Treasures are out there if you look

Octocrook

New member
Case in point: 13 months, 3 main sales, with much money spent and sometimes wasted in services, and a bunch of my portfolio pretty much sitting there doing nothing, I FINALLY found a whale of a domain.

For those who don't know much about how domains work, they are registered yearly and either expire if the registration isn't paid, or unexpectedly drop due to misuse of the name. Big backordering companies see everything that drops expectedly in the major extensions, so unless you want to go into auctions and pay what a name is worth to get it, you have to get other extensions or unexpected drops.

I thought I had a pretty good name that was related to tsunamis, simply because it had been getting a lot of traffic around the time the tsunami hit Asia (and I was, at least for a few days, making a few bucks a day sending people to charities). The traffic died down, from 10 visitors an hour to now 10 visitors a day. I don't care though since the name cost me $7, so I made the money back in a couple days. That was an example of getting an unexpected drop. At the point of it getting 250 visitors a day, it was worth probably $3,000 or so.

It seems though that the better names drop in the non-major extensions, and those even sit around for longer. One of them I had gotten, Poker.md, had bid up to $2,000 at one point, though I held out for more because with the hotness of poker and poker domains right now, it's realistically worth twice that. I had picked up another few that have gotten interest and are worth several hundred, if not a couple thousand, and one that even sold for a decent amount within a week of getting it (K.md for $475, minus $200 total expense netting me $275 in 2 weeks time).

However, all the crap I have in my portfolio now seems meaningless except for my most recent grab, Host.sh. It's so mesmeric that I've felt the need to check it out now and then. I know, you're thinking "Host.sh.....oooook". The quality of the name is not what made this pickup great. The name gets about 2,500 visits a day! I was salivating over the tsunami domain's 250 a day and this is 10 times that!

Now I'm rushing to see the best way to capitalize on it...I put a reseller hosting site on there that got absolutely no action, and have switched parked pages a few times but still am not getting 10% click through, which is merely average for my names and is what I want. 10% click through at....say, $0.15 per click on average (not that high, especially if it's a hosting parked page), gets me 250x0.15 = $37.50 a day x 365 = $13687.50/yr (before taxes of course :/ ). I REALLY wish the hosting site would pan out, because say if I had 0.2% of the visits be customers, that's 5 customers a day, making $10-$20 per customer per year, and that would add up really quick (especially when year 2 comes around and people renew). But it was just getting nothing...a week with no sales. Still, I'm just amazed I found a name with that much traffic that sat there...I know it was available for less than a week, but it was sitting there when I looked up "host" at the right time. $90 for a cash cow, probably a $30,000 sell at least if I sold it...yay!

<P ID="signature"><center>| | <a href=http://www.crooky.us>Crooky’s Music | <a href=http://www.drprison.com>Dr. Prison</a> |</center></P>
 
and I bet you're still not going to tell us what the bloody domain name is.

Speaking of treasures, I make it a habit to peruse the local EB/Gamestops whenever I'm in the city, and very often find things that double my investment.

Valkyrie Profile for PSX, for example. Bought for 39.99, just sold it on ebay for 91.00. :)

Edit: Oh yeah, I still think it's shitty that you're trying to capitalize on interest in natural disasters, even if it's in a roundabout sort of way. :\

<P ID="signature">--

http://www.oddigy.com
beadsprites and PSFs, oh my!</P><P ID="edit"><FONT class="small">Edited by Audigy on 04/06/05 10:47 AM.</FONT></P>
 
So you're a cybersquatter? What?

<P ID="signature"><hr>
Those who are able to adapt and change in accord with the enemy and achieve victory are called divine.

-Sun Tzu</P>
 
> So you're a cybersquatter? What?

That's what I was thinking. Nothing pisses me off more than people who hold domains simply for profit. The internet was a success because it was FREE and people gave a damn about each other. 1999 = the last year the internet didn't suck.

<P ID="signature"><marquee direction=right scrollamount=10>
hsrun.gif
</marquee></P>
 
> Valkyrie Profile for PSX, for example. Bought for 39.99,
> just sold it on ebay for 91.00. :)

Man, I hate you. I really want that game but I refuse to pay more than $50 for it. <img src=smilies/cry.gif>

<P ID="signature"></P>
 
> > Valkyrie Profile for PSX, for example. Bought for 39.99,

> Man, I hate you. I really want that game but I refuse to pay
> more than $50 for it.

That is kinda steep, but it's a classic. :)
I am completely in love with Valkyrie Profile.

<P ID="signature"><center><img src=http://img78.photobucket.com/albums/v295/Trucido/MegaVin.png>
Coming to cinemas near you! </center></P>
 
> Nothing pisses me off more than
> people who hold domains simply for profit.

Funny, I totally went off on him a long time ago and posted a topic in the backroom about the indecency of cybersquatting.

Nobody took my side, wtf. :)
but yeah, lame lame lame.

<P ID="signature">--

http://www.oddigy.com
beadsprites and PSFs, oh my!</P>
 
> Edit: Oh yeah, I still think it's shitty that you're trying
> to capitalize on interest in natural disasters, even if it's
> in a roundabout sort of way. :\

I regretted it when I did it, and wound up putting a page of links to charities that I wasn't getting money on after the parked page got taken off. I was mentioning it though as a name that I found and registered just after it expired (in other words, you don't necessarily have to pay what a name is worth to get a valuable name). Shortly after the tsunami hit, I contributed approx. 10% of what I had in my bank account ($500 of the $5000 I had) to charity for the tsunami victims, so I'd like to think I'm not an asshole "cybersquatter". Other people don't always see it that way though, obviously.

