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zenmarketing
16th January 2007, 03:39 AM
I was just looking through some of the ASCII domain sales on DNJournal, trying to help establish how undervalued the IDN market is.

Speaking just for the Chinese market, I believe that Chinese IDN's are undervalued by a margin of about 300X to 500X right now.

In other words, in a liquid market once everyone realizes the true value of these names, hopefully within a 3-5 year timeframe, names will be selling for approximately 300 to 500 times what they are selling for now.

What do you think?

I'd love to get more viewpoints.

blastfromthepast
16th January 2007, 03:41 AM
x5000

touchring
16th January 2007, 04:03 AM
I was just looking through some of the ASCII domain sales on DNJournal, trying to help establish how undervalued the IDN market is.

Speaking just for the Chinese market, I believe that Chinese IDN's are undervalued by a margin of about 300X to 500X right now.

In other words, in a liquid market once everyone realizes the true value of these names, hopefully within a 3-5 year timeframe, names will be selling for approximately 300 to 500 times what they are selling for now.

What do you think?

I'd love to get more viewpoints.


The multiplication is anything, but a bet (referring to all languages not just chinese). Yes, i'm quite sure there will be appreciation above current prices in the future, but 300X and 500X??

Even for the ASCII market, we see DNjournal announcing snaps fetching 5 or 6 figures, but if we try selling the same name, probably low 4 figures if at all.

There's also a difference between ASCII.com and names for specific markets. If you want to know, spend sometmie to research on how much romaji.jp and pinyin.cn are selling for today. Good if you can share with us your findings.

For Chinese names, we're now betting on economic growth and further development of its internet economy. The problem in China from time immemorial has always been unity (not democracy or human rights), so the main consideration right now is the Taiwan issue. If Taiwan is absorbed by China peacefully, this issue won't be a threat, if not, delay the timeline by 15-20 years. The chance of peaceful absorb increases with each year of peace, and as the economic and political difference between them narrow, and the odds are in our favor right now (the outlook is promising), especially with the middle east problem bogging down the US, unfortunately.

markits
16th January 2007, 04:36 AM
The ascii generic keyword domain has been maintaining quite stable over the past years. The three letter domain value has been increased by 30 times over the last 3 years.

Concerning Chinese domains, I do think it is possible to increse by up to 100 times in the next 5 years. I think there will be a huge increase in values of single char domains since there are only about 3000 common chars in the Chinese langauge and each has its own solid root meaning.

touchring
16th January 2007, 06:13 AM
The ascii generic keyword domain has been maintaining quite stable over the past years. The three letter domain value has been increased by 30 times over the last 3 years.

Concerning Chinese domains, I do think it is possible to increse by up to 100 times in the next 5 years. I think there will be a huge increase in values of single char domains since there are only about 3000 common chars in the Chinese langauge and each has its own solid root meaning.


Interesting, by 100 times, do you mean frmo $10 to $1000, or $100 to $10000? or $1000 to $100,000?

The single char play is tricky, i got a few junks, though there are 3000 common chars, i think are less than 300 i think. Your 财.net must be the top 5? :p

markits
16th January 2007, 06:45 AM
Yes I think it is possible in 5 years. The Chinese economy developing speed is astonishing. Most of you only know the figure of 8-11% GDP growth per year. But inside China, many of my friends told me that their personal income has been doubled each year every year over the last 5 or so years. Now, imagine in five years.....

There are a large number of characters in Chinese but the number of commomly used ones is only 3000 or less. It is a bit tricky because some chars are obviously more popular than others: all chars are not the same. However, native Chinese can instantly tell a char's value (popularity and usage etc). Many single chars have been registered as TMs, even though many of which are not used stand alone.

touchring
16th January 2007, 07:01 AM
Yes I think it is possible in 5 years. The Chinese economy developing speed is astonishing. Most of you only know the figure of 8-11% GDP growth per year. But inside China, many of my friends told me that their personal income has been doubled each year every year over the last 5 or so years. Now, imagine in five years.....


The 11% GDP figure is used to bluff the Americans. Anyway, your friends made their money on real estate, side business commission, etc?

bramiozo
16th January 2007, 09:24 AM
....if things continue like this I might consider to completely trim down my portfolio to say a size of about 50 names which I reg for 3/4 years.

This is costing a lot of time and money, if I don't see results before the summer, I will consolidate most of my portfolio and focus on development as I probably should have done months ago.

Nothing sells at the moment, great .net's go for low $xxx if at all and good com's sporadically sell at low $xxxx.

alpha
16th January 2007, 09:40 AM
....if things continue like this I might consider to completely trim down my portfolio to say a size of about 50 names which I reg for 3/4 years.

:o

sarcle
16th January 2007, 09:48 AM
The three letter domain value has been increased by 30 times over the last 3 years.

Yes, and based on what? I've seen crappy 3 letter .coms sell quite high just because of them being a 3 letter. I do have IDNs on the other hand that have traffic and revenue already that wouldn't even get a second look to most domainers; hell even to domainers here.

I continously scratch my head in amazement when DNJournals sales report comes out every week. Most are a complete joke and will never make the money back that the prices they bought them at. There is a balloon building in the Ascii market right now. It's going to have to burst sooner or later. Hopefully it's right about the time when IDN take off. Then not only are we in a position to get some great Ascii generics at great prices but have control of the IDN market was well.


