Godaddy: Don't Buy dot-TV Domains, The Island is Sinking.

If I'm reading the pop-up window correctly, domain registrar Godaddy recommends against purchasing .tv domain names because the island of Tuvalu, which the domain represents, is sinking. One more reason not to get bent out of shape over the fact that CNN bought "boingboing.tv" out from under us back in 2007. (via Eddie Codel)

• [stacywinters11]

  Haha, that’s pretty hilarious, just the comment on GoDaddy. I always thought .tv domains just stood for television. Not some sinking island. Lol.

• [Anonymous]

  I’m pretty sure the only reason GoDaddy put that notice is for legal reasons..

• [OuChTrOnX]

  @15

  No, sorry to you – cybersquatters suck, no two ways about it. Thanks for the thoroughness, though of your post and the link provided – not your responsibility domaintools returns what it does. Keep up the good work I enjoy reading everyday.

• [gabrielm]

  BOINGBOING.ME is available if you guys are planning a “mobile edition”/”middle east”/”is about you!(tm)” section. And I don’t think that Montenegro is going to sink any time soon.

• [Anonymous]

  GoDaddy hosts my kids’ boy scout troop site, which my spouse administrates.

  GoDaddy tech support says “there is no way to password protect your pages” full stop. This from three separate techs!

  The parents want a password-protected page to share email addresses with each other, and the kids too. They do not want to post a unprotected page full of valid email addresses of young boys for pederasts to find (This is of course ridiculous, and what they need to worry about is SPAMMERS and botnets scraping those addresses, not pedophiles).

  But in any case, GoDaddy is unable to provide any assistance with this butt-simple task. Use another registrar.

  • [Anonymous]

    read up on .htaccess and .htpasswd files then do it yourself.
    odd if the techs dont know how, or want people to secure their site. :?

• [Anonymous]

  Not to totally talk past the point, but the island of Tuvalu isn’t so much “sinking” as sea levels are rising due to the effects of climate change.

  I’ll always remember this NPR story I heard a while ago where the people of Tuvalu pooled their money to send an ambassador to the UN’s climate talks at the time with an impassioned plea for their nation’s existence:
  http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=10950375

  But this has been going on for a while:
  http://www.tuvaluislands.com/warming.htm

• [aelfscine]

  #19: *watches as Montenegro slips beneath the waves into Davy Jones’ locker* Now look what you’ve done!

• [Anonymous]

  How funny… I actually work for GoDaddy — albeit not directly for the domains group. I’ll ask around, see if I can probably find out who wrote this. (FWIW, they’re a pretty good employer here in the PHX area…)

• [Brainspore]

  @ Gavrielm #19:

  If we all work together I bet we can turn the phrase “BoingBoing me!” into some kind of sexual innuendo.

• [MB10]

  While on the subject of top level domains, I thought that .com basically meant it was a US site? I came across this site today, and it is clearly a UK site. Can you use .com for any country?

  http://www.uk-shoppingonline.com

• [dainel]

  If we turn it into a rubbish dump, it can still be saved. They could sacrifice one of the islands and have it start growing today.

• [Anonymous]

  The island is not sinking. It’s the oceans that are rising!

• [Anonymous]

  so what happens to people that have a .tv domain – I contribute to a music blog that uses a .tv account (creamteam.tv), will the domain be in jeopardy if the nation sinks? They wouldn’t rescind the contract would they?

• [Anonymous]

  But what about that Island that had an earthquake and rose up 10 feet?

• [merreborn]

  #20:

  Godaddy’s not all that bad as a registrar… but they’re a dreadful host. Register with GoDaddy, host elsewhere.

• [Anonymous]

  server underwater = sites underwater= no more site

• [Anonymous]

  I haven’t ever seen reviews as bad as godaddy seems to go. What godaddy should have said is don’t buy anything from us, including .tv:

  http://hostjury.com/reviews/godaddy

• [Anonymous]

  All of the television networks bought .TV domain names and use them exclusively TNT.tv CNN.tv History Channel.tv- Go Daddy jacked up the price for .TV domains to $39.99 and is using a marketing ploy to sell the .tv names as such.This is all based on fright of a island that may perish someday. All proper domains are decided by and regulated ICANN and should be the only mitigating source for the demise of a .TV extention. Certainly not Bob Parsons of Go Daddy.com………… The Networks will never let the extention die…follow the money…!!

