invest in a newTLD domain that the renewal price will not increase more as the rest of the market for that TLD extension.
I know already it will not go down with the rest of the market for the same TLD, and that is still acceptable.

 

[eenmakkie]

This is really nasty power abuse of registrars. That is just crazy.
I specially made an account at this forum to be able to react on this post.

This news should be widely spread around big forums like this. I think if things like this happen, a gltd should be put on a blacklist somewhere here. @eenmakkie (Nederlander zo te lezen) Please fight this in court, as it threatens the business of domainers like you and me.

What gives them the right to do that? Where are these rules stated? Why does .com not have this problems, as I just read ? What about other (new LTD) extensions ? This should not be accepted.

yes I am Dutch. I have no time to fight it in court as they will win if it is in there right. I am stupid enough to invest in newTLD's and not knowing my rights. For sure it should be somewhere in the small print. But that is my question to the registries of the newTLD's. Just please come out with it and tell us our rights and your rights. So we all know upfront what to expect.

Probably my comparison with Google.com and Facebook.com was stupid as those are .com and probably under different rules set up years ago. Anyway, the Godaddy support, told me they have probably bought the renewal years ahead when I asked him what about Google.com and Facebook.com .
He told that also godaddy.com doesn't own the domain and just renting it. Maybe he also did not knew how the laws really are.
For that reason I made this post, so someone could come out and tell us exactly our rights and the rights of the registries. So we are not just playing Russian roulette in this game.

 

[eenmakkie]

The registries will do this for as long as they can. Then they will come out with a different policy so they don't look so bad and continue to lose business. In the mean time they will steal back domains and resell them as much as they can.

All they have to do is raise the renewal costs to the point that we can't justify renewing our domains. We will drop 1000's of domains. Then the registries can reclassify any domain that they get back into the registry as a premium domain. Lower the renewals and restart the whole theft process on the next batch of new domainers.

If you don't think this can, will, or is happening, then you are the perfect target for them.

This process erodes trust in the domain industry.

this is to scary! who wants to invest then in the newTLD's?

 

[eenmakkie]

thanks, it might be possible that every registry has there own rules set up when they brought a new TLD to the market. And it was for us to read those first before investing.
More like the wild west in the past. I remember even the comparison they made as explaining how to be the one that could register a domain with a new TLD extension.
Probably the rules are also of the Wild West.

I don't want to shoot to much in my own foot here, as if it are there rights to do that, they could increase the renewals of all my domains in the TLD market by 10 fold, and take over all my domains. Just because I brought something out that should NOT have been know by the general public.

If it was an error and the helpdesk guy just made things up or did not knew what he was telling me, ok fine, please come out, post the law and our rights and a link to that law here please so we all can go on with our domain investments and sleep well when the next renewal is coming up. (in my case, it will be many sleepless nights as I have a lot of newTLD domains renewing each year)

I want security regarding my investment in the newTLD's, not starting a fight, we will always lose, even with class action law suits where the lawyers are the winners.

(as mentioned, I have a print screen of the high renewal price asked me and the conversation is recorded by Godaddy, I am not making thinks up just to loose my time, as my time is to precious)

 

[eenmakkie]

Donut wrote me back on this forum. Not sure if it is private or public. Just look on my profile, maybe you find the conversation. As I am new, I still have not figured fully out how this forum works.

I never receive a notification, just see the new price of the renewal. Many have gone up but probably for all domains of that extension. And no problem, a 20-30$ increase is still payable, even if the amount of domains is high.

just a 10 fold increase is to go out of business in a year

 

[lifegoals]

This is really scary , because I have domains in the same tld

 

[eenmakkie]

Isn't there a clause that they have to give you 6 months to renew it at the current price, and you can do so for upto 10 years. You should report it to ICANN, Who is the company, what is the domain, you need to provide all details to get any traction.

can you explain more please that clause? and a link if you have that, thanks.
Do you mean 6 months after your first registering the newTLD domain?
Or 6 months after the price increase.
I heard from the 2nd Godaddy support that more of my domains have become premium or top level. But at the moment I still can renew those at normal levels. They where not top level when I registered them.

Some I even bought at the auction as more people tried to register those same domains. What increased my initial investment a lot.

Maybe it happened because I have the same 8 letter domain name with a .com and have it on the market for 3000€, some robot crawler would have detected that and for that reason increased the renewal price by 10 fold for the same name with the .villas extension. (just a thinking, because manually those things won't happen)

 

[eenmakkie]

of one of the links posted above:

George Kirikos says

September 23, 2015 at 12:02 pm

Actually, that’s not quite correct. The new gTLDs registries have to give *ICANN* and the *registrar* the notice. Whether the registrar passes on the bad news to the clients would be something determined by the RAA — and I don’t think the RAA contemplated that scenario.

