Check your messages.

Yeah, the only thing is, I know I am in the right.  But do I want to spend the time and money to prove it?  I'm sure they are banking on the fact that I don't...

WE'll see, I may drop old Cadenhead an email.

Roger_That wrote:

Oh, thanks for the thoughts, HK. 

I'm not interested in money persay, I would just like my domain name back.  However, if I could *get* some money out of it...I guess that wouldn't be out of the question.

I PMed you back.

The problem with assholes like that is that they usually have no assets, so even in you pay an attorney to pursue them and get a whopping judgment, you're likely to never be able to collect on it...plus you're out of the money you paid the lawyers regardless of the outcome.

I sent you some additional thoughts in a PM.

Roger_That wrote:

Why are people such fucking retards?  They aren't doing anything with my domain, and I'm certainly not going to pay them for it.

I'd like to know what HKgirl had to say, if she's willing to let you condense whatever advisement she gave, publicly. I have a friend who's going through the exact same thing (he already has the .net, but the squatters are being dipshits about the .com). I think he's haggling with the registrar, not the registrant (and he's certainly not wasting his time with ICANN).

One of the issues tho, and I dunno if she may have already mentioned it, is related to your quote above. In some cases--I say from experience, not as a legal opinion--it's not enough that they aren't doing anything with it, but that you have to demonstrate some need for the TLD. Depending on where you're located, their feckless ransoming of your name doesn't represent a personal or professional loss to you if you don't have plans for it either, and they're not using the name maliciously. I'm betting, however, that you DO have something in mind for the site.

Thanks. Understood. That's why I figured it would be best to get your permission first.

That's a tough one because you can't scare them over the prospects of a UDRP, since they've already lost so many. But they are legally subject to up to $100,000 for cybersquatting your name, so that's one potential minitube you can ram up their ass.

I'll post a longer answer later when I have more time.

"I'm thinking as many times as they've lost they can't possibly have any money worth suing over."

They own 500,000 domains and have fought legal battles against Exxon and other big companies. I suspect they're making a shitload of money.

If the domain name has no economic value to you it's not worth the investment in trying to get it back.  Chances are they'll give it up anyway when they determine that no one wants it.

I think they hope that someone would rather pay them the 100-1000 bucks to buy the domain back if they really want it, rather than litigate against them in court for the price of a retainer.  Like HK said, as soon as they realize no one wants it, they'll probably drop it. 

So, money is in it for them.  Without very much effort other than employing a cavalcade of lawyers...

They also make a lot of money on click-throughs due to type-in traffic. Unless there's a reason people are typing in your name as a domain, though, they're unlikely to be earning much that way. But with 500,000 domains, they're raking in a lot of dough on clicks.

One thing you should do is join GoDaddy's domain monitoring and backordering service, and put in an order on your name. GoDaddy only sells one catch per name, and if they don't get it for you after it expires, you can transfer it to another domain.