• [hectorinwa]

  And then there’s this: http://www.darrenbarefoot.com/archives/2005/06/godaddy-president-favours-torture.html

  And the boyscouts being more afraid of pedophiles than spammers it totally in line with their policy regarding who can be a scout leader:
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boy_Scouts_of_America_membership_controversies

• [RM]

  I’m launching an TV network (tiny little network) and I’m not sure if I should roll out with the .TV or the .COM domain that I secured. What do you think? Which DN should I use for marketing and communications. Example, let’s assume the network name is Four Television, should I use fourtv.com or four.tv? I want to brand the network as “four” not “four tv” thus the dot come situation throws me off. Feedback? Thank you.

• [Astara]

  Why would the island sinking be a problem?

  1) while most governments are sinking, they could be the first to be fully functionally while underwater!

  2) Having no land doesn’t prevent a government from continuing (Tibet)

  3) Supporting a sinking nation could enable them to solve the problem! They might start importing all the mounds of “trash” from developed countries and build gigantic mountains as countries do now and have done for centuries. Landfill becomes the mountains of tomorrow — already packed with mineral wealth to mine in the future! They could become rich by solving the landfill problems of other countries!

• [Anonymous]

  It should switch from .tv to .atl

• [Anonymous]

  just checked the USPTO database.. You Haven’t Trademarked Boingboing ?

  really?

• [Anonymous]

  #23 Godaddy’s not all that bad as a registrar
  I second that. Their hosting may suck and their marketing is creepy, but their domain registration and certs are competitively priced and I have never had any problem reaching a live, English-speaking support rep immediately. Most web retailers make you search endlessly for their support number and then subject you to a labyrinth of touch-tone options. I’ve switched all my registration and cert business to GoDaddy for this very reason.

• [adamnvillani]

  I find it difficult to believe that I’m the first person to point out that there is no single “island of Tuvalu.” Tuvalu is a nation comprising a group of islands, none of which is individually named Tuvalu. The capital island is Funafuti.

• [Anonymous]

  #8 – the USAToday article quotes someone who is wrong

  http://domainnamewire.com/2009/04/30/godaddy-disses-tv-and-what-it-says-about-the-echo-chamber/

• [nosehat]

  After turning on a TV for the first time in a long time today, and wading through a rising ocean of commercials trying to find any dry land of substantive content on network broadcast, I began to wonder: Which will disappear faster, Tuvalu or TV?

• [Antinous / Moderator]

  Huh? What do the Boy Scouts have to do with this post?

• [Brainspore]

  @ Anonymous #34: I think you’re thinking of Nauru, which is one of only two independent countries with a population smaller than Tuvalu. That was a great TAL episode though.

• [Anonymous]

  Once Tuvulu is under water it will be the perfect location for the Secret Headquarters of EvilGenius.tv!

• [Anonymous]

  pardon me if someone’s already written this but if i’m not mistaken, a company bought what amounts to a long term lease on the .tv domain from the island about 8 years ago. I think they paid like $10 million which was enough for a new highway and not much else. it’s a shame tuvalu didn’t negotiate a piece of the back end…

• [hectorinwa]

  @antinous, #20 brought them up. ;-)

• [Anonymous]

  If Godaddy is adamant about this then why aren’t the tv domains names going to $1 instead of the price they are?
  Does Godaddy intend buying them all and then selling them back to the public at a higher price????????

• [Anonymous]

  I must admit I avoid websites with strange domain tags.

  However I do believe .biz should be the ironic domain for future low brow websites.

• [Anonymous]

  I thought .tv meant television? d’oh!

• [Iason]

  So, you haven’t yet taken CNN to court yet for cybersquatting because . . .

