All About the .mobi Extension

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Monte: Hello everyone. This is Monte Cahn. Welcome to Domain Masters. Sorry about the little delay. We had a little complication trying to call the folks in the U.K. to do the .mobi interview, and it turns out that they were conferencing the folks in Seattle to do the .mobi interview, and we're going to call the Seattle guys directly and talk with Rick Fant from the .mobi domain extension. So, we'll have them on in a minute. The reason why I think this is an interesting play, if everyone remembers, I had the .travel and .jobs folks on and we spoke about the .xxx movement. The .mobi extension got a pretty fast approval on getting approved by ICAN, probably because of who's behind it. If anybody's done any research on the .mobi extension, you have some big powerhouse mobile companies, such as Ericsson, Samsung, MotoPhone, Nokia, and T‑Mobile and several others; and we're going to talk to those guys about this and what impact it might have on our mobile devices, especially cell phones and PDAs. So, we're going to break for a commercial real quick; and come back on with Rick Fant from the .mobi extension.

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Monte: Hello everyone. Welcome back to the show. Again, this is Monte Cahn. We are going to talk with Rick Fant from the mTLD Top Level Domain, Ltd. and find out what's going on with the .mobi extension. Rick, you on board?

Rick Yes I am.

Monte: Well, I want to first of all apologize for the little delay in getting you guys on board. I know there was a little complication with the conference call lines; but we were able to get you on. And I wanted to welcome you to the show and thank you for your time in advance. Why don't you give us a little bit of a background on the .mobi extension, who's behind it, and why this movement you feel is so important.

Rick: Well thank you. First of all, thank you for inviting me this afternoon. .mobi essentially got started by Microsoft, Nokia, and Vodafone, taking a look at the mobile market and trying to figure out how to grow the mobile internet usage on PDAs, cell phones, and other mobile devices. They came to the conclusion that a .mobi or a mobile top level domain would be a way by which consumers could very quickly identify mobile services and then of course use them from the mobile device. Once the companies decided to go forward with an application to ICAN, it then invited others within the mobile community, such as GSM Association, Orange, Samsung, and Sun, etc., to join us; and we went ahead and created the application. ICAN sent it through the process, and it has now been approved. So, the news is that we are now locked and loaded and moving forward with creating a company that will launch the .mobi domain into the services market in the first half of 2006.

Monte: Okay. Well great. The reason why I thought it was important to get you guys on the show, and I explained in my opening, you know, show opener, that I've had the .travel guys on, we've had .jobs on, and we've talked a lot about the .xxx movement. The difference in this extension to me is the power of the companies that are supporting it and behind it. There's obviously a lot of financial strength backing customer base behind the whole movement; and so, I'm real interested, and I'm sure our audience is, on how each of the companies are going to be able to contribute their customer base and their technology to making this a successful extension to be used on mobile devices. Can you give us a little bit of background on what the plans are and how this thing's going to be deployed, and what might one experience on their cell phone or PDA with the use of this extension.

Rick: Certainly, I'll try. So, .mobi is actually a separate company that is sponsored as a joint venture by the companies we just talked about. So, it's independent, it is not a wholly owned subsidiary or anything like that. The purpose of .mobi is to actually operate the registry with a little bit of a twist and the differentiator. The differentiator is that we intend to instill and set up domain requirements such that those folks that launch a .mobi service will, in fact, have a predictable user experience for the consumer. So remember this is a consumer-first structure. So, .mobi is all about identifying new services or existing services that will work with mobile devices, we call that discoverability, and then making sure that the end consumer gets a predictable user experience by instituting the best practices that services will be required as part of their registrant agreement to institute.

Monte: So give us an example of what kind of experience is different than a typical domain extension, like a .com, or another extension. I mean, will you be able to use this extension through your web site and other places besides just your cell phone? What's the unique application that makes this extension unique?

Rick: Well, .mobi will essentially indicate to the consumer that this service has been specifically designed with mobile devices. The experience is this, that typically a .com site, a .org, or a .info has not been programmed to understand the different form factors that a mobile device could bring up, like screen size, different buttons, different colored [inaudible] screens and so on.