Concerning Chinese domains, I do think it is possible to increse by up to 100 times in the next 5 years. I think there will be a huge increase in values of single char domains since there are only about 3000 common chars in the Chinese langauge and each has its own solid root meaning.

You can do this already by simply building a generic site get it adsensed and get it ranked in the SE's.


I will consolidate most of my portfolio and focus on development as I probably should have done months ago.



This is the way to go. Right now, to squeeze everything you can out of IDN, development is needed. It doesn't even need to be fancy either. We have results of wiki copied material ranking #1 in yahoo.co.jp. This will not only make you money but will get IDN in the face of the very people we are trying to sell it to.

Fka200
16th January 2007, 09:52 AM
Edited.

alpha
16th January 2007, 09:59 AM
I want to pick up on Bram's post.

Good on you bram, you've probably said what a lot of people are thinking but not saying (as usual)

.. but is that it then, the Summer? Shit or bust?

I always had this down as long haul and every year when the pinch of renewals comes in, you trim down some more. But culling to 50. really?

seamo
16th January 2007, 10:18 AM
But culling to 50. really?
Depends on the quality of those 50.

Pure gold in this case is my bet...

sarcle
16th January 2007, 10:19 AM
I want to pick up on Bram's post.

Good on you bram, you've probably said what a lot of people are thinking but not saying (as usual)

.. but is that it then, the Summer? Shit or bust?

I think that many here bought way to much way to fast without thinking of the consequences. Many major portfolio holders have been in this since 2000.

We are now finding that search engines are giving us preferences over our names alone. I really don't know why more of us aren't taking advantage of this situation?

I know that most are domainers and have no idea how to get a site up, but learn. Jeez, take an hour out of your day to learn html and know what "<a href="http://thiscouldbeanything.com">IDN SITE</a>" means.

I was just a domainer when I started a few years ago in Ascii. With gold fever in my eyes I bought what I thought would make me rich. No reasoning no realization of what or how the domain market works. I had no major funding and no financial backing, just a job to pay for a few 9.95 regs now and again at Godaddy. Yeah, I was a noob once too. I had no idea what the f*ck an FTP was or how get a site up. But the only way to have a market is to build one.

Type-ins from Ascii came because sites were built. It's not going to start raining gold coins just because a browser is out, it takes consumer awareness and marketing.


I always had this down as long haul and every year when the pinch of renewals comes in, you trim down some more. But culling to 50. really?

I too am in this for the long haul. Traffic on parked domains is improving. Built sites are getting nice rankings. I see this as the perfect time to start your generic sites.

alpha
16th January 2007, 10:25 AM
sure but theres a balance to strike, and thats what I think a lot of people are struggling with.

lets face it, until the moneys in the bank and Stretch limo on the drive, its all just a gamble not yet paid off.

Nobody wants to mirror the many a sad tale of an ascii domainer who regged diamond encrusted generics back in the early days, only to lose faith, dump his names and now watches from the sidelines crying into his glass of cut-price budget vino.

At the same time, nobody wants to sit on a pile of coal that could easily endup bankrupting you.

It's fine to say "i believe, i believe.." but theres a cost to that belief, and a shelf-life to it as well.

and everyone will have to set their own shelf-life, and in Brams case i guess it is the summer. waaaay to soon IMO, but it is his opinion none the less.

sarcle
16th January 2007, 10:41 AM
sure but theres a balance to strike, and thats what I think a lot of people are struggling with.

I do agree. But it's like anything in life, as far as investments go, "don't put more money into something than you can afford to lose."


Nobody wants to mirror the many a sad tale of an ascii domainer who regged diamond encrusted generics back in the early days, only to lose faith, dump his names and now watches from the sidelines crying into his glass of cut-price budget vino.

Agreed, but in those days there were no parking companies, there were no advertisers. Regs cost $40 a year. It was blind faith. I'd like to think we have more than this today.

We as IDNers have all of this, we can see what people in Japan, or Europe are paying for our keywords. And exactly how many people are typing them in. This is great insight, compared to what they had back then. We have parking companies that will monetize our names. But again, those early pioneers of the 90's built that market with sites.


and everyone will have to set their own shelf-life, and in Brams case i guess it is the summer. waaaay to soon IMO, but it is his opinion none the less.

I agree with this too. Bram just send me your list before you drop them. :)

alpha
16th January 2007, 10:43 AM
... Bram just send me your list before you drop them. :)

get in line Sarcle.

bramiozo
16th January 2007, 10:52 AM
I want to pick up on Bram's post.

Good on you bram, you've probably said what a lot of people are thinking but not saying (as usual)

.. but is that it then, the Summer? Shit or bust?

I always had this down as long haul and every year when the pinch of renewals comes in, you trim down some more. But culling to 50. really?

I can say this for sure, I will be take on a passive role if my activities don't start bearing fruit. The number of 50 is a bit abitrary, it might well be 100, it was just to make a statement.

markits
16th January 2007, 11:07 AM
The 11% GDP figure is used to bluff the Americans. Anyway, your friends made their money on real estate, side business commission, etc?
They make money by all kinds of different business.

