I'm so pissed

[Ipdster]

Yesterday I was playing around with excel, looking for names on godaddy and values on estibot. I found a pretty nice unregistered name: kik.mobi
Stupid me was too tired to bother registering it, and I put it off until this morning. As you can guess, someone registered it overnight.

Now, it is registered under godaddy. Yesterday when I had searched under estibot, it said "owner has it up for sale" or something like that, even though it was still free.

So who do you guys think is the culprit?

 

[mywebbie]

goDaddy, I think. if the domain name is good, still available, and someone searched it in godaddy, they grab it. But again, that's just an opinion based on same experience with godaddy months ago.

 

[estibot.com]

One very real possibility is that no one sniffed your whois searches: This is an LLL domain, and people are constantly monitoring them. I'm really surprised it was available. Leaving one unregged overnight, frankly I would be surprised if it hadn't gone. There are thousands of domainers looking for good names at any given time, and there are only a very small number of unregged LLL's. Someone is going to notice.

Another possibility is that this can happen with any whois service, including GoDaddy, and also internic.net, which is the whois Estibot uses. Estibot does not record your searches in any way, but any whois searches can and will be sniffed and every now and then this sort of thing happens. It's unfortunate, but it's part of the cutthroat domain name game. Always be prepared to register the name you want immediately.

Sorry you lost the name... next time, more aggressive!

 

[Jasonn]

It was probably just a mistake. All the LLL.mobi were regged long ago.

 

[nielsencl]

You can't always trust the whois information, so you have to be careful with that. Plus, unless you know you can trust another site to NOT share what you search for, check your domains using Domaintools.com. It may be that someone just happened to register it, but it could also be that you have spyware on your PC, or you used a site that may have noticed that you searched for it. They can register the domain and then drop it if they can't sell it or it doesn't make money while parking.

In your case:

Registrant Search: "Sunrise Holdings" owns about 5,142 other domains
Whois History: 2 records have been archived since 2007-05-24.

Domain ID:D2930990-MOBI
Domain Name:KIK.MOBI
Created On:06-May-2008 06:26:47 UTC
Last Updated On:06-May-2008 06:28:00 UTC
Expiration Date:06-May-2009 06:26:47 UTC
Sponsoring Registrar:Go Daddy Software, Inc (146)
Created by Registrar:Go Daddy Software, Inc (146)
Last Updated by Registrar:Go Daddy Software, Inc (146)
Status:CLIENT DELETE PROHIBITED
Status:CLIENT RENEW PROHIBITED
Status:CLIENT TRANSFER PROHIBITED
Status:CLIENT UPDATE PROHIBITED
Status:TRANSFER PROHIBITED
Registrant ID:GODA-047326330
Registrant Name:Sunrise Holdings
Registrant Organization:Sunrise Holdings
Registrant Street1:Suite 226
Registrant Street2:34A - 2755 Lougheed HWY
Registrant City:Port Coquitlam
Registrant State/Province:British Columbia
Registrant Postal Code:V3V 5Y9
Registrant Country:CA

This information doesn't make sense to me, but maybe I am too new at this and I'm missing something...?

This domain shows 2 whois records that started on 2007-05-24. Note that if the domain was registered on that date, it should still have been registered until later this month. Yet creation date for this whois record is listed as 06-May-2008.

So, the only thing that can explain this with what I know is that the domain was registered back in 2007, but then either tasted and dropped, or suspended and deleted before the registration had expired.

It seems pretty weird to me....

 

[weblord]

fyi: Sunrise Holdings got it before you.

 

[Bannen]

Names that are searched through registrars are generally made visible. Godaddy does this; if you search for a name, when you get the results page you'll see a button saying something like 'see more results'; if you click that, you'll see all kinds of similar names still available that look somewhat like what you typed in and have been searched for recently. If someone typed in kick or kikk or kicc, whatever, on that results page they might see that kik.mobi is still avail. Most top registrars do this. Godaddy for sure. I'm not sure of their exact process for it but your searches are seen.
Even if you only typed the name on Estibot, I think Esa uses registrar searches to show the availability of the names, don't you Esa? In that case any name you search through there can be seen via the registrar used. Or by anyone 'sniffing' that registrar.

This used to happen to me often, I search for so many unregged names for myself and my Bannen's best list. Once I saw so many good names being taken literally an hour or two after I searched them, and before I put them on my list publicly, I knew something was up and did some research.

If you don't want your searched names to be seen by anyone, then you need a secure search tool rather than using a registrar (or using a tool like Estibot that uses a registrar to check availability while doing the estimates). For my searches I usually use the dnaz program you can download for free. Domain name analyzer. When I use that, none of my searches get mysteriously regged moments after I search them, and they usually remain unregged for months afterwards. Though I still get lazy and use the registrars occasionally, and then yes, my searched names get whacked like crazy from sniffers and from the aforementioned results pages of registrars. A lot of the better names I run through Estibot also get nabbed, but that's not Estibot's fault but rather whatever registrar/s he's using for the search.

