Extremely Interesting Dilemma - Attorneys LOOK

[merlix]

I have a domain that I won from a Pool.com auction back in November of 2003. For the past several months, I have been getting requests to transfer the name out from Domain Registry of America. I finally got them to stop and now NameJuice.com is trying to transfer them out. I figured someone was trying to hijack the name. I found out that it is a lady who was the previous owner who is trying to transfer it out. I did a history lookup on Whois.sc to find the previous owner and she owned it from September of 1999 through September of 2003 and then of course I captured it in November two months after it expired.

I contacted her today and she was in tears thinking she still owned the name. She said she was trying to transfer it away from Network Solutions back in 2003 to another company and apparently, it didn't go through. She forwarded me her email from the company that she was transferring to which interestingly enough is Domain Registry of America. The email is from July of 2003 which would have been plenty of time to make the transfer happen. She sent DROA a check for $85 for a 5 year renewal and their email is confirming that they received it.

I realize that I don't have anything to worry about as I obtained the name in a perfectly legal fashion. However, I feel sorry for her because the name is pretty good. It sounds like she would have a pretty good case against DROA. What does everyone here think?

I actually had to outbid several people to obtain the name. The domain has value to me, but for the right price, I would sell my wife (oops! Did I say that?)

If there is an attorney that thinks she has a good case against DROA?

Maybe Mr. Berryhill might be interested in this.

I can PM an attorney the domain name and I can send her your information for her to contact you.

 

[jberryhill]

Boiling this down to its essence, she's out $85.

Lots of people put in domain transfer requests and then either don't confirm them, spam filter them out, don't unlock them, or have a stale admin contact address. Surely she could look at the whois and determine that the name was at Network Solutions. Network Solutions will, and believe me they will, show that the name wasn't transferred out because it was (a) already expired, (b) locked, or (c) the transfer wasn't confirmed by the admin contact.

DROA, at best, owes her $85. At 30% contingency, and a couple million cases like this one, an attorney could retire.

 

[Dave_Z]

I wonder if the lady did think long and hard enough about transferring to DROA
in the first place when that happened. It's supposedly a no-brainer, but it's
unfortunate that some people still don't really "get" it.

But as jberryhill pointed out, she's out $85.

A painful thing to learn, more so letting the domain expire...

At 30% contingency, and a couple million cases like this one, an attorney could retire.

Would you be interested if there's someone or a group willing to? :D

 

[gramma]

I would have felt obligated to let her have the domain for whatever I paid for it. Especially if she cried.
That's why I'll never be a millionaire

 

[Gene]

Perhaps allow her to lease the name from you for a modest amount, while you retain ownership? Just a thought. Personally, (and I know this goes against good business sense) I would let her buy it back from me for whatever I paid plus my time in acquiring it. That is... if her sob story is true...

 

[Lyte]

I'm getting more and more letters from DROA these days. I always toss them out and wonder from whom these buggers are getting my name and addy!

 

[americancivilwar]

Lyte, they are getting your address from whois searches (unless your whois is private).

 

[wchan]

Can she verify her story? I recommend selling the site back to her anyway, but at a price you think you deserve.

 

[Lyte]

Lyte, they are getting your address from whois searches (unless your whois is private).

I looked at the three I got yesterday and they are all for .INFO domains which I picked up (free) at www.mydomain.com. So, beware that MyDomain.com is somehow connected to this DROA ompany!