If you have any domain names registered with yahoo, you may want to consider moving them to a less expensive registrar before they start hitting you with $35/yr renewal fees!

I registered a few domains with them last year at less than $10 a year which was great, but them asking $35/yr to renew is crazy! I haven't seen prices that high since Network solutions had a monopoly on the business!

See the Cnet write up here for more details.

Maybe they should've taken that buyout offer from MS if they need the cash so badly?

Steve

Steve,

Thanks for the heads-up. Yahoo will raise their prices to $34.95 and Network Solutions is $34.99. Sounds like Yahoo is using another Registrar as a backend.

API
I used to work in that industry and I saw how really big companies who don't have registration as a core business but still want to offer the service to their clients have no problem having another registrar provide an API to their registration system. I know because I developed a system to do that. And it was totally hush-hush because the much bigger company didn't want their clients easily knowing unless they asked.

Yahoo To?
Based on what the deal was when I did that years ago, it's sounds a lot like what Yahoo is doing. Can't blame them. If they're not good at it then farm the work out. I wish companies wouldn't have to "lie" about it though. People will still call them for help and Yahoo gets to upsell to them.

Then again, maybe that last thing has slowed down to so they're not seeing as much market penetration so they have to raise their entry level service.

Cheap Domains
You probably already know, domains are cheap. They're theoretical, they're not real. And registries still get to charge a bundle. 5 years ago the raw cost of a .com domain registration was $6. Registrations have had fees added on over the years but it's still got to be less than $7. Sell that for $10 leaves a razor thin margin so again and they have to support it all year. I can't blame them for raising prices.

Registry vs. Registrar
Note for those who may not know; Registries actually manage the technicals of the Top-Level Domain (TLD) they were assigned by ICANN. Registrars (Godaddy, Tucows, Register.com, Network Solutions) are conduits between end-users (us) and the Registry. They lease domains wholesale and sell them retail.

Leased Domains
Notice the word lease? Something most people don't know, you don't actually own a domain name...you just control it. This is evidenced by the fact that if you don't pay the Registrar they take the domain and don't have to give it back even if you pay.

Free My Domains
They're usually supposed to release the domain back to the Registry after some amount of time. Usually. I've heard some Registrars have associations with domain squatters (aka cyber-squatters) that have a "high priority" to purchase newly expired domains. Among other reasons being that many of the people come looking for the domain they used to control and will pay a premium to get it back.

The registrars I worked with had dual personalities. They had retail clients and corporate clients like Time-Warner who has over 20,000 properties. Whoever scores those kind of corporate accounts is in heaven so the competition is fierce.

Thanks again.

Thanks for the additional info Kawika!

You know I can't blame them for raising prices. I'm sure they were hoping to upsell a lot of folks to web hosting etc... and I guess that didn't happen as they'd planned, but to go back to pricing from 10 years ago seems like a bad move in my book.

It's interesting to see GoDaddy capitalize on this and I'm sure they'll get a lot of domains transferred to them as a result.

Cheers,

Steve

I believe MelbourneIT is handling registrations for Yahoo.

Expired names, even if they are dropped by the registrar, get picked up by an auction service like SnapNames.

I wouldn't go so far as to call them cyber-squatters. Cybersquatting is when you purchase a domain name that is a trademark...usually with the purpose of trying to resell it to the TM holder or their competitors.

If you have a good domain, it's worth money, and it's up to you to keep it registered. The fact that someone sees the value in it, doesn't make them a squatter.

You have to understand that usually the domineers don't intend to sell it back to the original party...they keep it to monetize the traffic or to sell it to the general market. It's like the people who swoop down in housing auctions and buy property cheap. They don't really intend to sell it to the person who lost it.

Thanks for the link. He he, man that was quick. I like godaddy...now. At first they were annoying and their support was horrible. They evolved nicely. Cheers.