Bram seems a bit inpatient. In fact I won't say that the idn is under valued right now. The end using demand is still close to zero; general awareness of idn is still not there hence typing-in is low. However, we have seen big progresses happened already. Two additional Chinese idn forums have been set up and are swamped by local domainers; the transaction number are reaching all time higher even though the price is still low; many new Japanese and Chinese websites have been set up using idns, etc.. I see all the positive signs around.

One critical issue that hammper the idn development is that most top idns are held in very few hands. These top portfolio holders have no intention to develop or sell at the current market prices. This situation is indeed damage the IDNs. I contacted two members here yesterday about the possibility of selling their domains. They both replied with a big "no" answer without even asking me to make an offer.

I think that the idn fate is in the hands of big portfolio holders. How do you guys think?

bramiozo
16th January 2007, 11:16 AM
It's not about enduser activity but reseller activity AND participation, I think the active community hasn't grown since a year or so. Sure people are regging but they should be buying and discussing, I am not saying that I'll quit just that I will focus on development instead of reselling and then a large portfolio size is more of a burden than a blessing.

alpha
16th January 2007, 11:18 AM
I think that the idn fate is in the hands of big portfolio holders. How do you guys think?

putting it in perspective, a guy holding a few hundred pure generics isn't going to stop anything dead in its tracks. slow it down maybe but not dead.

The locals will just register a two word combo instead won't they? it's still better than a meaningless numeric domain or a random ascii combo

markits
16th January 2007, 11:19 AM
Type-ins from Ascii came because sites were built. It's not going to start raining gold coins just because a browser is out, it takes consumer awareness and marketing.


Well said. We all can promote idn awareness in various ways. eg, last month, I renewed ten Chinese domains for 5 years and gave them to five friends of mine as christmas gifts, asking them to find or wait for an end user for their domains!

sarcle
16th January 2007, 11:25 AM
It's not about enduser activity but reseller activity AND participation, I think the active community hasn't grown since a year or so. Sure people are regging but they should be buying and discussing, I am not saying that I'll quit just that I will focus on development instead of reselling.

Yes, but what is it you exactly want? You want screenshots of developed sites and their traffic sources? Not even ascii guy's will give that away without major dollars at stake. We can show our rankings, we can provide information, and to the most part we have been.

Yes, it's been a bit of rehashing the same crap over and over, but this is because new people are jumping in daily. I think sometimes we forget we had to learn all of this too.

Yes, development will yield you more money at the moment as their is no hard evidence other than a developed site getting rankings in SE's. It's not hard to see why the reseller market is soft at the moment.

I could sell you "condoms.com" in japanese for $1000. "just an example, it's not for sale." but with people wanting only to buy "lowhousingincome.com" or whatever in chinese for $20 bucks what's the point?

Rubber Duck
16th January 2007, 11:44 AM
Buyers are going to have to get real. You have all seen how fast and how far Mobi exploded on the basis of total miscomprehension. When the IDN message sinks in, these domains are instantly going to go to comparable level. Dot Mobi isn't going to change the World, it isn't needed and may not even be wanted. IDN is essential and it will change the World.

When will it happen. Well as soon as people are convinced that this is the way things are going. Huge amounts of traffic would do it. Clear evidence that major companies are converting their web sites would do it. May be even a organised Workshops from one of the more respected parking organisations will do it.

Well Microsoft have claimed 100M IE7 downloads. They have proved they can get their Browser out there at will. They are talking about having completed all the language versions soon and stepping up the roll out as Auto Updates.

My guess is that in rough figures, that we about 50 Million installation of IE7 in the US. And don't forget these figures are already out of date. They must be increasing by about 10 Million a week. The other 50 odd Million installations are probably accounted for by Western Europe and the British Commonwealth.

The Auto Updates Roll out will have quotas. If Japan and China are not going to be taking from those quotas then things will get very interesting elsewhere. Once download from the US starts to tail off things will switch to Russian, Arabic and perhaps Korean. If the servers are working full tilt to get these language out, without the Chinese distraction, it could all be over in a couple of weeks. How long is it going to take them to hit 50% in Russia and the Arabic Countries if that is what they are focused on?

This is soon going to be reinforced with the launch of Vista, another couple of weeks. When is the massive publicity around Vista going to start appearing on everything you look at? Well, if it is not in the next week, Microsoft either know they don't have the capacity to meet demand or they need they brains blowing out.

Domainfest. This is much more important than most peopel think. The ASCII world seem to have four main pillars holding it in place. TRAFFCS, MONIKER, DNJournal and DOMANSPONSOR. Moniker is putting its shoulder to the IDN cause, as has DNJournal for a while. I know TRAFFICS is still largely hostile. Domain Sponsor like Moniker is really going for it now. Their customers will be be free IDN workshops in LA, in fact they will get the whole conference fee refunded. Domain Sponsor is doing this because this is where they see the growth in the Domain Industry. Trust me, after DomainFest, a lot of other people will too.