Hey, that's a lot of typing, did I make any sense? Long workday

P.S. Port Coquitlam (where the registrant of kik.mobi is) is only a few hours drive from me here in BC... but I had nothing to do with it, honest!! I can even go 'kik' their asses, if you like

 

[VisualArtistFrankBonilla]

One very real possibility is that no one sniffed your whois searches: This is an LLL domain, and people are constantly monitoring them. I'm really surprised it was available. Leaving one unregged overnight, frankly I would be surprised if it hadn't gone. There are thousands of domainers looking for good names at any given time, and there are only a very small number of unregged LLL's. Someone is going to notice.

Another possibility is that this can happen with any whois service, including GoDaddy, and also internic.net, which is the whois Estibot uses. Estibot does not record your searches in any way, but any whois searches can and will be sniffed and every now and then this sort of thing happens. It's unfortunate, but it's part of the cutthroat domain name game. Always be prepared to register the name you want immediately.

Sorry you lost the name... next time, more aggressive!

I agree with estibot 100%. Frankly, this is a clear case of you snooze, you lose! :o


Frank

 

[newton]

I found it available yesterday so I regged it There was certainly no whois sniffing involved.

 

[VisualArtistFrankBonilla]

Case dismissed!

I found it available yesterday so I regged it There was certainly no whois sniffing involved.

There you go. Your honor, I motion we dismiss this case on the grounds of ....... You snooze, you lose! (Newbie was given 30 days probation, No regging for 30 days!!!)

Frank :o

 

[Bannen]

I found it available yesterday so I regged it There was certainly no whois sniffing involved.

Nice to meet a fellow BC domainer. Ssup? Nice find on kik.mobi both of you, but nice grab for the one who dived on it

 

[newton]

Thanks Bannen and BC is a wonderful place

 

[Traveler]

Wow, sorry for the newbie but congrats to newton. Nothing like finding money on the ground!

 

[estibot.com]

I put it off until this morning.

A literal case of "you snooze you lose"

So who do you guys think is the culprit?

Often, as in this case there is no "culprit". You presented yourself in a cool manner and I commend you for that.

Sadly, a lot of people post here crying murder everytime they snooze&lose. They are quick to blame Estibot or GoDaddy, when in fact it is more likely than not that a good unregged domain will be regged by someone in the next 12 hours. As I said, there are thousands of domainers going through large lists of keywords and checking for availability. There is only a finite number of good domains, and the better the domain name, the more likely it is that multiple people will hit upon it within a short period of time.

One very real possibility is that no one sniffed your whois searches: This is an LLL domain, and people are constantly monitoring them. I'm really surprised it was available. Leaving one unregged overnight, frankly I would be surprised if it hadn't gone. There are thousands of domainers looking for good names at any given time, and there are only a very small number of unregged LLL's. Someone is going to notice.

I found it available yesterday so I regged it There was certainly no whois sniffing involved.

Newton just proved my first argument correct. Congrats on your keen eye for available names, Newton

I think Esa uses registrar searches to show the availability of the names, don't you Esa? In that case any name you search through there can be seen via the registrar used. Or by anyone 'sniffing' that registrar.

Estibot uses direct command-line queries to top-level whois servers.

Estibot analyzes millions of domain names every month, and very rarely I get reports of someone losing their name, ostensibly due to them having ran them through Estibot. I try to tell them that it happens, like this one, very rarely, but often they lose all rational thought and get overcome by paranoia.

It's so rare, it's not a real issue. Most of them are probably just coincidences like this.

Actually, the new Estibot available names tool (the one that supports all TLD's) doesn't query any whois servers at all, so it is 100% safe from sniffers. I found a way to work around having to query external servers.

 

[bmugford]

Esa, I love estibot.com and I will be signing up for the pro account soon enough.

I just used it last night to grab 4 gems for $8/each. Can't beat that.

Brad

A literal case of "you snooze you lose"



Often, as in this case there is no "culprit". You presented yourself in a cool manner and I commend you for that.

Sadly, a lot of people post here crying murder everytime they snooze&lose. They are quick to blame Estibot or GoDaddy, when in fact it is more likely than not that a good unregged domain will be regged by someone in the next 12 hours. As I said, there are thousands of domainers going through large lists of keywords and checking for availability. There is only a finite number of good domains, and the better the domain name, the more likely it is that multiple people will hit upon it within a short period of time.





Newton just proved my first argument correct. Congrats on your keen eye for available names, Newton



Estibot uses direct command-line queries to top-level whois servers.

Estibot analyzes millions of domain names every month, and very rarely I get reports of someone losing their name, ostensibly due to them having ran them through Estibot. I try to tell them that it happens, like this one, very rarely, but often they lose all rational thought and get overcome by paranoia.

It's so rare, it's not a real issue. Most of them are probably just coincidences like this.

Actually, the new Estibot available names tool (the one that supports all TLD's) doesn't query any whois servers at all, so it is 100% safe from sniffers. I found a way to work around having to query external servers.

 

[Ipdster]

I found it available yesterday so I regged it There was certainly no whois sniffing involved.

Well then congrats! That makes me feel good.

 

[Bannen]

Actually, the new Estibot available names tool (the one that supports all TLD's) doesn't query any whois servers at all, so it is 100% safe from sniffers. I found a way to work around having to query external servers.

Great to hear; just keeps getting better. You gotta slow down and enjoy life, instead of working like a madman to make Estibot better and better for all of us ungrateful hacks