BTW, Mike, for “Premium” names, section 2.10(c) of the horse ICANN agreement says:

“In addition, Registry Operator must have uniform pricing for renewals of domain name registrations (“Renewal Pricing”). For the purposes of determining Renewal Pricing, the price for each domain registration renewal must be identical to the price of all other domain name registration renewals in place at the time of such renewal, and such price must take into account universal application of any refunds, rebates, discounts, product tying or other programs in place at the time of renewal. The foregoing requirements of this Section 2.10(c) shall not apply for (i) purposes of determining Renewal Pricing if the registrar has provided Registry Operator with documentation that demonstrates that the applicable registrant expressly agreed in its registration agreement with registrar to higher Renewal Pricing at the time of the initial registration of the domain name following clear and conspicuous disclosure of such Renewal Pricing to such registrant, and (ii) discounted Renewal Pricing pursuant to a Qualified Marketing Program (as defined below). ”

 

[eenmakkie]

other post on that very interesting link to article by thedomains by Mike

"
janedoe says
September 24, 2015 at 10:54 am

Actually, from a legal standpoint (depending on jurisdiction, specifically as relating to consumer protection laws)

If you sell a product or service at an incorrect price, in this case with a renewal fee stated below that intended, you are obligated to honour that renewal fee as it constituted a part of the decision process to buy.

Now a vendor may have the opportunity to remove a product/service prior to the exchange of money, but once money has changed hands, options may be far more limited as a contract has been entered into.

Of course this is where you would point to your Terms and Conditions as a “get out of jail free card”

Except, depending on a countries consumer protection laws, Terms and Conditions that aim to remove the rights of the consumer may be deemed invalid and unenforceable.

Further to this, by offering your product/service into a country, you may be held liable by that countries consumer protection laws irrespective of where you are located (Steam for instance is required by Australian law to provide local customer service support and warranties for software sold to Australian customers even though such warranties are not offered to their local customer base, with a requirement that such warranties meet the minimum requirements under Australian law"

 

[eenmakkie]

All new gTLD registries have the basic same contract with ICANN

New gTLD registries, including Donuts can raise renewal prices, but they have to give a registrant a 6 month notice and give them the opportunity to renew the domain at the current rate for the remainder of the 10 year term

thanks for your great link you shared wwwweb, I have learned a lot of it and will check my renewals for all my M+M domains I have.

I would like someone of Godaddy to join this and explain if they passes the bad news to there customers if the registries have raised the renewal prices or we just will see it when renewal comes up?

 

[davidthornton]

If a registry decides to adjust the prices of a gtld I am not currently of the belief that they are permitted to selectively or variably do it to already registered domain names. Adjustments in price to already registered domain names should be at the same percentage across all registered domain names. Thus if a $20 domain name renewal increased by 2%, a $3000 AA rated premium domain name renewal should also increase by 2%. Unregistered domain names are different and their premium status can be amended by the registry without notice.

If @eenmakkie does this thread a considered favour and informs us of the domain name at issue some of us with connections to registrars could have the domain name checked against the original list of premiums to see what it cost and also whether the price has actually changed.

 

[SiteMachine]

Lol this thread is hilarious, you have your standard anti-ngtld fanboys spouting the same nonsense that has been proven time and time again to be untrue, then you have them calling out reps from the registries and AGAIN being told it isn't true namepros.com/threads/call-out-to-all-registry-and-registrar-representatives-where-are-you-on-this-forum.932250/ thanks fearmongerbrindle

And then it all just goes back to the same fear tactics as if this whole conspiracy wasn't just shot down by anyone with the authority to speak on it.

Better than Saturday morning cartoons, i LOLed. Thanks.

 

[brindle123]

You can put a screenshot of the price on the forum. You can say the domain on the forum, unless you want to keep that between you and the registry/registrar.

Notices of price increases don't make it to me like they should. I've seen price hikes go up on renewals without any notice at all. I can't go in and renew them at the old price either. If I place the domain into my cart it has the new renewal price not the old price!

This seems to be a "SCAM" that is placed on domainers. We get taken advantage of and many don't do anything about it. Send your complains to ICANN so they can do something about it. Make your voices heard. Sign up for the ICANN volunteer program. Send an email to the registry and registrar. Call them out on the forum when you are wronged. Don't renew stuff that you've been screwed on.

Stick to .com if this continues. Let the new gtlds go down in flames if they want to take advantage of us.

 

[SiteMachine]

You can put a screenshot of the price on the forum. You can say the domain on the forum, unless you want to keep that between you and the registry/registrar.

Notices of price increases don't make it to me like they should. I've seen price hikes go up on renewals without any notice at all. I can't go in and renew them at the old price either. If I place the domain into my cart it has the new renewal price not the old price!

This seems to be a "SCAM" that is placed on domainers. We get taken advantage of and many don't do anything about it. Send your complains to ICANN so they can do something about it. Make your voices heard. Sign up for the ICANN volunteer program. Send an email to the registry and registrar. Call them out on the forum when you are wronged. Don't renew stuff that you've been screwed on.

Stick to .com if this continues. Let the new gtlds go down in flames if they want to take advantage of us.

Jesus the reps came in and shot you down in BOTH threads and you still spout the nonsense ROFL

fearmongerbrindle

 

[brindle123]

Lol this thread is hilarious, you have your standard anti-ngtld fanboys spouting the same nonsense that has been proven time and time again to be untrue, then you have them calling out reps from the registries and AGAIN being told it isn't true namepros.com/threads/call-out-to-all-registry-and-registrar-representatives-where-are-you-on-this-forum.932250/ thanks fearmongerbrindle

And then it all just goes back to the same fear tactics as if this whole conspiracy wasn't just shot down by anyone with the authority to speak on it.