On Strategy, we are not going to attempting to sell of drops. If you want my rubbish then shame on you. The stuff I have been dropping to date has been going because it is worthless. I have decided that due to various problems over Transfers and Payments, I am not even going to negociate with anyone who cannot put $50 bucks on the table for a single domain or $500 bucks for a group of domains. It is just not worth my while. I we do decide to rationalise, anything that will not shift above this floor will simply get dropped. Dropping has the advantage that we can change our minds well past expiry date. It takes very little adminstration, and it will not further weaken a depressed market. Even if the sleep walkers here will not buy a domain they get scooped up at Snapnames. I actually think a lot of buyers are trying to squeeze the pips out the market at the moment and will buy from Snapnames when they won't buy here the same name here.

Anyway, if you are one of the Sleep Walkers who think you are going to make money without commiting to the market, all I can say, is the time is getting very short now. 100 to 1000 increases in prices are likely to happen over the next 3 years, perhaps 5 year for languages like Hindi. Once people understand where this is going it will start to move. The steepest rises in percentage terms will come very soon and it will tail off into a gradual climb over an extended period. If you think you can afford to sit around on your hands, then I suggest you go and get another hobby.

bramiozo
16th January 2007, 11:55 AM
I could sell you "condoms.com" in japanese for $1000. "just an example, it's not for sale." but with people wanting only to buy "lowhousingincome.com" or whatever in chinese for $20 bucks what's the point?


This is what bothers me, I still can't liquify my domains assets, so how can I finance development if I also have to renew my domains knowing that parking revenues are insignificant ?

alpha
16th January 2007, 12:04 PM
[i]This is what bothers me, I still can't liquify my domains assets, so how can I finance development if I also have to renew my domains knowing that parking revenues are insignificant ?

The only barrier is language; you have all the other skills necessary.

I was thinking about this the other day, I am almost at the stage to offer something like a 50% share for 12months of any revenue generated by developing a site.

From a native speaker perspective its just as easy as typing a paragraph or two

From a domain owners perspective its just as easy as pasting it into a doc and hosting it

but together it could well pay dividends. I need to give it some serious thought - but thats where I am on the development side of things. I'd like to get 800 mini sites up asap.

nobody really knows what the next 12 months hold. do you think this in incentive enough for a native speaker?

sarcle
16th January 2007, 12:11 PM
The only barrier is language; you have all the other skills necessary.

I was thinking about this the other day, I am almost at the stage to offer something like a 50% share for 12months of any revenue generated by developing a site.

From a native speaker perspective its just as easy as typing a paragraph or two

From a domain owners perspective its just as easy as pasting it into a doc and hosting it

but together it could well pay dividends. I need to give it some serious thought - but thats where I am on the development side of things. I'd like to get 800 mini sites up asap.


Actually I think a better way is getting native speakers to develop the sites and offering them a percentage of advertiser's money. To actually go out and seek real companies to put their banners on your sites. This will also give them incentives to keep those advertisers and those spots in the rankings. 'Cause let's face it, adsense, for the time being is okay, but the real money is in company sponsorship.

I've been trying to do the same thing but finding a native Japanese speaker to hire has been kind of a bitch.


This is what bothers me, I still can't liquify my domains assets, so how can I finance development if I also have to renew my domains knowing that parking revenues are insignificant ?


Then get an extra job at Mcdonalds or whatever it takes to make it. Because I know you know that this is going to work. It's just a little longer than we expected is all.

And get to developing!

touchring
16th January 2007, 12:14 PM
Guys and gals, let's not give up so quickly, wait for IE7.

In the meantime, let's all start thinking about the 7-digit hebrew sale. :) :)

sarcle
16th January 2007, 12:19 PM
Guys and gals, let's not give up so quickly, wait for IE7.

In the meantime, let's all start thinking about the 7-digit hebrew sale. :) :)

I don't think anyone is giving up. I think we are just talking about our hardships right now. Which is a great stress reliever and should be discussed. It's cheaper than a shrink. I think we will be laughing over cocktails soon about this.

BTW, what is the deal with that 7-digit hebrew sale, was Monte talking out his ass or are we going to hear something?

bramiozo
16th January 2007, 12:25 PM
At this stage a guaranteed fee is probably unavoidable and if native speakers only have to translate contents that fee will by western standards be (very) low (if not japanese) .


development :
domain owner
/\
\/
website developer <-> translator


operations :
domain owner
/\
\/
website admin <-> translator

For 800 minisites you would need a whole contingency of translators and webdevelopers, I would focus on a single language and a single theme.

Actually I think a better way is getting native speakers to develop the sites and offering them a percentage of advertiser's money. To actually go out and seek real companies to put their banners on your sites. This will also give them incentives to keep those advertisers and those spots in the rankings. 'Cause let's face it, adsense, for the time being is okay, but the real money is in company sponsorship.

I've been trying to do the same thing but finding a native Japanese speaker to hire has been kind of a bitch.



Then get an extra job at Mcdonalds or whatever it takes to make it. Because I know you know that this is going to work. It's just a little longer than we expected is all.

And get to developing!

This is an interesting story about more or less the same question, how to monetize your domains in an emerging domain market;
http://www.dnjournal.com/cover/2006/december.htm

I know it's going to work but it costs too much time to manage my portfolio, to develop idntools AND to develop new websites besides finishing my masters which is not a trivial task. In fact I should be studying at this moment so I am off.

sarcle
16th January 2007, 12:47 PM
This is an interesting story about more or less the same question, how to monetize your domains in an emerging domain market;
http://www.dnjournal.com/cover/2006/december.htm

I know it's going to work but it costs too much time to manage my portfolio, to develop idntools AND to develop new websites besides finishing my masters which is not a trivial task. In fact I should be studying at this moment so I am off.

