According to the New York Times, in 2005, David Choe was invited to paint murals on the walls of Facebook’s first offices in Palo Alto, Calif., by Sean Parker, then Facebook’s president. As pay, Mr. Parker offered Mr. Choe a choice between cash in the “thousands of dollars,” according to several people who know Mr. Choe, or stock then worth about the same.

Mr. Choe, who has said that at the time that he thought the idea of Facebook was “ridiculous and pointless,” nevertheless chose the stock.

Many “advisers” to the company at that time, which is how Mr. Choe would have been classified, would have received about 0.1 to 0.25 percent of the company, according to a former Facebook employee. That may sound like a paltry amount, but a stake that size is worth hundreds of millions of dollars, based on a market value of $100 billion. Mr. Choe’s payment is valued at roughly $200 million, according to a number of people who know Mr. Choe and Facebook executives.

Today was the final day of DomainFest when the big domain auction is held…To date, the reported sales was $393,450 for 23 sold domains out of 61 domains.

The Top 10 Domain Name Sales were:
Place Domain Price
1 Empire.com $135,000.00
2 Qe.com $89,000.00
3 CatFood.com $62,000.00
4 Marriages.com $36,000.00
5 ICard.com $26,000.00
6 RentalTrucks.com $12,500.00
7 Avengers.com $4,000.00
8 Margo.com $4,000.00
9 StripMall.com $3,700.00
10 LiverDonor.com $3,000.00

It’s interesting to note that a few high bids were rejected for EO.com ($200k), Sox.com ($50k) and Drill.com ($42k)

@AndrewHazen

According to Domain Name Wire, legendary domainer Gary Chernoff has sold BowlingBalls.com for $225,000 to Nick Melnikoff, who has bowled in PBA tours and owns Bowlers Paradise, a web site that sells bowling balls and accessories.

Recent domain sales within the past year for Chernoff include:

BlueJeans.com – $150,000
Ripley.com – $78,000
MoneyLender.com – $75,000

Not bad and certainly motivating!! Congratulation Gary!!

@AndrewHazen

A World Intellectual Property Organization panel has awarded Twitter the domain name Twittr.com in a uniform domain name dispute resolution policy (UDRP) proceeding.

Twittr.com was originally registered before Twitter’s “first use in commerce” date on its trademark for “Twitter”. Although Twitter says it actually started the service prior to this first use date, it was a moot point in this case because the current owner purchased the domain after the first use date.

The owner of the domain, identified as 21562719 Ont Ltd a/k/a Galt Networks Inc., did not respond to Twitter’s complaint. The registrant acquired the domain after Twitter purchased the Twitter.com domain name.

You can read the entire WIPO decision here

@AndrewHazen

The Wisconsin man who has owned Newspapers.com is selling the domain name and hoping to get up to $1 million for it. “[Francis Diederich] bought the domain back in 1994 or 1995 and always thought he would do something with it, but he never developed it,” says broker John Cribb, who is handling the sale. (The site is currently a newspaper website directory.)

“He turned down big money for it in the old days — he had offers of $750,000 and $1 million,” says Cribb. “My guess is that somewhere between $400,000 and a million is what he’d like to get now.” Cribb says newspapers.com appears as the first or second result in a Google search for newspapers. (The New York Times, he notes, owns newspaper.com.)

@AndrewHazen

The interview below is from Domain Sherpa…In this show, I shares how I turned 90 admittedly marginal hand-registered .com domain names and one .info domain into $56,000 per month. (The interviewee has seen the Google Adsense report to verify this impressive figure.) You will be surprised to learn that in addition to search engine optimization, a clever television ad campaign drove the results.

Enjoy the show and let me know what you think….

@AndrewHazen

A Dallas firm has sued an anonymous “Ben Doe” who allegedly wrote a negative Google Review about the firm, a case that highlights the difficulties lawyers face when trying to address online comments.

The Lenahan Law Firm seeks to collect $50,000 from “Ben,” who wrote the review that reads, “Bad experience with this firm. Don’t trust the fake reviews here,” the plaintiff alleges in its petition in In Re “Ben Doe.”

“Discovery will include an investigation into the identity of ‘Ben,’ ” the firm notes, adding that a “subpoena will be served upon Google immediately.”

In the petition, filed Dec. 22, 2011, in Travis County’s 98th District Court, the firm alleges the review is defamatory because it “implies professional incompetence” and “alleges dishonesty and fraudulent conduct by the Plaintiff, though the ‘fake reviews’ were written by actual clients and are bona fide.” [See the Lenahan petition.]

Lenahan Law Firm partner Wes Black says he does not even think “Ben” was a client of his firm. The firm found a review of a cleaning company written by someone under the same online profile. Based on that, Black thinks the reviewer lives in Oregon, and the firm has never represented a person in Oregon.

@AndrewHazen

Virgin boss Richard Branson is attempting to gain control of the domain RichardBranson.xxx.

The company took the action after an individual unconnected with the company registered the name.

“We have a complaint against the owner of RichardBranson.xxx,” a Virgin spokesman said.

The .xxx top-level domain launched last year after considerable debate. Virgin said it was spending an increasing amount of time protecting its brands, including the Branson name, online.

In order to win control of the domain Virgin has filed an application with the National Arbitration Forum, a body which deals with domain name disputes.

Virgin’s claim will turn on factors such as whether the original registration was in good faith and what legitimate interest the present owner may have to the use of the name.

I’ll let you know what happens…..stay tuned!

@AndrewHazen

Pearl Jam frontman Eddie Vedder is trying to secure the web address EddieVedder.com. According to Fusible, a complaint (WIPO Case Number: D2012-0035) was recorded this past week with the World Intellectual Property Organization regarding the domain name. EV Touring, Inc., which owns the trademark of Eddie Vedder, is the complainant in the domain debate.

Fusible states that what stands out about this particular grievance is that according to WHOIS records, Pearl Jam owned the domain eddievedder.com in the mid-2000s through late 2010, at which point the domain name was transferred over to Whois privacy. So, Vedder perhaps forgot to make payment to keep the site, and somebody took notice and lapped it up, likely hoping to make profit.

Aftermarket, which is an online shopping space for various domain names, has EddieVedder.com listed for sale for at a steep $18,400!

Best of luck Eddie, I truly hope you get your name back and keep on rockin in the free world!

@AndrewHazen

A group of Vancouver-based New Zealand expats has made an application for the .kiwi internet domain.

If Dot Kiwi’s application is successful, the new domain is expected to be available to individuals or organizations in early 2013.

Dot Kiwi says it will establish a fund from the sale of .kiwi domains to benefit the Christchurch rebuild.

A percentage of the revenue and profit before tax from the sale of .kiwi domains will be donated to a trust formed to receive, administer and distribute funds to Christchurch as they are earned and donated. The trust will be chaired by Sir John Hansen, a former High Court judge.

@AndrewHazen