Who Owns HurricaneAlberto.com?

Hurricane domain names receive lots of traffic and attention if the storm turns out to be powerful, damaging or deadly. As a result, speculators buy up prime hurricane-related domain names almost as soon as the annual list of names is announced by the National Hurricane Center.

HurricaneAlberto.com was registered through Go Daddy's Domains by Proxy service, which keeps the owner's identity out of the WHOIS database. The domain resolves to the USA Hurricanes web site, which appears to have captured most of the .com domains for this season's storm names. HurricaneAlberto.org is owned by the non-profit disaster relief group Friendships Unlimited. The .net domain was registered by "Shadow Inc." and appears to be for sale.

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  Posted by RichM June 12, 2006 | Permalink | Newsletter

May 20, 2005

Cleveland Man Patents WHOIS Integration in Search Results

Ohio "inventor" Eric Schneider was awarded a patent Tuesday for a method of integrating a domain availability check into search engine results. Schneider's application ("A Method and Apparatus for Integrating Resolution Services, Registration Services and Search Services") was submitted June 21, 2000 and approved on May 17.

The patent covers "request types other than that of a registration request or availability request," and thus does not affect WHOIS inquiries. But it appears to have implications for including domain availability recommendations in other types of information searches. Here's Schneider's comment in a press release announcing the patent's approval:

One aspect of the '430 patent specifies receiving keyword input for a search engine and in response providing both search engine results of Web pages, and in addition, providing one or more domain names that may be available for registration relating to those keywords.

IANAL, but that statement suggests that search engines can't integrate WHOIS results - or partner with a domain registrar to include keyword-based WHOIS results - without dealing with Schneider, who said he is already taking steps to commercialize the patent.

"We are currently in discussions to license the technology to a number of companies," said Schneider. "The issuance of the '430 patent provides an opportunity to invite interested search engine providers and domain name registration providers to learn more about how this technology can help their business and their customers."

  Posted by RichM May 20, 2005 | Permalink | Newsletter

April 29, 2005

The Speculating Senator

From The Hill (via Domain Direct News):

Sen. Rick Santorum (R-Pa.) has "no intention" to run for president in 2008, but a media communications firm that represents him has registered a slew of relevant domain names in case the senator changes his mind.

But why's this story appearing now? The domains were registered in Feb. 2004. Could it be ... politics? They seem to have missed santorum2008store.com, which was scarfed up immediately after the November elections. They'll probably need that one if they want to sell campaign stuff. Hypothetically speaking, of course.

  Posted by RichM April 29, 2005 | Permalink | Newsletter