Evening folks!!
"Domain Squatter"?? REALLY?? In 2013??
With hundreds of new extensions coming out? With Auctions by large companies 24/7?
Really?
Rick Schwartz
Forbes.com Calls me a “Domain Squatter” and Disses Domain Industry
Really?
Really?
Really?
36 thoughts on “Forbes.com Calls me a “Domain Squatter” and Disses Domain Industry”
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Mark Hershiser
So it looks like Danny owes you for that bet of who gets a write up in Forbes first, lol…
bhartzer
Amazing, even after Steve Forbes keynoted the TRAFFIC conference a while back, in 2007.
Diego
Only a fool or a communist could call squatter a legitimate domainer. Is a communist that lady?
Steven Chang
educate him, Rick!
Steven Chang
sorry, I meant her
Adam
The word squatter is what “Everyone else” calls domainers.
Garnet
Looks like she is angry with you Rick. :)
Rick Schwartz
Well we had a very cordial conversation.
Did not expect to get broadsided.
Casino
fuck forbes and forbes.com – in the words of Sam Rothstein “is forbes just another dumb white man?” I wouldn’t give the bum a mop job
gary dell
“Domain Names are the real estate of the 21st century” Steve Forbes
Ms Domainer
*
The word “communist” is bandied around too much in this country (U.S.). If someone doesn’t “like” something, their opponent is a “communist” who practices “communism.”
LOL
If anything, Rick, you’re a capitalist, through and through.
:)
*
Ted Maul
lol! She picked out the example of DVDs.com losing value. With streaming and downloads as popular as ever and Blu-ray a term that’s used instead of DVD more often than it used to, of course DVDs.com isn’t going to be as valuable as when DVDs themselves were in their heyday…
A definite agenda at play here, I wonder if any parties that will benefit most from GLTDs are paying her…
Hugh
Rick,
Read the article…sad our industry gets such a bad rap. She should have mentioned you organize domain conferences in educating and bringing together the community. Maybe it would be worth sending her a free ticket to the next conference to cover it…
Hugh
ivorytrader
WoW.. i use to read forbes regularly. that article was on the level of a high school journalism student. good spelling and punctuation. informative and insightful… not so much.
Rhid
She’s right that the gold rush for .Com is over, it’s also over In Manhattan. These apartments and buildings still sell, for allot.
richard
that’s unfortunate, you’d think that they would educate themselves more about a pioneer in this industry. haters gunna hate :(
Dev Sheffield
I’m not entirely sure where the author’s blatant animosity is coming from, however, I have a few guesses. To be perfectly honest, this entire write-up seems like a passive aggressive hit piece on the .com aftermarket. It’s almost as if she was “encouraged” to write an article designed to spread the misnomer that the value of premium domain names have truly been diluted. Consumers are confused as it is, and articles like this only make the confusion worse. Why? because her writing is chalk full of contradictions. In one sentence she’s discussing the fact that Rick sold ebet for$1.35M this year (from a 50k opening offer), and yet in her next breath she is claiming that domain values of .com’s are dropping like rocks. So the question remains: what was the inspiration to even bother writing this article? Did it stem purely from regret that she did not have the “foresight” (and yes it is foresight) to register generic .com’s back in the late 90′s? I’m skeptical, and the fact that she misused the standard trigger word of the industry (squatter) only makes this article even more transparent. It really makes you wonder the timing of articles like this; especially seeing that nearly 2,000 gtlds will be available in the very near future, all of which will be needing a heavy dose of marketing to survive.
DonnyM
I know what happened, she probably made an offer on one of your domains names and you told her to stick it ? ? !
She mentions dropout WOW- You know people like Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, Turner, Walt D, ZuckenB and so many more.
The worst part of this so called journalism is that she forgets to mention Forbes going to your conference in 2007.
The nice thing about the article is that it brings more attention to domains names.
petre7Observer
On almost every blog, I only see all the praises and glorifications of an event that ends with quite a disappointing result. That may be the limits of most of the active blogs. That’s because they cannot be free from sponsors or friends or potential sponsors. I agree with her on some points about the reality of domain market today except the squatter thing. Domain is just a thing like real estate or pictures or phone numbers that can be an object of investment. Even in a “communist country” like China, a cellphone number was sold for more than a million dollars. Do you call a person with lots of land squatter?
Ian
Looks like she removed ‘squatter’ from her article after all of the comments…
Alan Dodd, namedream.com
Yes, just read the article and reads very positively. Missed the squatter thing, and looks like someone reached for the digital Tippex.
The word “squatter” as now used is changing from the old “cybersquatter”, from some people there is no negative connotation intended.
Me
I’ll say that Rick isn’t a domain squatter, buying generics in the resale market that aren’t a specific trademark of a single company cannot be domain squatting.