Monte: So, just correct me if I'm wrong. So, if you have your name .mobi, it's going to be kind of configured in the background to optimize itself on a mobile device given its screen size and limitations in terms of resolution and so on and so forth.

Rick: That is correct. We will make sure that, a part of the registrant agreement, the service will adhere to a set of best practices that will give the consumer a good experience. Now that doesn't mean to say that you can't go to it from your PC browser. Of course because the service will detect the type of device you're reaching it from, it will probably send you to a full screen version as opposed to a multi-version.

Monte: Okay. And so, you will obviously be able to go to any ICAN accredited registrar and register this?

Rick: That's correct. We will be selling .mobi names through the normal and standard ICAN accredited registrar account.

Monte: And what will be the predicted retail price to the end user consumer for these extensions?

Rick: We don't know at this time. We're working out the details. We don't expect it to be significantly different from the other markets in the sponsor top level domain. We don't know what the registrars will do from the standpoint of uplifts, so we can't predict the end user price; but we expect it to be in the same price category.

Monte: Okay. So in that category from a sponsored TLD, sponsored TLDs have been in a sense much higher than a regular TLD, a .com or .net, which is generally between $5 and $35. We're looking at something in excess of that to the registrars obviously, and then the registrars would have to mark it up?

Rick: No, we're not. We're looking at something in that range.

Monte: In which range?

Rick: In the $5 to $35 range.

Monte: Okay, so it would be not based off of a sponsored TLD price, a regular TLD price, a GTLD price.

Rick: Okay. If you…. That's fine.

Monte: Okay. Because just for example, the .xxx extension is going to be in the $75 to $100 range. So are the . travel and .jobs extensions because they are going to be very limited towards the people in those particular industries. Therefore, their registration usage is going to be limited and they are going to need enough funds to support their infrastructures, so their prices are going to be somewhat higher. In this case, I, just based off of the consumer, I guess the consumer volume that each of these big companies have, you're going to be able to make up the price with a lot of volume in this particular case.

Rick: Yeah, we expect broad implementation of .mobi because of the graphically growing mobile internet usage both in the North American, European, and Asian markets, but also in the developing and emerging markets, we expect a very broad implementation of .mobi sites. So, from a size of the registry perspective, I don't think we'll ever achieve .com size. We expect to be substantial.

Monte: Right. And that brings up another good pointer question for you. Because there are so many international companies involved here, how will the extensions work for the different languages? Obviously today there is country code extensions and IDN, International Domain Name, character sets that help someone in Japan have a Japanese domain name that converts from English to Japanese pretty easily. How's the .mobi extension or registry going to be handling the international community in that regard?

Rick: Well, .mobi is a world-wide domain extension; so we don't anticipate country codes like .mobi.jp or anything like that. That's not in our plan. We do anticipate that, when IDN support has agreed by ICAN in a way that it will operate, that we will immediately support that as we go forward.

Monte: Okay, so that answers that part. Okay, great. And the predicted deployment of this extension you mentioned in 2006. When in 2006?

Rick: Well, at this time because we are still setting our plans, we are committing into the market in the first half of 2006.

Monte: The first half of 2006?

Rick: That's right.

Monte: And the different, in terms of the different companies that are involved in this, well, first of all, the registry platform, many of the other sponsored TLDs are going to be using a common registry platform, an EPP platform, like Affilius and .biz use. As a matter of fact, .xxx is going to be using the Affilius platform, and I believe so is the .travel domain extension. Will you be using an already existent EPP platform to distribute this, or are you going to have your own separate platform and interfaces back from the registrars to the registry?

Rick: No. We believe that the value to the registrars would be to have a common interface. We will likely use Affilius like all the other, well not all the other, but like the other sponsored top level domains. It's probably worth mentioning that the value of .mobi to registrars is all about the significant opportunity to expand their offerings with new names hosting functions that the mobile internet is going to enable as it grows and grows around the world.