  If you happen to need a good lawyer for such a thing, I would happy to take that on contingency. Or for free, just for fun.

• [Anonymous]

  who wants to help me start the “Ladders for Tuvala Foundation”?

• [Brian H Campbell]

  I am shocked at even the remote posibility .tv could sink. If the island does sink then making .tv only a media domain name makes it much more valuable.

  Also, what about integrity? The registars built up .tv to its customers and now some say its no good? Godaddy should use its influence to protect their customers who bought .tv’s from them, not bring down the value.

• [Anonymous]

  I can’t believe no-one’s noted the Uniform Domain Name Dispute Resolution Policy (wiki link). No need for a lawsuit per se: everyone who buys a domain name agrees to this disputes process. Boing Boing has extremely good grounds to get boingboing.tv off those Time Warner bastards.

• [Brandon Abell]

  @ iason #41: I’m no lawyer, but I don’t think you can do much in a civil action if there are no damages. It would take far more than owning a domain name similar to somebody else’s (and they aren’t even doing anything with it, commercial or otherwise) to even make it worth the filing fee. Best case scenario the judge awards $1 damages and requires that the domain be transferred. And all that would do is *cost* boingboing money because now they’d have to pay the domain reg renewals.

• [Ian Holmes]

  Domain Name: BOINGBOING.TV
  Registrar: CSC CORPORATE DOMAINS, INC.
  Whois Server: whois.corporatedomains.com
  Referral URL: http://www.cscprotectsbrands.com
  Name Server: TWDNS-01.NS.AOL.COM
  Name Server: TWDNS-02.NS.AOL.COM
  Name Server: TWDNS-03.NS.AOL.COM
  Name Server: TWDNS-04.NS.AOL.COM
  Status: CLIENT-XFER-PROHIBITED
  Updated Date: 21-apr-2009
  Creation Date: 18-may-2007
  Expiration Date: 18-may-2010

• [Anonymous]

  As the owner of a .tv site that is currently underwater, it’s only appropriate that the island would sink too.

• [Cowicide]

  I was thinking about purchasing this domain from these guys:
  http://iptools.com/dnstools.php?tool=whois&user_data=boingboing.com&submit=Go

  …and starting some sort of blog with it … what could possibly go wrong?

• [monkeythumpa]

  Wouldn’t this be a reason to buy a .tv domain? Once the island is underwater they will stop issuing domains. They will be rare.

  • [Anonymous]

    no because the DOMAIN NAME SERVERS that control the domain will be out of service.

• [bveditz]

  considering they’re going to be opening up all sorts of domains soon with just about any extension, i don’t think .tv would be going anywhere. Guess Tuvulu will just become one of those nations without land.

• [Jay Levitt]

  I think the story-behind-the-joke is that GoDaddy can’t offer .tv domains, so they’re spreading funny(ish) false rumors about it instead.

  I have an .fm domain, and I think the same company maintains the .fm, .am and .tv registries. For one brief moment in the 1990s, it seemed that they would be the trendy spot for existing radio and TV stations.

  Guess not.

• [MrWeeble]

  @Anonymous #28

  It’s not actually such a bad deal, if you look at https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/tv.html it says that the deal was for $50 million for a 12 year deal, a little over $4 million a year. For a country with a total GDP (presumably including this) of $14 million per year, that means this is a pretty huge amount

• [Brainspore]

  Technically the island is staying where it is, but it’s so shallow that it will be submerged by even a modest rise in ocean level. That’s why I insist that my tropical islands all come with active volcanoes.

• [ZoopyFunk]

  If BB did not own the domain at the time, how could they have bought it out ‘from under you’?

• [MajorD]

  Monkeythumpa is right! Maybe in a few years, it’d be like having an Atlantis domain. What would that be anyway .atl? .at? .ats?

