Domain name theft Domain name theft

In my previous post, I talked about getting a Web site up and operational for my patent practice. One of the requirements is that I need a domain name for the site.

And there, I ran into a problem. I had registered a domain name in the early 1990s, and used it for more than a decade for mostly email. But 2 1/2 years ago, I let my registration lapse. About six months later, I tried to reregister it, and someone else had grabbed it.

A year ago, Register.com (where I already had an account and a couple of other domain names) showed this domain name as available. So, I contracted with them to move it to their registry. Turns out, it was still tied up, and they just didn't have a full domain name registry. (The best still is apparently networksolutions. com, which was the original domain name registry).

So, yesterday, I typed in that domain name, and was directed to a site that tried to sell it to me. Turns out that this company in the U.K. grabbed it, and is trying to sell it to someone. They have, of course, never done anything with it for the last two years.

What it looks like is happening is that there are companies that sit around and look for expiring domain names. They grab them, and try to resell them.

The problem is that this is all a bit dishonest, or at least disreputable. They do not have a bona fide intent to use the domain, but rather are just trying to resell to me what should be mine.

I probably should have just paid them their $100, but pride got in the way, and I have acquired a different domain name (softpats.com).