Yes that story was very interesting. But it still doesn't get me a native Japanese Speaker/Web Designer. I've been searching everywhere. Craigslist, Myspace, Forums, even my websites.

Not saying this is the best option for you, but even Bill Gates had to drop out of college to work on a project he "knew" was going to make it.

Rubber Duck
16th January 2007, 01:04 PM
Well, I am going to outline our Road Map, which has been sitting gathering dust on the shelves for quite some time.

This Road Map is born of simplicity, necessity and commercial rationale.

We are going to develop everything we have, as soon as the business models are proven. Well when I say we, I did actually mean that at all. The idea is to develop partnership for development. In other words we are going to get other people to do it.

The first thing you need to understand about development, is it is not a one off process. If you want to maximise your earnings from a site you need to do exactly what you claim to do but generally actually don't. You need to develop it. It needs to be seen an evolving useful resource with a purpose, not some kind of amateurish blog. I have seen some people working already. Some of them have real vision and commitment, others well it is just like photocopy somebody elses school homework.

So, how do I go about turning thousands of domains into money. Well, I let somebody else do it. We park them at Namedrive until something better comes along. That something better is going to be achieved with Revenue Share Partnerships. Basically, there will be locally based people out there with the necessary skills, that would rather work on 50% of our domains than 100% of their own domains. They will be the monetizers, the mini Sedo's of this world, but they will do a much better job for me than Sedo ever could.

What these guys will do is everything they would do for their own sites but for only half the generated revenues, because they will know that they can do much better if they have access to much better names. It will all be set up so I can get the maximum amount of money for doing the least amount of work. But this is a Win Win situation. It will only work if these guys feel motivated. I can assure you 50% of my earnings stream will be motivation enough.

Why would I be prepared to loose 50%? Because I will gain much much more! I will get access to the talent and the resources that will unlock the full potential. It is much better to have 50% of 100% than a 100% of the 10% of the potential that I am capable of realising on my own.

When and where are we starting. Well right here, right now!

My main interest at the moment are partners that are going to be able to unleash the potential of affiliate programs in Japan. If anybody with Japanese residence and language skills, as well as a bit of development talent wants to talk to us we are listening.

alpha
16th January 2007, 01:12 PM
Deja Vu :rolleyes:

sarcle
16th January 2007, 01:18 PM
Deja Vu :rolleyes:

Exactly what I was thinking.

Rubber Duck
16th January 2007, 01:21 PM
I don't think anyone is giving up. I think we are just talking about our hardships right now. Which is a great stress reliever and should be discussed. It's cheaper than a shrink. I think we will be laughing over cocktails soon about this.

BTW, what is the deal with that 7-digit hebrew sale, was Monte talking out his ass or are we going to hear something?

I think he is not talking anymore on this one, but I think you should take what he does intimate seriously.

sarcle
16th January 2007, 01:24 PM
I think he is not talking anymore on this one, but I think you should take what he does intimate seriously.

I'm not doubting Monte's credibility in the industry. He is above par. But let's get real, announce a 7-figure deal and not speak of it anymore. What's up with that?

Rubber Duck
16th January 2007, 01:34 PM
I'm not doubting Monte's credibility in the industry. He is above par. But let's get real, announce a 7-figure deal and not speak of it anymore. What's up with that?

I think you will find that the race to acquire decent portfolios is already on.

This is not going to be fought under Queensbury Rules.

It is going to be more like Jungle Fighting in the dark against a bunch of mercenaries.

sarcle
16th January 2007, 01:42 PM
I think you will find that the race to acquire decent portfolios is already on.

This is not going to be fought under Queensbury Rules.

It is going to be more like Jungle Fighting in the dark against a bunch of mercenaries.

I'm well aware of this. I will announce myself, that I made my very first call to Tokyo just a short time ago about a buyer wanting to aquire some of my domains. This it was very exciting and surreal at the same time.

But to announce that a 7-figure deal was in the wraps and then not speak of it at all is no different to me than hyping the market with this .mobi b.s. Just the way I see it.

mdw
16th January 2007, 01:49 PM
....if things continue like this I might consider to completely trim down my portfolio to say a size of about 50 names which I reg for 3/4 years.

Think of the real estate analogy again here. If you bought land just outside town for a fast growing city, what would you do if after a couple years the land was worth only 120% of your purchase price?

If you wait and the city grows in your direction (we all believe the domain name market will grow in this IDN direction) then developers will be keen to buy you out. Don't be passive, because that strategy can take decades if your timing is off a little bit.

Developers can get a road put in, and start building a neighborhood close to the road. May be slow going but they can offset the carrying costs without diminishing the underlying value of their investment. BUILD THOSE SITES - DON'T WAIT!

Rubber Duck
16th January 2007, 02:01 PM
Think of the real estate analogy again here. If you bought land just outside town for a fast growing city, what would you do if after a couple years the land was worth only 120% of your purchase price?

If you wait and the city grows in your direction (we all believe the domain name market will grow in this IDN direction) then developers will be keen to buy you out. Don't be passive, because that strategy can take decades if your timing is off a little bit.

