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Apr 17, 2008 12:20:12 GMT
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Looking at it from a purely search engine optimisation point of view retro-rides.com isn't as much of a loss as you'd think.
Why? The content on the site is all here, on a Proboards forum. Not on retro-rides.com. The content is the thing that drives this board in the search engines and it has done all that driving for Proboards, not retro-rides.com.
In other words, retro-rides.com is a nice domain name but it doesn't have much search engine capital invested in it so it's not a valuable one from the search perspective. It's only got a PageRank of 2 and it doesn't return many results from the engines.
Losing a domain name is a sod of a thing to happen to anyone. But in this case the investment is not in the domain name itself but in the name of the site, it's known as Retro Rides, not retro-rides.com, so any other retro rides related domain name can work just as well with respect to the search engines.
So if the site reappears under retroridesshow.com, retro-rides.org or whichever site, it can be brought up in the engines with a little effort and it can probably do better than it did before if it has a little more content on it. We're a community, we can help bring the new domain up in the rankings.
I wouldn't normally say this but I think we're lucky in this case that this community has its home on Proboards, if this wasn't so we'd really be cast adrift.
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"Jeremy Clarkson, a man we motor enthusiasts need on our side like Lewis Hamilton's F1 car needs a towing ball and a Sprite Musketeer" My motor |
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Apr 17, 2008 12:22:53 GMT
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I lost ScrapingScrap.com in much the same way, except it hadn't even expired. Very odd.
Hope we can collectively sort something out for RR...
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There is nothing more expensive than a cheap Mercedes
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Apr 17, 2008 12:41:20 GMT
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Hey H W all the best with whatever you decide to do about it. I hope the bloodsucking dog botherers gets what is coming to em perhaps they need hitting with a different kind of stick. Any way awesome work keepit up and I'm sure that goes for any lurkers on the board as well this place really is like another home. Chin up old bean :-) :-) :-)
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'81 maxi (broken soon to be restored ) '88 Volvo 240 (Looking for some cheap 3spokes or Slotmag's and needs hitting wit da stick) B-)
'00 Omega tourer very slowly spoiling me :@
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Apr 17, 2008 12:41:36 GMT
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I lost ScrapingScrap.com in much the same way, except it hadn't even expired. Very odd. Hope we can collectively sort something out for RR... I remember that, Was the Renault 4 Yours? Loved that car |
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Odin
Posted a lot
Posts: 1,406
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Apr 17, 2008 12:46:16 GMT
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Ouch! Just come across this as I've been snowed under with work.
I hadn't noticed because I have a direct boomark to the forum, but I understand the hard work that goes into getting a domain a reputation. Maybe use it as an excuse to relaunch? Press release etc.
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Apr 17, 2008 13:01:25 GMT
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If you do get in negotiation with the person that has just re-registered it i would avoid mentioning how popular this site is as they will then realise how much it is worth and no doubt demand a higher price.
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Apr 17, 2008 13:03:47 GMT
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indeed. It may come to that, in which case: Use what you can as a positive and move on...
I'm mildly amused at the talk of establishing a legal fighting fund. Do you guys ever pursue commercial litigation? I had one I started just before Christmas and I had one, maybe two phone calls and a handful of emails and a bill for £1200 +VAT within 2 weeks. And that was not even to pursue the matter, that was to look into whether we had a case to go forward with and get the preparatory data together.
You could spend £10K without trying on this.
I'm sure we all have good wishes and all that but how much of the £10K are you able to put up?
A court can award damages and all that based on the financial loss caused - but as HW doesn't turn a profit from this site then thats a fat zero.
If HW loses the case, which under the circumstances looks pretty much a guaranttee then he has to pay the other side's legal fees too as well as all court costs.
You could be into £25K without trying hard.
My thoughts:
contact the new domain owner and ask nicely if they will sell back the domain name. Find out hw much. We did this and it only cost a tenner. I'll chip into that if neccessary...
if they won't sell then we have to look how to move on. a relaunch with a new domain name is one obvious answer.
As has been said thank f**k for proboards on this occasion!
I always wondered where scrapingscrap went.
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1941 Wolseley Not Rod - 1956 Humber Hawk - 1957 Daimler Conquest - 1966 Buick LeSabre - 1968 Plymouth Sport Fury - 1968 Ford Galaxie - 1969 Ford Country Squire - 1969 Mercury Marquis - 1970 Morris Minor - 1970 Buick Skylark - 1970 Ford Galaxie - 1971 Ford Galaxie - 1976 Continental Mark IV - 1976 Ford Capri - 1994 Ford Fiesta
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Apr 17, 2008 13:21:11 GMT
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If HW loses the case, which under the circumstances looks pretty much a guaranttee then he has to pay the other side's legal fees too as well as all court costs. You could be into £25K without trying hard. Exactly... and if this forum manages to raise £25k,.. I'll be spending it on an Aston Martin thankyouverymuch  My thoughts: contact the new domain owner and ask nicely if they will sell back the domain name. Find out hw much. We did this and it only cost a tenner. I'll chip into that if neccessary... if they won't sell then we have to look how to move on. a relaunch with a new domain name is one obvious answer. As has been said thank f**k for proboards on this occasion! Yup,.. the RR name is known enough and I can get any changes out int he media... the domain isn't really worth anything to anyone.. and having a backup domain and the desire for a relaunch its actually worth less to me now than it was before someone grabbed it. So we shall wait and see until Monday/Tuesday. If we get it back, great,.. if not, we turn a negative into a positive And some people have some nice stickers and shirts which they can reminise about in 5-10 years time  This has really reminded me that I should pay more attention to the main site though, the gallery code has been redone for about 6-7 months and I've got a bunch of other things I've been meaning to put online and never do... So it'll get a bit or a relaunch no matter what |
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rysz
Club Retro Rides Member
Posts: 2,558
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Apr 17, 2008 13:22:49 GMT
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Agree 100% with akku there, a legal battle will do no good whatsoever.