Monte: That's an interesting point. Can you give us an idea of where you envision that going from a mobile hosting environment where cell phones and PDAs are going to go with that?

Rick: Well there are two things that I can think of right off the top of my head. The first is that a large number of already-hosted sites, whether they be .com or .org, also wish to reach mobile devices. Today most hosted sites are not .mobi compatible in that they will automatically align themselves and adjust themselves for mobile devices. So I think that the first opportunity for a registrar is to create an extension to the existing hosting infrastructure for their existing customers that supports .mobi and of course with the requisite charges. The second is that there is a second and new class of customer who want a .mobi only site for their service or their particular web orientation. And the reason why they are very interested in reaching mobile customers, either because their market is predominantly mobile, not PC based or whatever, but also because the type of business that they're in. We think that the registrars will be able to pick up new customers and their existing based on .mobi and the style guides that will create a predictable user experience for mobile users.

Monte: Will the .mobi registry or the companies that are behind the .mobi registry restrict other extensions from being deployable on a mobile phone or a mobile device, or will you be complimenting those services in those extensions with .mobi.

Rick: Well, .mobi is an independent company and will be operated as such by the investors. I can't speak for any of the investors, but I can say that they are most interested in broad growth of the mobile internet. And I cannot imagine them restricting anything to just .mobi. I think that the growth of the mobile internet will operate both in the .mobi space and in the other domain; but clearly the advantage that .mobi is discoverable by the end user by seeing a web site address or a service address on the side of the bus in with .mobi is an immediate indication to the mobile user that this service is designed to work a mobile device.

Monte: Right. Right. Yeah, and as you described before, there are some clear advantages here. There's going to be a pre-configuration in a technical sense or a technical respect that if you have a .mobi extension, that your web site, your service, your application, whatever you're providing to end users or whatever you want to put across that network will be optimized for a mobile phone or cellular device or PDA or so.

Rick: Right.

Monte: So, that's a real unique approach. You know, just to go back on that; how do you tie in the technology side to the domain extension side? When you got a .mobi extension, what's behind the scenes that's making sure that things are going to look different or better or be optimized for those types of devices just because it's a .mobi.

Rick: .mobi has a registry at the domain name. It's nothing different from what is out there today. What is different is the registrant will be required to implement .mobi's best practices, and those best practices are incumbent upon the registrant to read the guides, us the sample codes, use the sample technical infrastructure to essentially implement. Now we expect that a large number of the registrars and other hosting companies will implement these along with what they already have to support the .com, .info, etc., domains. But if you are a registrant who wishes to host it yourself, you will have technical manuals, sample code, self-verification tools, etc., that you won't be able to get from .mobi that will be able to help you quickly build your existing site or your new site to operate in the .mobi best practices environment.

Monte: Oh, Okay. So it will come with a kind of a like a building set, a tool set, and a guide to be able to do that. Now, are you going to have to be a webmaster in order to do that or would the layman, the general novice guy that has his domain name, easily be able to configure that. Will you need a web designer to be able to enact your site on a mobile device using the .mobi extension?

Rick: We hope not. We hope that developers of all levels of skill will be able to take the technical guide that we are collecting to produce and just either cut and paste the necessary code into their existing product, or use commercial off-the-shelf products to create .mobi compliance sites. Remember the value of this to developers at all levels is that they create a consistent user experience and customer, and therefore the customer starts using them; and of course, it grows their business.

Monte: Will there be any additional monthly fees tapped into the mobile phones' bills to host these particular web sites. Is an there an additional revenue channel here for the cellular and mobile phone companies to deploy this technology and like host a web site. You know, in the real world, obviously, if somebody wants hosting, you know there's of course a lot of free hosting sites out there, but most people pay you know somewhere between $10 and $50 a month to hose their web site, depending on how elaborate it is. Sometimes it bigger, you know, if it's a much bigger site. Is there an additional angle here for the cellular phone companies and the mobile phone companies to earn additional revenue by, hey for $5 extra a month, you can have your web site enabled?