  Although, it isn’t as if your websites would actually be hosted at Tuvalu, or run through networks there, is it? So there’s no physical reason the domain should expire just because those islands sink. And in the meantime, aren’t those Tuvaluans (Tuvalese? Tuvalunes? Tuvalutes?) trying to raise enough funds to move their whole population someplace else? I thought there was talk of moving the whole nation to Australia. So they’re going to need the money they’d get from licensing the .TV domain.

  Having a .tv address should become a sign of support and compassion for their cause. Their largest island is hardly large enough for a game of Ultimate Frisbee, and they’re losing it to global warming. That’s enough suckage for one tiny nation already. Go Daddy shouldn’t be trashing their cause.

• [Anonymous]

  The whois link says no match for boingboing.tv? Perhaps it’s time to go grab it, Xeni?

• [GeekMan]

  @#1: The breakup of the Soviet Union hasn’t stopped the persistent registrars of .su domains.

  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/.su

• [catfood]

  @#23 & 25

  I’d be careful of GoDaddy even as a registrar.

  A decade or so ago, many registrars started writing into their contracts that if you registered a domain with them, they were actually the owner and they were merely leasing your own domain back to you.

  So, for instance, if you happened to own IBM.com and the IBM corporation wanted to buy your domain, the registrar to could refund your $15, kick you off your own domain, and collect a big fat check from IBM by selling your (their) domain out from under you. It’s been many, many years, but I remember reading about this actually happening; I’m pretty certain the registrar was GoDaddy.

  They may have changed the contract wording by now. But when I started registering domains in the mid-90′s, I looked at GoDaddy’s legalese and ran screaming to a different registrar.

• [Anonymous]

  http://www.who.is/nameserver/twdns-01.ns.aol.com/

  same name server as cartoon network, but obviously a conspiracy, not like “boing boing” and “tv” would have anything to do with cartoons and television

  now, if John K. had registered it the use would obviously be innocent, but since a large corporation is involved it is obviously an attack on the happy mutants

  • [Xeni Jardin]

    No, in fact it was CNN.

• [Avram / Moderator]

  According to Wikipedia, the .tv domain is operated by a subsidiary of VeriSign.

• [Anonymous]

  A search for “tuvalu sinking domain” online gives this refutation of this story from 2004. Godaddy should probably take a look at this little thing called Google before they get all hot and bothered.

  http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/technology/maney/2004-04-27-tuvalu_x.htm

• [jjasper]

  Of course, even if it sinks, it’s still a nation, so after it sinks, enough people can buy citizenship cheap, r-write the constitution, and whammo, instant indisputable micro-nation. Net-based currency for all!

• [sophos7]

  http://www.thesinkingoftuvalu.com/

• [Anonymous]

  Tuvalu sold the rights to its domain for $50 Million (keeping the right to still use it for national websites).

• [Anonymous]

  Strictly speaking, the island is NOT sinking, sea level is rising.

• [Anonymous]

  I had also heard they were using .tv to help move people off the island, but a quick search only turned up this article:

  http://www.tuvaluislands.com/news/dot-tv/deal1.htm

  why would godaddy discourage people from buying .tv addresses?

• [W. James Au]

  Somewhat related, a lot of Second Life users are registering sites with “.sl” as a domain. Which makes sense for metaverse branding reasons, but then, these are being offered by… the government of war- torn, poverty-stricken Sierra Leone:

  http://nwn.blogs.com/nwn/2008/08/the-second-life.html

• [Cowicide]

  One more reason not to get bent out of shape over the fact that CNN bought “boingboing.tv” out from under us back in 2007.

  Oh, yeah, right…

  Wait…. What?!

• [Anonymous]

  CNN and Cartoon Network are part of the same company, last I checked.

• [Daemon]

  In other news, CNN is into cybersquatting.

• [OuChTrOnX]

  About the boingboing.tv domain:

  the provided link to domintools returns the following information:

  Error Message

  Server response:
  No match for boingboing.tv.

  • [Xeni Jardin]

    Hm. Not sure what happened since then, or why the link isn’t functioning, but CNN purchased the domain in May, 2007.

    • [Antinous / Moderator]

      The link works for me.