Developers can get a road put in, and start building a neighborhood close to the road. May be slow going but they can offset the carrying costs without diminishing the underlying value of their investment. BUILD THOSE SITES - DON'T WAIT!

Analogy is completely wrong. Try this:

Town has analogue phone system, but people want to go onto the Internet so they need digital phone system. The only problem is that most of the people in the town don't currently have computers or access the Internet. At some point in time they all need to be linked up by the IDN Telephone Company, which is installing the new digital network. That company has got problems, however, because the electricity utility Microcorp, which is a massive monopoly has booked in the power connection to its local exchange, which is now fully installed, in three months time.

zenmarketing
16th January 2007, 03:31 PM
Well, this thread certainly took on a life of its own while I was asleep :)

It's great to see all of the insights that are being put forth here.

I myself only got involved in IDN's last month. As soon as I found out about the existence of IDN's, I was hooked, and some of you might have noticed that I have been heavily acquiring names as quickly as possible.

Some of you mentioned that there is no liquidity in premium .com IDN's, so you won't even list your best names for sale.

I am ready to buy them! I am not afraid to spend several thousand dollars on a name, or even more. I haven't seen any being made available!

Everything has a price. Even if you say you want $100,000 for your name or whatever. I don't think anyone should be saying "my names are not for sale."

That is ridiculous. Name the price at which you would be very happy to sell the name -- and yes, there is ALWAYS a price.

mdw
16th January 2007, 06:17 PM
Analogy is completely wrong. Try this:

Town has analogue phone system, but people want to go onto the Internet so they need digital phone system. The only problem is that most of the people in the town don't currently have computers or access the Internet. At some point in time they all need to be linked up by the IDN Telephone Company, which is installing the new digital network. That company has got problems, however, because the electricity utility Microcorp, which is a massive monopoly has booked in the power connection to its local exchange, which is now fully installed, in three months time.

I don't think either line of thinking is wrong, just lacking the detail which makes then obviously analogous. To pursue my real estate analogy:


My version of IDN roadmap (step 1 is already behind us)

1. town is growing in the direction of our land investment (domain name market = town)(our land investment = IDN market segment)
2. we investors, seeing the approaching development need to get a road built which makes our land investment accessible (get a road built = IE7 achieves critical mass)
3. we investors with a road leading from town to our parcels must approach the local politicians and obtain the zoning we need to develop (obtain zoning = advertisers and affiliate programs competing in IDN space)
4. build homes and commercial properties to support those (build websites)

The most important point to make IMO is that you are missing a lot if you sell off most of your holdings before all four of these are realized. After that point you practically can't lose.

touchring
16th January 2007, 06:29 PM
I don't think either line of thinking is wrong, just lacking the detail which makes then obviously analogous. To pursue my real estate analogy:


My version of IDN roadmap (step 1 is already behind us)

1. town is growing in the direction of our land investment (domain name market = town)(our land investment = IDN market segment)
2. we investors, seeing the approaching development need to get a road built which makes our land investment accessible (get a road built = IE7 achieves critical mass)
3. we investors with a road leading from town to our parcels must approach the local politicians and obtain the zoning we need to develop (obtain zoning = advertisers and affiliate programs competing in IDN space)
4. build homes and commercial properties to support those (build websites)

The most important point to make IMO is that you are missing a lot if you sell off most of your holdings before all four of these are realized. After that point you practically can't lose.


I think yoiu are talking medium to long term. Most of us here are punters - looking for quick returns, 10x to 100x - takes a look at the fish.com thread.

Rubber Duck
16th January 2007, 06:36 PM
I think you need to think of ASCII as a more economically developed adjacent town that is getting infrastructure installed in preference to our town, which has a similar population, but is less economically developed and geographically a bit more remote.

The biggest problem is that rather than power up our little substation. Microcorp is effectively competing against another network in the adjacent town, where they are making big money and consequently neglecting our needs.

Your concepts suggest that we are essentially looking for growth expanding out from an established core. My model focuses on the concept of conversion. There a Billion Chinese webpages out there waiting to be given a web address that works. There is a lot of content there and it is growing. It will grow even faster when it becomes more accessible through IDN. The amount and quality of web content that is being added by IDNers is frankly minute and junk, even the better stuff. The content that we are searching is already out there. We just need big companies to convert. I believe that they will do this anyway, irrespective of what we do. It is possible that a few high ranking junk site will highlight their advantages to a few local SEO guys that are completely out of the loop.

My reading of the situation, however, is that most companies are not out of the loop and many of them are rapidly gearing up to do this. Japanese companies seem to be behind most, but we know Fujitsu have been to UDRP recently, and seem to rember it being mention Toshiba have their IDN.

Not much will happen until the big corporates judge the time is right. Thanks to Microsoft pushing back AU in Japan that is probably a few months off there. I think things will start to pop elsewhere first. Russia seems to be the most likely candidate to start to simmer and boil over.