Rick: No there isn't, Monte. The majority of cell phone providers and cell phone service providers, and mobile operators, already have mobile internet services or mobile internet built into their product. We're utilizing that ability with no additional cost.

Monte: Oh, okay. Great. Now what about all the other companies that didn't jump on the bandwagon on this, like Verizon, AT&T, Cellular One, and all those. Will they be restricted if they're not part of this conglomerate or, explain how that would work with all the phone companies. This just looks like a multi-national movement, but there's a lot of U.S.-based companies that aren't a part of this besides Microsoft.

Rick: That's true. There is a lot of European and Asians in there today. There is no restriction on any one of the companies you named from joining. It's just a timing issue of when they chose to participate. We do, in fact, have open investor slots for mobile industry companies to join and would welcome those companies to join us. I would point out that this is a worldwide initiative. We intend to launch and operate worldwide and the whole premise of this thing to grow the mobile internet and to make it accessible and predictable and discoverable for the end user, and that's why we've come together.

Monte: And will there be a fee for those other companies to jump on board?

Rick: Well, if they choose to invest, they certainly would participate in the capitalization of the company.

Monte: So they would have a choice of joining but not investing and not reaping the rewards of the revenue .mobi extension but they would still be provided the ability to enable the .mobi extension on their networks?

Rick: That's correct. We invite most of, excuse me, we invite all participants of the mobile internet community to join us. We have created something called a membership advisory group which would allow those folks that are interested both in the end user community and in the mobile internet community to get involved up front, to view the policy changes that we are going to be suggesting for .mobi as we move forward, and to give us feedback on what those changes would mean to their business, and more importantly, how best to make this a better consumer experience. So look for information at our web site at www.mTLD.com, look for information on our web site about how to get involved early in the policy formation of this domain. I would mention that we are using a .com address today. We're not in the route yet, but the moment we're in the route, mTLD.mobi will be live.

Monte: Right. Right. Now tell us a little bit about protecting trademarks and that whole process. Obviously each of the new extensions has gone through different types of procedures in order to protect trademark rights of existing .com holders or people that actually have filed either worldwide or United States patents and trademarks. How will that process work with the .mobi extension and how can one be sure that their brand is going to be protected during that registration process? Will there be a pre-registration process for that?

Rick: There will be. In fact, we intend to operate a sunrise period, we don't have the schedule set out yet, but we intend to operate a sunrise period where trademark owners can come in ahead of the land rush, register their domain, we will validate that they are in fact the trademark owner, and that domain will be assigned to them prior to land rush. Once land rush has occurred, we will follow the ICAN UDRP process as defined.

Monte: Okay. So there's the land rush period to protect brands, and then it will be open to the rest of the world I guess.

Rick: Well, there's the sunrise period to protect brands, and then the land rush will open to the world.

Monte: Right. Right. Regarding Microsoft's participation, are you with Microsoft, but are you the representative with Microsoft?

Rick: I'm an MTLD Board Member, but I'm also the representative for Microsoft on that Board.

Monte: And describe Microsoft's general role in this; because they seem to be the only non-mobile company that's involved, I could be wrong just looking at the list of the other companies that are on the Board here, but it seems that Microsoft is the only company that's a non-mobile player probably because of the applications that they have on mobile devices. But is there another Microsoft-like company or another non-mobile company part of this movement, and what role does Microsoft play in this short and long-term, and what about the other companies that are non-mobile in nature?

Rick: Well, I mean, Microsoft considers itself a mobile player in that we have MSN mobile as a service and we ship a mobile operating system, although Windows mobile and a variety of other Microsoft products for mobile devices broadly. So, we think we're a mobile player, our anticipation is that we will create a better customer service and therefore grow the market. As for other companies that are involved, as I said, this was very much a broad coalition to designed to balance the interests of the mobile industry across the coalition such that no particular industry interest gained any particular competitive advantage over the others, and that's why you ended up with handset manufacturers on one side, mobile operators in the middle, and contact providers like MSN and Microsoft and operating providers like Microsoft on the other spectrum. As I mentioned earlier, Monte, we fully anticipate that others will join us either directly as inventors or through the membership advisory group to give us advice on what the policies of the domain should be.

