Earlier this year, we published The Big List Of Search Engines & Their Employees On Twitter, which included plenty of Google accounts on Twitter. Now Google’s made life even easier by publishing its own list of official Twitter accounts.
Google accounts on Twitter is the list on the official Google blog. Also see our past post, […]
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As DNJournal reported we know that at least one fellow Domainer was also present at the Jackson Memorial Event Tuesday this week. Of course this celebrity death also created lots of domain name business, or at least attempts to capitalize his death. However when we checked the whois of MichaelJacksonIsDead.com we were surprised that the name was already registered five years ago. So we contacted the owner with a number of questions and you can read his answers after the jump.
Hi Tony, thanks for taking the time to talk to us. We see that you registered the domain MichaelJacksonIsDead over 5 years ago. What was the reason you picked this domain up?
My reason for buying “Michaeljacksonisdead.com” at that time was pure speculation on Mr Jackson’s death.
Were you speculating he would be dead soon ?
I told all my friends and family that I was positive he only had about 5 years to go, no more. They all thought I was crazy ,said I was morbid and wrong. I’m a poor man, I have a physical disability. I was just thinking Id found a cheep investment that might pay off for a guy like me. If I believed he would live 20 more years I would never have registerered the name.
I called it didn’t I? I however predicted it would be an accidental over dose not a heart attack.
Did you plan to build something on the domain?
There was never any plan to build a web site as I said my financial resources are limited, nor do I have the PC skill to build a web site.
Do you own other “celebrity is dead” type of domain names? Are you a domain investor?
There were other celebrity dead domains. At one point I owned “RonaldReaganisdead.com” I also owned “Richardpryorisdead.com”. Ironically enough both celebrities died shortly after I bought the domain names (is there a pattern here - just kidding).
I also bought “Deadcelebrities.Com”. The Ronald Reagan domain was registered only a few months before his death but when he died no one seem interested in the name. I even emailed the forsale page to the Regan library but no one cared. I let those registrations lapse and never renewed them but I kept the Michael Jackson domain just on the hope that his fame would transcend.I’m a 45-year-old male from Philadelphia; I am not a professional domain name investor and have only dabbled slightly, 5 years ago I started investing in domain names, I sold “bonorocks.com” for $400+
Did you register any other Michael Jackson domain names this week when you learned he died?
I did not buy any other Jackson domain names now or ever. I feel I had the first and I got the .COM name. At the time I thought my investment was an original idea.
I understand you want $100k for the domain name. Have you received any offers ? Can you speak about the people/companies that have contacted you with offers ?
As for the 100K price tag. That’s not set in stone and I am willing to negotiate and entertain any reasonable offer. Within in minutes of his death I had over 30 emails and within 24 hours I had close to 100 emails, many wanted a price to which I replied “make me an offer”, then when I got offers I simply told the next person emailing what the top offer was. Many of those emailing told me I was scum and should die, other still congratulated me on a smart business idea and suggested that maybe it could be used for a memorial web site.
3 years ago a guy offered 250k and again he never return my emails. The fact is I’m not sure which offers are legitimate I had one for 85K and I was willing to take it but he never responded to my return emails.
There were a few in the last 48 hours when the email negotiating went back and forth so I thought the offers were genuine. That persons highest offer was 22K and although I didn’t want to go that low I wrote him back and said yes. Again he never got back to me. But that’s ok because although im very willing to consider any offer, I’m not willing to sell out that cheep.
I just came off a year lay off; I am disabled and walk with a cane. My car was totaled by a hit a run driver. I think maybe my personal needs are a little more then 22k.
I’m starting to think 100k is a little out of the ballpark for being reasonable my biggest offer that seems legit was 9k, a far cry below what I was hoping for( I need a new car) of course I have had million dollar offers but they we bogus and I knew it, especially the offer from bubbles the chimp..I decided to hold off and see if i could beat that by at least a little more. This is a calculated risk, but the guys death is still in the news. I’m still getting a boat load of hits on the name and more emails so we will see.
You mentioned hate mail. Surely you are receiving a lot of it about registering the domain name and now trying to make a profit on the name.
Here a few exact pasted excerpts from some of the more colorful emails I’ve received:
Dear Tony
“When you die I will park your domain…. www.tonygumbahisdead.com but….I dunno if someone will purchase it ……I doubt! “Tony
“I hope you get a ton of money for this and then have a heart attack and die at the bank where you’re cashing the check”Hey scumbag
“I hope someone kills you maybe the Jackson family can put a hit on you for your lack of feelings”
Tony, thank you very much for your time - is there anything else you’d like to share with our readers?
In closing I would like to say I was a fan, I never wished his death so I could get paid. I was just betting the odds.
I would really love it if the Jackson family bought it and kept it for themselves forever. Who ever does buy it will never be exposed by me.
Thanks again Tony.
Domain Name News does not endorse or recommend the purchase of domain names that may infringe on the rights of others.
(c) 2009 DomainNameNews.com
DomainConvergence | August 12-13, 2009 | Toronto, ON, Canada
Sahar Sarid of Bido.com announced the new release of Bido on his conceptualist blog, pointing out many exciting improvements to the industry’s only social auction platform.
The bigger, better Bido platform now allows you to:
And the team at Bido aren’t settling there. They will soon be running multiple auctions per day with a wide range of possibilites as to how this will occur. In the end, the changes will only help Bido become a more relevant player in the domain aftermarket. So head on over to Bido and check it out!
[via Conceptualist.com]
Full Disclosure: Bido is a paid advertiser at DNN.com.
(c) 2009 DomainNameNews.com
DomainConvergence | August 12-13, 2009 | Toronto, ON, Canada