I don't think either line of thinking is wrong, just lacking the detail which makes then obviously analogous. To pursue my real estate analogy:


My version of IDN roadmap (step 1 is already behind us)

1. town is growing in the direction of our land investment (domain name market = town)(our land investment = IDN market segment)
2. we investors, seeing the approaching development need to get a road built which makes our land investment accessible (get a road built = IE7 achieves critical mass)
3. we investors with a road leading from town to our parcels must approach the local politicians and obtain the zoning we need to develop (obtain zoning = advertisers and affiliate programs competing in IDN space)
4. build homes and commercial properties to support those (build websites)

The most important point to make IMO is that you are missing a lot if you sell off most of your holdings before all four of these are realized. After that point you practically can't lose.

mdw
16th January 2007, 06:36 PM
I think you are talking medium to long term. Most of us here are punters - looking for quick returns, 10x to 100x - takes a look at the fish.com thread.

Right you are - I'm a developer. I don't want to buy land at fair value and build on it, I want to speculate (buy them dirt cheap) and maximize my return.

Your concepts suggest that we are essentially looking for growth expanding out from an established core. My model focuses on the concept of conversion. There a Billion Chinese webpages out there waiting to be given a web address that works.


Too bad for zenmarketing that a topic worthy of discussion seems to have branched out into this theoretical discussion. But this is insightful stuff and that's a nice way to look at it: those billion Chinese pages you refer to are not very accessible YET are they.

Rubber Duck
16th January 2007, 06:48 PM
Right you are - I'm a developer. I don't want to buy land at fair value and build on it, I want to speculate and maximize my return.

Well, in terms of how we trade, yes we do see ourselves at a large landowner with ambitions of becoming a property company collecting rents off thousands of properties ad infinitum. However, what we have is more land than we have the resources to build on. We also don't have the management skills to sort it all out. We either build a few ourselves and use the rent from that to finance the building of a few more or we go into some form of oursourcing revenue sharing partnership with others for a share of the income. If they are capable of doing better development in a much shorter time frame than we can ourselves, thereby greatly increasing the return, perhaps by as much as a factor of ten, the fact that we are not get 100% of the pie should be no reason to cry into our beer.

sarcle
16th January 2007, 06:56 PM
Everything has a price. Even if you say you want $100,000 for your name or whatever. I don't think anyone should be saying "my names are not for sale."

That is ridiculous. Name the price at which you would be very happy to sell the name -- and yes, there is ALWAYS a price.

What I meant was not for sale for $1000. But you are right there is always a price.

But right now, the price the buyers want and sellers want are two different things. The near future is about to unleash a dragon on the world of IDN. Sellers don't want sell low and get fleeced when Vista and IE7 hit's Asia.

Buyers that want pre-release prices, are about to get hung out to dry. When the future is very certain on what is about to happen.

zenmarketing
16th January 2007, 07:44 PM
I just came across this:

http://局部.cn/

CNNIC appears to be putting up these pages to educate Chinese Internet users about IDN's.

As a result of that, I found out about:
http://海信.cn/

Hisense is a major Chinese electronics company. I used to have a television made by them when I lived in China. And now it looks like they are embracing IDN.

touchring
16th January 2007, 07:52 PM
I just came across this:

http://局部.cn/

CNNIC appears to be putting up these pages to educate Chinese Internet users about IDN's.

As a result of that, I found out about:
http://海信.cn/

Hisense is a major Chinese electronics company. I used to have a television made by them when I lived in China. And now it looks like they are embracing IDN.



Nice, if you lived in China once, that might explain your optimism. :)

Rubber Duck
16th January 2007, 08:00 PM
I just came across this:

http://局部.cn/

CNNIC appears to be putting up these pages to educate Chinese Internet users about IDN's.

As a result of that, I found out about:
http://海信.cn/

Hisense is a major Chinese electronics company. I used to have a television made by them when I lived in China. And now it looks like they are embracing IDN.

Yes, and like other IDN developments in China, this isn't any of that BS forwarding nonsense. This is a fully functioning IDN Clone of the existing site. That means the site has been copied and all the internal links have been substituted, so that it can work in parallel and fully independently of the ASCII site.

Of course until they have widespread IDN support and most of the traffic has migrated, the ASCII site will continue to function in parallel. One day soon, however, it will be shut down and the ASCII domain permanently forwarded to this site.

Japan might have it head up its arse, China knows where this thing is going and is travelling much faster than anyone else! Personally, I suspect the delays are because the Companies in the Far East want time to convert their sites before the IE7 goes AU. It might be astonishing how fast all this actually happens when it finally comes together.

rhys
16th January 2007, 10:48 PM
Japan might have it head up its arse, China knows where this thing is going and is travelling much faster than anyone else! Personally, I suspect the delays are because the Companies in the Far East want time to convert their sites before the IE7 goes AU. It might be astonishing how fast all this actually happens when it finally comes together.

Japan is a boom nation. Change sweeps across the landscape in a few months. I remember up until about 1996, most workers used wapro (word processors - imagine a computer that can only run MS Word) and few had PCs or were on the internet. Suddenly that summer I noticed that everyone on the train was reading books on HTML and Manga about how to use a PC. The next Christmas, everyone I spoke to had a PC and every other person had their own dinky homepage up. Point being, when IDN comes, it will dominate Japan in a heartbeat. Where we are now is no indication of where we may be in even 6 months time.

Rubber Duck
16th January 2007, 11:00 PM
Well done Rhys, that has really been exactly what I have been trying to get across for a while. Trying to plot charts from where we are to where we are going based on current data trends is meaningless. This is not an evolutionary process. IDN is about revolution. Either it will happen or it won't. It will either be everything or nothing. This cannot happen gradually. It will either suddenly be the dawn of a new reality or be proven to be a worthless pipedream.