Monte: So there won't be any going back to the restrictive nature of some of the companies, and I see that there's competitive mobile companies; so Microsoft it would be certainly open or this movement would be open to other competitive operating systems that operate on PDAs and mobile devices, I guess?

Rick: Absolutely. I'm sure that you recognized the Nokia is involved as well. At least at the very highest level there are multiple levels of competitive operating systems.

Monte: Hey, I wanted to ask you, where you part of the movement and the initiative from the very start?

Rick: Yeah, pretty close. We've been involved in this Microsoft, MotoPhone, and Nokia have been involved in this for the last 18 months. You mentioned earlier that this was a fast approval process. We don't see that ICAN approved us very quickly, but perhaps in the ICAN world, this was a fast approval.

Monte: Yeah. I was speaking in ICAN terms. It was pretty quick.

Rick: Okay. Well.

Monte: You guys were at it since; well you guys became founded in March 2004, correct?

Rick: That's correct. That's when we put the application in; and then, of course, since March 2004, we went through the ICAN and very public, very transparent investigation process. In December 2004, the ICAN staff recommended approval, and the Board agreed with them. And we then went into commercial negotiations, which cumulated about a month ago; and we launched and told the world about .mobi at the Luxembourg ICAN event last month, excuse me, last week.

Monte: So, why the extension .mobi versus .cell or another, shorter, more descriptive extension name? A lot of people are commenting about why .mobi. I know it's short for mobile, but what was the consideration versus .cell or something that was more cell phone related or mobile device related?

Rick: Well, we tested the names, a lot of the names you just mentioned, we tested those names worldwide, and .mobi came back as the most instantly recognizable to the broadest community that this was a mobile-enabled site.

Monte: Yeah. I guess across Europe .mobi is used a little bit more than it is here; that's probably one of the reasons, I guess. What were some of the other extensions that were being considered?

Rick: Oh, there were a number of them Monte. You know, all of them were shall we say rejected after evaluation and after we went through a test process where we found what the end user would instantly recognize.

Monte: Can you throw a couple at us, just so? I'm just interested in what else besides .cell was considered.

Rick: Ah, .mob was one of them that we considered; but that has obvious….

Monte: [Laughing] That has some unique applications.

Rick: Yeah, exactly. So, you get the idea.

Monte: Well, what else can you tell us that we haven't already covered during the interview so far regarding the extension and it's long-term use?

Rick: Right. Well, let me tell you a little bit about what we're going to be doing next. So, we are very committed to creating a registry service that is best for the end user; and with that in mind, what we are going to be doing over the next six months is essentially putting together the company, working with affiliates and the registrars to make sure that the names can be quickly and conveniently sold into the market. We will be completing the style guides or best practices to make sure that the customer, end user, has a predictable user experience. We will be working with the ISDs in this space to make sure that their sites are up and operational by the time .mobi launches in the first half of 2006. As I mentioned earlier, we're going to start with a 90-day or so sunrise period for trademark owners; and we expect that you will be able to reach, excuse me, see the event schedule and the announcements as soon as we have them ready later this year.

Monte: Great. And I'm also, I also run an ICAN accredited domain registrar, Moniker.com. From a registrar point of view, will there be any extra of, when you fill out your form in terms of understanding of the extension for .jobs or .travel, there will be some extra form areas that one would have to fill out to verify in fact they're from that industry in order to have the right to register that domain name. Knowing that this domain is going to be open to the general public, will there also be a special form or an extra step to complete during the registration process in terms of getting the other part of your application enabled, which is getting a web site onto a mobile device. I mean, will the registrar be the one distributing those tool sets or linking to those tool sets from the registrar applications.