It seems the article has been written on a reflective grudge basis along the lines ‘I’m angry that I wasn’t perceptive enough to make this sort of money’. If she thinks that way (and I think she does) then why on earth is she writing for Forbes?
I tended to think that Forbes was an ‘authoritative’ financial publication, not a blend of misinformation and personal grudges, I can read any number of ill informed online newspapers for that.
Anyway, seems the article has been changed.
Diego
Thanks for the lesson, but I know what communism is and how it was used in the U.S. during the Cold War. I was speaking literally: communists considered private property as a kind of perversion, except when they are the owners, they become capitalists then.
I observe a certain trend where people who want a domain from another person instantly becomes communist. This happens only with domains, nobody calls squatter a guy who rightfully owns the flat or the car that everyone dreams.
Owen Frager
The bigger lesson that should be learned here is your BS meter went off because you, live, breath and experience the truth. Now think about the fact that 99% of what you hear or see on mainstream news is similarly backed by someone with an agenda like a study saying coffee is good for the heart which is a really veiled sales pitch by a lobbyist to sell coffee. On this anniversary of JFK’s death where speculation of a cover up is widely accepted, what about Viet Nam, 911, Iraq etc.
It’s time to challenge your belief system because you can’t change the power of the PR machine. But you can open your eyes and question everything.
NEIL
Mrs.Nonsense knows a lot about domain names’ history.
Probably she was reading your blog, Rick…
NEIL
The King is in FORBES now!
Awesomest.net!
Soiree.me, we’ll have a Huge Party for that!
Where?
West-Palm-Beach.org…
Mitch Giangobbe
I personally enjoyed this bit of expert opinion…
“Your domain name is far less important than it was a decade ago,” says Weston Anson, owner of CONSOR Intellectual Asset Management, a San Diego firm that does valuations of intellectual property. Search engines are much smarter so the domain name doesn’t matter as much as the meta-tags embedded in your website, he adds.
Search engines using meta tags? I need to go find my Palm Treo. I didn’t realize it was 2003 again.
Meta Tag
Started bad and then got worse. She is totally clueless and totally wrong. Meta tags, yeah.
Davinderpal S Bhatia
Calling Rick a Domain squatter could be result of trying to beat the deadline
(article appeared in few hours after HA.com’s Inaugural Domain Auction ended),
misinformation, ignorance, jealously (5 paid up houses, 7 Cars) or a combination
of all the above qualities which this lawyer/writer possesses.
Even when a person is arrested from the murder scene, he is NOT called a killer.
He is called “the alleged killer” till the Judge/Jury come to a conclusion.
Moral of the story
1. You don’t have to be a college dropout to act like one.
2. For some people it is hard to digest that College dropouts can outperform “Qualified” people.
3. If the writer she does not retract her statement, this could be a very expensive statement.
Good luck and may better sense prevail.
Kevin Davis
There is no such thing as bad press.
Jonathan
Couple of errors but all in all, not a bad reflection of economic timelines.
Dr. Christopher W. Hartnett
At least she spelled your name right Rick. This too will pass. This can turn out to be a good thing in the bigger picture. So many more people know about you now that didn’t know about you before. We have known that the big 7 and 8 figure sales at auction has been over for a number of years now. We are OK with that. That doesn’t mean that 7 and 8 figure domain name sales are dead, it just means that end users aren’t buying names like that through auctions.The marketplace is maturing. This is a good thing. The big bubble creating speculators have moved on and the intrinsic value market is getting even more established and integrated. This is a good thing. I still love the fact that you and Marc were in Forbes this week. Congrats. Enjoy bro. Life is good.
UFO
Yes, its important to get the story straight, otherwise next Rick will a UDRP action and they’ll cite this article as evidence. ‘Forbes stated he was a domain squatter’ etc.
Pat w
No pun intended on this but this lady Deborah J. is not a a very good Financial and / or Investment expert Reporter especially when it comes to financial history and true facts & dates and times… And claiming to be a Financial expert for the Baby Boomers — Wow…
She is talking to and interviewing the undisputed King & one if the Top Pioneer’s of the Dot Com Boom back from 1995 & 1996 (that he dropped out of college) (big deal & smart move) and she Headlines & writes a Story that the Domain Name “Gold Rush” is all over and “Lost its Glitter”– Wow again…
When in fact the Dot Com & Domain Names Business is Exploding with no end in Site and the Strength & Numbers & Prices are Higher than Ever…
The “industrial age” is Gone — and Hi Tech Internet & communication business is the new thing with the “Domain Names” Business making this all Possible.
And finally Big Business is starting to understand that the High Price on a Dot Com is really an incredible bargain – investment & money maker — and a very good deal.
Max
Sue her donkey Rick!
Altaf
@Frager: I agree with you. Only media people & the media could make you famous or important.