GoDaddy VP Caught Bidding Against Customers

[Rob J]

From Slashdot: http://tech.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/06/29/0625249

"A GoDaddy Vice President has been caught bidding against customers in their own domain name auctions. The employee Adam Dicker isn't just any GoDaddy employee; he's head of the GoDaddy subsidiary that controls the auctions. Dicker won some of the domains he bid for, and pushed up the bid price on auctions he didn't win. The conflict of interest is unethical, but could this practice also be illegal? Said a representative for a competitor, 'Even if controlled, that practice has bad news written all over it.' This comes hot on the heels of news that despite earlier promises to ICANN to end their 60-Day ban on transfers, GoDaddy quietly circumvented it by forcing customers to agree to the ban anyway. ICANN doesn't appear to be investigating or asking follow-up questions about this. What can be done to force ICANN to police the registrars for which it is responsible?"

 

[dax44]

Personally i think the whole .com drop/auction/registrar warehousing business is disgraceful - registrars should be impartial and non-competing - like Nominet (.uk).

One reason that ccTLDs are probably destined for success in all countries - their control and administration is out of ICANN's hands ...

 

[Mark]

I'm not sure how I feel about a Employee competing against other domainers in this manner , But in all honesty ... It was done "Openly and Notoriously". Nothing was hidden , which is more than we can say about other things going on. Do you think for one second this isn't happening all over ? Under family members names or corporate entities ? I'm not defending this happening , And I do feel there could be a huge conflict of interest here ... But at least it wasn't hidden from us for once.

 

[onlinedomains00]

How can you come from a technology background, and be a Vice President of a Internet giant like GoDaddy, and not have any know how of how the technical aspects of your platform or your company...who knows maybe a lower down is accessing the info with their user ids, and feeding the info to the higher ups,,,, so many scenarios... that is why companies restrict this activity. Insiders are insiders for a reason, this is not a for charity business, if he is bidding on domains while he is on the clock for godaddy, which he probably is due to auction closing hours, are they not paying him to bid?

 

[deleted984054565403]

I'm glad GoDaddy is all over this one.

From Domain Name Wire:

Go Daddy has reviewed the auction and found nothing improper.

Adam Dicker’s knowledge on the auction was no different from what any customer coming to our TDNAM site would have had.

To ensure customer confidence and to avoid any possible future questions of impropriety all GD employees are now and in the future prohibited from participating in TDNAM auctions, purchasing, sales & back orders.

 

[DotUSDomains]

Just had a pm from someone claiming to be from wired.com asking about this.

Dont know if they are legit or not.

Be carefull what you say if they pm you.

 

[klm390]

I'm glad GoDaddy is all over this one.

From Domain Name Wire:
Go Daddy has reviewed the auction and found nothing improper.

Adam Dicker’s knowledge on the auction was no different from what any customer coming to our TDNAM site would have had.

To ensure customer confidence and to avoid any possible future questions of impropriety all GD employees are now and in the future prohibited from participating in TDNAM auctions, purchasing, sales & back orders.

Perfect. Should have been in place long ago.

 

[onlinedomains00]

Would godaddy have admitted to any wrong doing if they had discovered it, most likely not, as it would probably lead to a class action suit..It is very interesting to see that godaddy employees are no longer able to purchase domains from tdnam, a policy which can probably be easily evaded through family members, but good to know it is in place.

 

[fonzie_007]

I'm glad GoDaddy is all over this one.

From Domain Name Wire:

Has anyone been able to verify this is in fact correct? If so, smart move by GD.

 

[bmugford]

If this is true, it is a good move by GoDaddy.com, because this event did not look good for them, even if nothing fishy was going on.

GoDaddy Bans Employees from Bidding on TDNAM

 

[DomainNameWire]

Has anyone been able to verify this is in fact correct? If so, smart move by GD.

Well, I can verify it

I had direct contact with GoDaddy regarding the statement.

 

[onlinedomains00]

Is full disclosure in order? What names were bid on, and to what price>?

 

[ulasbbtr]

I don't know whether it's some sort of paranoia or some random event. Here is my experience with Godaddy auctions so far. Let's say a domain is listed for 100$ and already has no bids
* If I bid just the exact amount (100$), I mostly buy it at 100$
* If I place a more secure bid such as 200$, most of the times someone bids against me and make it more than 100$ for me, but don't win just increase my paid amount.

I don't know it's just a coincidence, but since bidders like ghosts (no info, no history, just bid count) in Godaddy auctions, everything seems possible to me.

 

[VegasCoupons]

Don't forget also that when Godaddy has a really high starting bid or even a higher starting bid than $10 and nobody bids on it. It doesn't go to FireSale or cannot be backordered via Godaddy. Guess it where it goes.....

The Godaddy Warehouse =)

 

[Meongtae]

had bob parsons addressed this yet? he likes to blog, radio and all that..

 

[VisionEdger]

This simply emphasizes what the domain industry is about in these wild west domain rush days - GREED!!!!!!

And yes it's in all other industries as well NOT just domaining for those of you about to defend domaining.

 

[Charley]

This is the same Adam Dicker (-=DCG=-) that owns that other domain forum.

I vote YES, immediate dismisal.

If true, it's definitely bad business IMO and he should be asked to step down, no questions asked.

 

[ahtum]

Godaddy = Unethical Bastards ... never use them .

 

[Charley]

Godaddy = Unethical Bastards ... never use them .

I've never used them ever. Will never use them. :td:

Their user interface is so slow and customer service is below standard.

 

[equity78]

Go Daddy has stopped allowing it.

http://www.thedomains.com/2008/06/30/godaddy-stops-employees-from-bidding-in-tdnam-auction

 

[ulasbbtr]

Go Daddy has stopped allowing it.

http://www.thedomains.com/2008/06/30/godaddy-stops-employees-from-bidding-in-tdnam-auction

since they are caught, now they can do this with more covered people, being greedy is not an easily vanished sin.