Rick: Monte, the details aren't worked out yet; but I do envision that a registrar would have to make the purchaser of the domain very aware that this new domain .mobi has specific requirements and, of course, to link them to the .mobi site where they can download the tool set and the style guide, the best practices, and so on.

Monte: Okay. Yeah. Because, you know, I'm just thinking forward a little bit about how that all will work and how we help enable those on behalf of our customers so that, when you do register one of those extensions, you make them aware, you provide them with the tool sets so they're most successful, so they have a good user experience, you know, so that they want to come back and register additional names for whatever reason.

Rick: Right. And we agree with you. We understand that requirement, and we'll work with the registrars like yourself to make sure that the consumer, excuse me, the registrant knows that there are specific requirements but not to make them too onerous.

Monte: Alright. Well, great. Anything else that we didn't cover?

Rick: I think you covered it all. I think that, in closing, I just want to repeat that .mobi is all about taking the internet experience to the mobile user in a way that they can find it, otherwise known as discoverability, and that it works every time on their mobile device for a predictable experience. We think that, with the combination of .mobi with the combination of the best practices, with the support of registrars with the enthusiastic response that we've received from comtech providers, ISDs, and ASDs, that we have a product that will dramatically grow through usage of the internet, not just broadly around the world, but specifically on mobile internet devices. I'm very pleased, and I think that most of the emerging markets will see a significant capability by .mobi in that many of the emerging markets have a situation where a consumer's first internet experience, their first email, their first web browsing, could in fact happen on a mobile device; and .mobi will ensure that it is predictable, that it works, and that they come back for more.

Monte: Hey, a good question just came up in the chat room that is pretty interesting; because, as you know, in the on line world in terms of PC-based hosting sites, part of my big listening audience are SEOs, search engine optimizers and web masters. What's going to make a .mobi site searchable on the .mobi platform, and how would one optimize those web sites from a search engine point of view? I mean, are we creating a whole new industry here in terms of getting .mobi sites listed in Google, high page ranks, and [inaudible] ratings, I mean those all be part of that whole initiative on helping one become more visible on the web?

Rick: Well, I think that the search engines generally will be able to find .mobi sites much more quickly simply by the domain extension. It will also be as part of the style guides tagging of contents so that search engines can very quickly find mobile-enabled or mobile-formatted content; and the search engines are expected to build indexes that work specifically on your mobile device. Um, I know that MSN, Google, and others have very much been interested in how .mobi is going to tag the content so that their crawlers can find it, index it better, and make it available to their consumers more quickly.

Monte: Sounds like MSN and Microsoft might have a leg up on Google on this one, since Google is not part of the initiative net.

Rick: I don't think that's true. I think that this is a very transparent process and that everybody will be able to get to the same content at the same time.

Monte: Right. Well, I mean, obviously the goal is to get everybody visible no matter what platform and who's behind it. I was just saying that was some pretty good insight, I guess, on Microsoft's part to get involved in that, and seeing a little bit about the future. We are going a lot more mobile, we're going to be doing stuff that's in our palm or at the tip of our finger, versus carrying around large devices and peripherals and being locked down to a desk. So, if you think about the future a little bit and play it forward a little bit, Microsoft and it's use of its products and services, along with some of the other companies involved, will have a little bit of an advantage there.

Rick: Well, we think, as I said earlier Monte, that the road from the mobile internet services not only the consumer, who is our number one person that we want to make sure they have a good experience, but also services the industry broadly. Like I said, the mobile internet is not being broadly used around the world, with the possible exception of Japan and Korea. We want to see it grow.

Monte: Right, right. Well, that's great. Well, Rick, I really appreciate your time tonight. That was a real education on .mobi, it's movement, where it came from, the companies that are behind it, and the future of it. Again, I do think it's a unique proposition as a registrar; and if I'm a registrant listening and also a web site developer and an SCO, it seems like there is a whole new avenue that could help feed my family in the future based off of this new platform. So, it sounds like it's pretty interesting.

Rick: Good. Glad you like it.

