I think the best I can tell you Robert is for the right offer we would sell
Domain Direct happily. Our commitment is to the wholesale business and, as
mentioned previously, the Opera deal is, in essence a wholesale deal.
I don't know if you have seen what Yahoo is doing. Virtually every other ad
is for a domain name. As companies who previously relied exclusively on
advertising are forced away from an exclusively ad-centered model, you will
see more and more of this. Domain names and messaging are some of the best
opportunities for profitable use of excess inventory and loyal customers.
For those of you who have a really nice set of end-user tools and features,
are able to create your environment out of relatively simple templates, and
are able to provide a bit of customer service, there are great opportunities
out there. Call your buddy who has that struggling for revenue content site
with a couple million excess ads a month, and there are hundreds of them.
Heck, don't be shy. Call some biz dev wonk at a public content company
struggling for revenue and educate him. The Yahoo site provides an awesome
selling tool. The good news is in the current environment there is no need
for placement fees. Everything is transactional. Yahoo is buying wholesale
names (not from us) and they are kicking ass.
The Micron thing today is in the same vein
(http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20010323/bs/interland_micron_dc_1.html).
Microsoft and Oracle are talking about Web Services as the future. Names,
messaging and hosting are Web Services that are big, lucrative markets
today. Certs and payment processing facilitate commerce and the first three.
For those doing it right you are in the right business at the right time.
Regards
Elliot Noss
----- Original Message -----
From: "Tiger Technologies" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Sent: Friday, March 23, 2001 11:08 PM
Subject: Re: Tucows browser deal incorporates domaindirect functionality
> At 3/23/01 5:21 PM, William X. Walsh wrote:
>
> >"Tucows' domain name registration service, Domain Direct, will also be
> >incorporated into the new browser, offering users the ability to easily
> >register and manage domain names. Users can search for and register a
domain
> >name anytime by simply clicking on a link in the button bar. They will
also
> >be able to set up multiple e-mail accounts, forward domain names and
manage
> >their domains."
>
> I see William's just going to post the facts and let others do the
> ranting. Sheesh. I guess I'll have to do it if nobody else will....
>
> I realize that Tucows had Domain Direct running before starting OpenSRS,
> so there's probably little to be done about its existence. But if Tucows
> is making new deals, it bothers me greatly that Domain Direct would get
> an advantage over other resellers that comes directly from being a
> division of Tucows.
>
> OpenSRS makes a big deal out of the fact that unlike other registrars
> (such as the one mentioned on this list last week), they don't compete
> with us. However, that's a convenient fiction that just doesn't hold
> water. Domain Direct *does* compete with us, and they are part of the
> same company as OpenSRS. Every domain sold through Domain Direct via a
> click of that Opera button is one less potential sale for an OpenSRS
> reseller.
>
> The fact that Tucows is selling domains retail under a different name
> seems to have lulled people into believing there's no conflict: if Domain
> Direct was called "OpenSRS End User Domain Registration", I bet there
> would be a big brouhaha.
>
> I know this stuff is subtle, and there are many arguments that can be
> made here. Someone will point out that I, too, could pay the Opera people
> and get a link in the Opera button bar. Of course, I probably couldn't
> afford to do so, and neither, I suspect, could Domain Direct if they
> didn't happen to be owned by a company that has something Opera wants.
> Maybe it's just my tough luck that I'm not owned by a portal company, and
> that's capitalism for you; I certainly can't fault Tucows for trying to
> make a buck.
>
> But that's the whole point. Tucows is just trying to make a buck, and in
> this particular case they could have done it two ways. They could have
> made a deal to put a link on that button bar that took people to a list
> of OpenSRS resellers (or a random reseller), or they could just choose to
> link to Domain Direct instead.
>
> Why they chose as they did is somewhat irrelevant. Sure, they make at
> least three times as much money per transaction with Domain Direct, but
> maybe they can justify the decision totally aside from any financial
> considerations at all. Still, there *are* financial ramifications of this
> decision, and these work out to the benefit of Domain Direct/Tucows and
> to the detriment of OpenSRS resellers. Some would say the end result is
> okay if the decision was well intentioned, but I don't like the fact that
> a conflict happened at all.
>
> There's a myth that due to carefully constructed institutional firewalls,
> etc., THERE WILL BE NO POSSIBILITY OF CONFLICTS between OpenSRS resellers
> and Domain Direct, as if Domain Direct were in a blind trust.
>
> As we can see, that's not true. THERE WILL BE CONFLICTS, even
> unintentional ones, where Tucows has an opportunity to decide whether to
> offer a lucrative advantage to Domain Direct or to all OpenSRS resellers.
> And if Tucows keeps Domain Direct running, there will be more. It doesn't
> matter what Tucows intends; the very nature of selling both wholesale and
> retail leads to conflicts. It's a long-standing business issue, and
> unfortunately many companies that try to maintain both retail and
> wholesale channels eventually lose the goodwill of their resellers,
> usually to the detriment of both parties.
>
> The only way to surely avoid people thinking you're screwing them due to
> a conflict of interest is to avoid the very possibility of conflicts
> happening in the first place. As long as Tucows runs Domain Direct,
> that's impossible.
>
> Maybe there's no way around it; it seems like every registrar competes
> with their resellers. So be it. But most of the others aren't doing what
> Tucows is doing: selling retail under one name (and spending
> money/resources promoting that channel) while selling wholesale under
> another name with the statement "we focus exclusively on the
> 'business-to-business' market". It's, um, disingenuous.
>
> At least we can all be honest about it: Tucows sells domain names, both
> retail and wholesale. Their retail channel competes with many of the
> resellers who buy from their wholesale channel, and sometimes they make
> choices that favor one over the other.
>
> If that doesn't bother anyone, that's fine. Bothers me some, though.
>
>
> --
> Robert L Mathews, Tiger Technologies
>
> [Standard disclaimer... I generally like OpenSRS and there's no need to
> tell me to go somewhere else if I disagree with some policies... we spend
> the most effort criticizing the ones we love... etc. In fact, while I've
> got the space, a tip o'the hat to OpenSRS for fixing some o' the
> outstanding bugs today.]