Better than Saturday morning cartoons, i LOLed. Thanks.

You're part of the problem. Everything is ok, no one is getting screwed, stick your head in the sand and don't worry about anything that is going on. The registry doesn't have our best interest in mind.

Look at what happened to Michael Berkens with 25 of his domains! That isn't just fear mongering, that's just plain FACTS.

ICANN let's us get shit on. What did they do for Michael? They didn't have his back and they don't have yours.

Continue with the cartoons.

 

[brindle123]

Jesus the reps came in and shot you down in BOTH threads and you still spout the nonsense ROFL

fearmongerbrindle

quote that post that they "SHOT it down"
They offered help with it, but didn't prove that it didn't happen.

 

[SiteMachine]

quote that post that they "SHOT it down"
They offered help with it, but didn't prove that it didn't happen.

Sure thing buddy

We’re posting to this thread in order to provide information about Rightside’s domain pricing.

We have never moved a registered standard domain to a premium price tier or raised the price of a registered premium domain. This type of activity is not part of our business model and therefore we have no plans to do so now or in the future.

I'm the one with my head in the sand? You can't even remember where you called out the registries. You're all over the place friend.

 

[SiteMachine]

If I place the domain into my cart it has the new renewal price not the old price!

How scientific! Any reasonable person who did that would of course assume the world is ending and all gTLD domains are going up in price by several orders of magnitude!!! I mean, I would just check another registry and see if I could transfer out at the normal price but hey I'm not a reasonable person, just one who is capable of thinking before jumping to conclusions.

Oh Michael Berkins.. please post the list of the 25 domains that he was price gouged on and also the original price and the price it was raised to so we can follow up with the registries who you were kind enough to get engaged with us on these forums.

Everything you post is anecdotal, 3rd party i heard this from this person, then literally rightside comes in (they run the backend for .villas!!!) and says it never has and never will happen and you straight up ignore it and continue on, and then say MY head is in the sand. LOL

 

[brindle123]

They didn't say they can't they just said it's not part of their business model.
Show me where it says they "can't" change it, and I'll concede.

 

[eenmakkie]

I deal in the Aftermarket so I would have to ask the team that does gtld registrations about the domain. I would say that I have not heard of anything like this happening yet, although I have read the same blogs by Berkens and others warning about the possibility, I have yet to see any tld do so. That being said, if you can send me the domain name I can certainly have someone on our side look into it for you and then get back to you and let you know what I find out.

Thanks Joe Styler,

I understand Godaddy records conversations with support. Ones I was spooked by the 499,99$ renewal price for the domain, I directly called support on March 21n 2016 ,

the support person explained me all what is written here, the registries can do want they want as they own the domains: if I want to renew I pay the 499.99$ +0.18$ICANN and that it. He did checked all the info first, my domain was a premium now. He also found the Godaddy invoice when I bought the domain. He explained it is not Godaddy but the registry that ask the renewal price.
I took a print screen of it.

I was literally spooked as I own many newTLD's, on different account by registrars. To not waste time, I tried all my other accounts by other registrars to see what they where offering me. And hoping one would not had adapted the rates from the premium domain. And I was lucky with 101domain , so directly bought 2 years renewals for the domain. Thanks 101domain (sorry I am transferring so many domains away, but that discount club % just made Godaddy cheaper for me)
done!? , no not done...

I could not transfer the domain, it was blocked, so called Godaddy support again and spoke to a new person. He went in to it and told me Godaddy could "now" offer me the same renewal price as 101domain. (even cheaper with the 40% off) Or wait till the 2 months are passed and risking ... I directly took the offer before having to pay the 499.99$ again.
He also looked at my account and some more of my domains where premium now. (not the ones I bought as premium and even bought at the auction, no just normal domains )

Over the last 2 years, I am transferring a lot of my domains to Godaddy because I have bought that discount club and with the 40% off, the renewal prices are cheaper then elsewhere. Just this last renewal price makes me think twice about whole this investment in the new TLD domains. And raising my vlauations for the .com's

I wanted to know if what the first support guy told is true and made an account here and post what happened to me. Hoping someone would post a link to the law or the rules. And they did. The link to the blogs by Berkens explains a lot. That eventually it can happen and registries have the right to do it. Scarry! My investment is now at risk.

My question to you Joe Styler of Godaddy is: If a registry increases the renewal rates of a domain, and passes that info to Godaddy as registrar, does Godaddy informs the registrant about the upcoming renewal price increase ? So at least we can take the right of the renewing at the old price before the 6 months expire?


It seems everybody is asking for the name of my domain that had a renewal offer price of 499.99$

1: I first like to know the answer of Donut, will they not increase the renewal price of there newTLDs except if the whole extension is increased. I mean not an increase case by case?

2: I still want to sell the domain, so publishing the name as a link so it can be crawled by Google is not a good idea. But I can post the print screen if that is legal to do. Godaddy just have to let me know if they want to.