The MediaWizard’s Blog | mwzd.com

I’ve been watching the LLLL.com or four letter .com scenario, fairly closely, for the longest of times. I started using DomainTools (or whois.sc as it was known then) to harvest these lists for a while in 2006. In fact, thats what got me interested in domaining in the first place. Well that and the fact that our programs were churning out domains that were nice seo-wise but terrible viz brand value, but thats another story.

In the beginning, around middle of 2006, there were hundreds of LLLL.com available for hand regs, even then though, single words were gone, so were popular acronyms and even major country code + LL. You could still find gems but you didn’t see them as that then. I got a few time and again, some for projects, some for putting turnkey sites on to resell and some for a private collection. They were short, easy to remember and .com, sold pretty well with ready-to-go sites even then.

Towards the end of 2007 there was a rush of registrations, now people might argue here that monthly regs were only slightly higher, but fact of the matter is that they were going… fast. Sites came up with countdowns - most have since been turned into parked pages. There was a general rush of registering these, even the worst ones, since nobody wanted to ‘miss the gravy train’.

To be honest, the price hike at the beginning of 2008 took me completely by surprise and I dumped almost all my 4Ls then for $35-$300 each. People jumped head first into short domains, prices went ballistic. Propagators of this philosophy became the new messiahs (A few are in my blog roll* - Michael Goldman, Reece Berg, Richard, Yofie and Italian Dragon). Every word they spoke was treated as god’s own truth. Partially they were right. If you bought a crappy 4L.com in oct 2007 for $7, or reg fee as its popularly called, you could easily ‘flip’ them for $30 or so in bulk. Which basically meant you quadrupled your investment value in 4 months or so, unbelievable returns as any investment manager will tell you. [*Edit-k, I messed up here, forgot a few important names - which I've added now, very embarrassing, apologies to MG & Y]

Prices continued to rise, soaring to $60 ‘for the worst ones’ on any forum or sales venue till the middle of feb ‘08. Then came the pause, it sent prices for the worst ones came crashing down to more logical levels and those for the best ones went through the roof. This is where the conundrum actually comes in… What really makes a 4letter .com valuable? Why have the prices suddenly gone ballistic? Why are priced dropping in the reseller market? A lot has been said about this by various people, I’ll give you my take.

Short domain values are based on applicability. What is or is not premium is directly related to the applicability of that particular domain to a function, the more the applicability the higher the value. Domainers on the other hand love to talk about premium letters.

What are and what are not premium letters are not subject to random statistics or studies. A company using that particular combination of letters will find that domain premium, regardless of what domainers think.

This of course does not take into account pronounceable names - these are more valuable as brands as they can be easily branded and promoted. Thats why premium cvcv’s have gone through the roof. If a domain sounds cool and is brandable (eg. xegg.com), it has great value, specially with new companies and brands being launched everyday.

So a domain that might be valuable for one end user might not be for another and vice versa. They are not going to make any new ones, the ones that are there are getting scarcer and scarcer as they slip into large portfolio holders’ hands. The worst ones might be dipping in value now, but eventually even they will be worth something to someone.

Sorry to say it but I predicted India’s first round exit from the World Cup sometime back. I’ve been on a vacation and not really keeping track of what happened, only got to know that my dire prediction came true on the flight back. Was with some gujarati pals who seem to think that both India and Pakistan were paid off, most of the top players performed worse than some school cricket teams, pathetic.

An extreme reaction to the shocking exits, just like stoning players houses (forgot that you were kissing the ground they walked on just a few days back?!!) but not entirely unexpected. We Indians do seem to be extreme when it comes to cricket. I always felt that we put too much of our national pride in a privately run team of individuals who are more interested in individual performances, endorsements and money they can make from them, than the game itself. While some, like Sachin & Dravid, probably deserve it, most are just flash in the pan performers. And some don’t even deserve to be in it.

Now Zee has announced a new cricket league. Another money making racket or a new way for corporate India to get involved with sport, only time will tell. But if they can even provide a platform to deserving people who don’t make it to the team just because of regional politics (and other petty considerations) within the selection committe, this will be a good initiative in the long run.

Since none of my advice was followed I assume that the powers that be don’t read my blog (or probably any other for that matter). Sad, so sad. As it is our performance in sports worldwide is pathetic, we don’t even matter in the Asian games, leave alone the Olympics! Now I guess the average Indian sports fan will also have to give up on cricket.

What next? Gulli danda? or Kho Kho (kabbaddi)? I guess we will be the best till some small country with a population of 20,000 people beats us at them too.