The best bet if the domain is wanted back is to offer a buyback, with 100 people offering a fiver, there should be more than enough.
Thanks.
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Apr 17, 2008 13:35:41 GMT
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Just to re-iterate nothing will be done until Monday at the earliest.. waiting to see what happens after the cooling off period |
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Apr 17, 2008 14:47:29 GMT
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can someone register godaddyaredomainstealingmonkeysuckers.com
They pulled this stunt at work with one of our domains.
We held two card on our account, with domains on both. One card expired, but they never warned us. Sent us an email to say needs renewing. I logged on, checked it was set to auto renew and left it. Week later got an email to say the site wasn't working, checked the whois and saw that it wasn't registered to us anymore, and hadn't been since the day after it expired.
The domain was still with GoDaddy, but with another of their customers.
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Stiff
Posted a lot
'kin 'ell
Posts: 3,019
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Apr 17, 2008 15:06:36 GMT
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Sorry to hear about this HoTWire  It's not the first time it's happened and certainly won't be the last unfortunately, web piracy is rife. It sounds like Godaddy aren't at fault if they tried to contact you to renew the domain name but are you sure they did and you missed the emails or are you just 'presuming' they did? A company I worked for at one time used to use them along with Registerfly.com Here's a little snippet on Registerfly taken from Wiki "On March 28, 2007, U.S. District Court Judge William Osteen unsealed a class action lawsuit filed by Attorney E. Clarke Dummit against RegisterFly, eNom, and ICANN. The lawsuit alleges that RegisterFly systematically defrauded customers attempting to register or renew Internet domain names."Some more on them here... www.registerfly-lawsuit.com/registerfly-lawsuit-overview.shtmlI'm sure this isn't the case with Godaddy but it shows how you can never be safe with Domain names. Oh, and if it does comes to chipping in to help out, count me in. |
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coxy
Part of things
The 4 Ring Mafia!
Posts: 525
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Apr 17, 2008 15:40:54 GMT
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We'll be taking pictures of cars in 10 years time there will be a Retro-Rides.com sticker in the window and it will be "Wow, remember that!?!?!". It's a curse word what's happened. The same thing happened with a website we had for a show a few years ago. The lad that bought the domain for us for 2 years, upped, left and went on his own way. leaving the domain name to us but we were unable to renew, so it expired. We went to buy it back after it expired but the holding company wanted £750 for it so we just registered a different name. 5 months later, it's was back on general sale, but never bothered buying it back as everyone had got used to the new one. 99% of the internet is links anyway so no biggie in losing the domain. It would be a shame if it went as it rolls of the tongue nicely and I think it's a name that has a nice ring to it, but when you can buy domains for next to nothing and just point them here, then it doesn't really matter anyway! They may think they can sell the domain for a quick buck to some dot.com domain name investor. Worth checking on www.sedo.com to see if it's put up for general auction. You'd be surprised to see how much people ask and will pay for certain domain names! |
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Apr 17, 2008 15:53:08 GMT
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Such a shame we have have lost the name,but like everyone says,its not the domain name that soimportant,as its so respected and well known it wouldn't be hard to get the new site (with relaunch) publicised easily and quickly.
#But if push comes to shove I'll gladly stump up some tokens to help!
And I'm not gonna want a new t-shirt!!lol
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Apr 17, 2008 16:04:54 GMT
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count me in for domain funding contributions as well Ill also happily add a link on my website to the new domain name if it goes down that route  |
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bstardchild
Club Retro Rides Member
Posts: 14,937
Club RR Member Number: 71
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Apr 17, 2008 17:05:25 GMT
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this made me happy - At least David can see a bit of humour in whats a sad situation ;D  |
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coxy
Part of things
The 4 Ring Mafia!
Posts: 525
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Apr 17, 2008 17:29:36 GMT
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this made me happy - At least David can see a bit of humour in whats a sad situation ;D think those stickers would sell!!! ;D ;D |
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ImpManiac
Part of things
Imps... Imps... Imps...
Posts: 868
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Apr 17, 2008 18:04:00 GMT
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FWIW, I'll be watching this development. If donations are needed, there'll be cohorts of us ready and waiting. There is a principle at stake here. But whatever it takes... "I'm"  |
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1966 Singer Chamois sprint/hillclimb car in white over blue two tone
1975 Triumph Stag long term project (over 20 years so far) in colour TBA
2003 Vauxhall Vectra GSi 3.2 in black sapphire
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Apr 17, 2008 18:12:14 GMT
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Having thought about it, and realising how little the domain actually means to the forum long term, I'd take great pleasure in not giving them any money. I'd ask them how much they want, and if it's more than a tenner I'd tell them to dash off the scamming curse word |
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Apr 17, 2008 18:18:00 GMT
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I'd ask them how much they want, and if it's more than a tenner I'd tell them to dash off the scamming child born out of wedlock In true RR style you'd have to say exactly that to them |
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