Japan is a boom nation. Change sweeps across the landscape in a few months. I remember up until about 1996, most workers used wapro (word processors - imagine a computer that can only run MS Word) and few had PCs or were on the internet. Suddenly that summer I noticed that everyone on the train was reading books on HTML and Manga about how to use a PC. The next Christmas, everyone I spoke to had a PC and every other person had their own dinky homepage up. Point being, when IDN comes, it will dominate Japan in a heartbeat. Where we are now is no indication of where we may be in even 6 months time.

yanni
16th January 2007, 11:18 PM
Either it will happen or it won't. It will either be everything or nothing. This cannot happen gradually. It will either suddenly be the dawn of a new reality or be proven to be a worthless pipedream.

So, what's been happening in the past 5 years then? Hasn't it been slowly evolving up to now? Five years in "internet time" is a looong-ass time.

It IS happening right now, albeit at faster speeds than 4 or 5 years ago. It won't take another 5 years (for some small markets maybe), but it isn't happening tomorrow either.

Rubber Duck
16th January 2007, 11:30 PM
So, what's been happening in the past 5 years then? Hasn't it been slowly evolving up to now? Five years in "internet time" is a looong-ass time.

It IS happening right now, albeit at faster speeds than 4 or 5 years ago. It won't take another 5 years (for some small markets maybe), but it isn't happening tomorrow either.

If you try to pick a lock nothing opens until the last tumbler is aligned. When that happens the door suddenly opens and the daylight rushes in.

A product has been being assembled slowly, but only when it is essentially complete can it go to market.

You will not get the content switched and the associated offline advertising until the browser support is there. Once that happens everything else will just click into place.

You have all the time in the World to do your development later. The priority for most at this point is to ensure they have the best portfolio profile in place whilst they can still afford to play with serious names.

In six months time the kind of stuff that will be available won't be that dissimilar to what is currently be registered as dot com in ASCII.

Giant
17th January 2007, 01:15 AM
If you try to pick a lock nothing opens until the last tumbler is aligned. When that happens the door suddenly opens and the daylight rushes in.

A product has been being assembled slowly, but only when it is essentially complete can it go to market.

You will not get the content switched and the associated offline advertising until the browser support is there. Once that happens everything else will just click into place.

You have all the time in the World to do your development later. The priority for most at this point is to ensure they have the best portfolio profile in place whilst they can still afford to play with serious names.

In six months time the kind of stuff that will be available won't be that dissimilar to what is currently be registered as dot com in ASCII.

Very well said. This is why no one can replace Rubber Duck :-)

Olney
17th January 2007, 01:40 AM
A lot of you own value Chinese domains,
I'm pretty sure it would be easier & cheaper to develop those, wouldn't it?
There are plenty of Chinese in the States & England.
I'd suggest starting with product domains first,
the kind of stuff you'd look for or buy online.

sarcle
17th January 2007, 01:48 AM
A lot of you own value Chinese domains,
I'm pretty sure it would be easier & cheaper to develop those, wouldn't it?
There are plenty of Chinese in the States & England.
I'd suggest starting with product domains first,
the kind of stuff you'd look for or buy online.

Olney, Rhys, Edwin, someone, point me in the direction of a japanese/english web developer. PLEASE.

555
17th January 2007, 01:58 AM
Did anyone try any of elance's Japan based providers?

http://www.elance.com/c/search/main/lSearch.pl?mode=search&stage=results&domain=profiles&catid=100&rid=&sk=&keywords=&avg_fb=-1&num_reviews=-1&countries=JP&btnGo=+Search+

touchring
17th January 2007, 03:20 AM
A lot of you own value Chinese domains,
I'm pretty sure it would be easier & cheaper to develop those, wouldn't it?
There are plenty of Chinese in the States & England.
I'd suggest starting with product domains first,
the kind of stuff you'd look for or buy online.


I've seen some names developed by China natives, not as adsense templates, but real websites. I'm now on acquisition mode, development will come when i got the time. Meanwhile, having too many adsense templates around might not be a good idea, lest Yahoo or Google notices it and starts imposes a penalty. :)

Japan is a boom nation. Change sweeps across the landscape in a few months. I remember up until about 1996, most workers used wapro (word processors - imagine a computer that can only run MS Word) and few had PCs or were on the internet. Suddenly that summer I noticed that everyone on the train was reading books on HTML and Manga about how to use a PC. The next Christmas, everyone I spoke to had a PC and every other person had their own dinky homepage up. Point being, when IDN comes, it will dominate Japan in a heartbeat. Where we are now is no indication of where we may be in even 6 months time.


There's no doubt that idns will be adopted, whether in a heart beat or years. Our main concern right now is whether an end user market will appear.

rhys
17th January 2007, 03:43 AM
Did anyone try any of elance's Japan based providers?

http://www.elance.com/c/search/main/lSearch.pl?mode=search&stage=results&domain=profiles&catid=100&rid=&sk=&keywords=&avg_fb=-1&num_reviews=-1&countries=JP&btnGo=+Search+

That's what I would suggest too, try elance.com