<P ID="signature"><center>| | <a href=http://www.drprison.com>Dr. Prison |</center></P><P ID="edit"><FONT class="small">Edited by Octocrook on 04/06/05 11:36 PM.</FONT></P>
 
> So you're a cybersquatter? What?

Here we go again, as Audigy said!

1. The average domain buyer, one who wants a domain name or two for some business or personal site, is too lazy to learn how to get the best domain they can get, or too scared to put in the time and effort to possibly lose quite a bit of money. They either search some names and register the first one they find available or they buy a domain from someone else. They don't go through the extensive name searching, the learning of all sorts of domain processes, the paying for a mutitude of domain services (hundreds of dollars a year mind you), or the buying of a lot of names that they most likely would lose money on. So yes, I believe that due to the amount of effort and money I have spent in getting what I have, I deserve any valuable name I get more than someone that finds out in 1 minute of searching out of dumb luck. So sue me.

2. 95% of the names I get are recently expired (recently as in expired hours ago). The average domain buyer will never even know this name was ever free whether I get it or not, because most of these names would be taken by another of my kind a minute to a few days after I would have taken them.

3. The average domain buyer gets a .com name, with .net such a distant 2nd that it's reasonable to say that most people that buy domains don't even pay attention to that, let alone the hundreds of other extensions. I do admit I've purchased about 10 .com domains that I have not used for websites that were never taken before (that would be cybersquatting). Ironically, I've made $0 on them, and I wouldn't do such a thing anymore because it's not profitable anyways. On the flip side, I own over 200 domains now and 10 out of 200 is a whopping 5% that I've "cybersquatted" on. In fact, well over half the names I own are .cc, .ws, .in, and other extensions that most people don't even realize exist. Once again, names that average people would never have known existed even if I didn't get them.

4. I've set up 10 websites on domains I've purchased (ironically, just as many websites as names I consider myself "cybersquatting" on). I don't always reg them and let them sit, as for some names it's plain foolish.

5. The quality of most my domain names compared to domain names the average domain buyer will find would make very little bearing on the success of their business or personal site. In other words, a bad site having a domain of the quality I get will not succeed, and a good site with whatever domain they can get will succeed. The domains that are of a quality that would make a difference were taken 5-10 years ago and are now selling for 5-figures or more. I would never be able to touch those, and I would have to own the names I have for probably 5-10 years for them to rise up to that quality. I'm barely renewing ANY of my names beyond the first year, and if they don't sell after 2 years, you bet your ass I wouldn't keep it.

So...in summary, if I am negatively impacting the quality of domains the average potential buyer can get, domains that they would be able to find and get with what little effort, work, and money they generally put in to get them as compared to the effort, work, and money I've had to put in, then George W. Bush is the Easter Bunny.

<P ID="signature"><center>| | <a href=http://www.drprison.com>Dr. Prison |</center></P>
 
I look for treasures too. I look for my favorite video games which are SNES RPG'S. I go to swap meets and garage sales every weekend looking and one rule i have is i never pay over $1 for a game- This year i have found 4 carts of Zelda - Link to the Past, 2 carts of Secret of Mana,2 carts of Final Fantasy 3, 2 carts of Breath of Fire,3 carts of Lufa 1, 1 cart of Breath of Fire 2, Lufia 2, Soul Blazer,Final Fantasy 2,Super Adventure Island 2( some call it an RPG) and last weekend i found Chrono Trigger at a library sale for $1.
Usually libraries only sell books but this one had a box of old video games marked $1 each and i found Chrono Trigger in the box-
How do you put a picture here- in the body of the message- instead of attaching it as a file? i have tried image shack but only the text shows up- not the picture

<P ID="signature"></P>
 
> How do you put a picture here- in the body of the message-
> instead of attaching it as a file? i have tried image shack
> but only the text shows up- not the picture

One of two ways...either use a pic hosting service and direct link to them, or upload the picture to ZMD, and then once the post is made, grab the link that is created in the post, and then edit the post and put that link in the body of the message.

You have to use the tag to get it to show up...but remember, use the angle bracktes, not the reguar brackets, so it gets interpreted as html code.

<P ID="signature"><div align="center">[img]http://stuorgs.lvc.edu/acm/_private/ZMD.gif
...the way to be!</div></P>
 
> How do you put a picture here- in the body of the message-
> instead of attaching it as a file? i have tried image shack
> but only the text shows up- not the picture

<img src="URL-OF-IMAGE" />

<P ID="signature"></P>
 
> just text
> > showed up again instead of picture
> > ???--http://img146.exs.cx/img146/5818/c47qy.jpg
>

c47qy.jpg


<P ID="signature">--------------------

peepos.gif


Welcome to the Bryant Street Theatre. Have a Fruit Roll-Up.</P>
 
> > just text
> > > showed up again instead of picture
> > > ???--http://img146.exs.cx/img146/5818/c47qy.jpg

It's worth noting that ZMD's "preview" feature garbles up HTML pretty badly. Try unchecking the "preview my post" box. Also, this should be in the Testing forum.

EDIT: On second thought, I'm an idiot. Check the faq:

http://www.zophar.net/wwwthreads/faq_english.php?Cat=#html<P ID="edit"><FONT class="small">Edited by Ugly Joe on 04/07/05 03:10 PM.</FONT></P>
 
Never heard of a purple flying (or running for that matter) chocobo; what's he do? He's cute.

<P ID="signature"></P>
 
> Never heard of a purple flying (or running for that matter)
> chocobo; what's he do? He's cute.
>

I suspect it's a black chocobo. They can fly. They're never black, but either purple or blue or dark gray. :p

<P ID="signature">--

http://www.oddigy.com
beadsprites and PSFs, oh my!</P>
 
Back
Top Bottom