Monte: Alright, well thank you for your time. We're going to take a little commercial break, folks, and just come back and wrap up the show and go over some of the domain sales for the past week from Domain Name Journal. Hang on with me for a minute.

[Commercials]

Monte: Hello folks. Welcome back to the show. Well, that was pretty interesting. I definitely got a lot more insight on this extension in thinking both as a registrar and as an end user. Even though as I just posted on the Board, I don't think .mobi extension sounds like an attractive name; but the powers of the companies behind this extension are pretty unique. I mean, you've got MotoPhone, TIM, Telefonica, Nokia, Ericsson, Microsoft, GSM, and Samsung, all behind this thing. You're talking about millions of active users on those devices. I mean, you have the cell phone makers, the mobile devices, the cellular networks, and of course the applications, like Microsoft, all behind the project. It could be something very big, and I think it will be with that kind of power behind it. I think of people will be registering these domain names; and like I said before, it could open the door for a lot of opportunities for those of you out there that are in the internet business, building web sites, doing SEO for folks, because these are going to use different applications to be searchable in search engines and be more visible. They'll probably different types of shopping cart applications and all kinds of stuff. It's good news that the industry is growing in different ways; and we'll be able to move in different directions to help supply and help support our customers, and you guys will as well. So anyway, I just wanted to, before I wrap up the show, visit DM Journal.com and just update everybody on some of the recent sales in case you haven't been there. Our good friend, customer, and internet guru, Rick Schwartz, web father, sold a big domain name this past week, and he rarely sells domain names, but he sold a domain name for $110,000 that he bought for $35 called PartnerCash. I'm not sure what the buyers are going to do with it yet, but PartnerCash sold for $110,000 to lead the top domain name sales for the week. Dreams.Co.uk sold for $43,000, 25,000 pounds but $43,000. Males.in, so we have an “.in” Indian extension selling for $24,000; that's pretty remarkable since the .in extension is pretty darned new and hasn't been that popular. I'm sorry, it's Mails.in, M-A-I-L-S.in sold for $24,000. Pathology.com sold for $22,000. Best.info sold for $20,880. Predators.com sold for $18,900. BlindDates.de, a German extension, sold for $18,350. Illusions.com, which was sold right here at Moniker through our escrow service, sold for $18,300. PittsburghPA.com sold for $16,750. Synergy.net sold for $16,255. So, there's the top 10 for the past week; and I thought it was pretty interesting to see a couple different extensions up there in the top ten, especially the .co.uk, a .in, a .info, and a .net, all in the top ten this week. So, instead of all .com; so it's pretty unique. I'm sure we'll have Ron Jackson on in a couple weeks and we'll be able to talk to him more about that. And I think we're starting to see a lot of that coming down the line. We also had two large 6-figure sales this past week, which we have to keep confidential; but I can tell you the market is strong and everybody is seeing the value of their domain names and it's definitely fall through both to the sellers and to the buyers, the value in the domain marketplace. So with that said, I'm going to wrap up the show. Next week, I have a very interesting guest on. Jamis MacNivan, who is considered the prime minister of Silicon Valley. He owns a restaurant in Silicon Valley in Woodside, California called Buck's; and Buck's happens to be the place where many of the internet companies were first invented and thought of on napkins and basically, it happened in his restaurant. And he's got a lot of interesting stories about how some of the concepts of the internet today, how some of the big today, were just concepts on napkins and in meetings at his restaurant in Silicon Valley. And it's going to be a pretty cool interview. He's a unique guy, very colorful, and thought it would be interesting to have him on board. So with that said, have a great week. Come back next week on Domain Masters. Remember the archives are at Moniker.com and also at WebmasterRadio.FM. There are also some great shows on WebmasterRadio.FM to listen to, that you should be listening to on a regular basis. Make sure you listen to all the shows. And the archives are available. And I think we're up to our 4th or 5th show being transcribed, so we have it in text form now. It's a long process to get them all transcribed, but we have them available on Moniker.com as well. Have a great week, and I'll see you next week, same time, same place, on Domain Masters.

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