Cliff Beer joins Epik as CFO and General CounselI am pleased to announce that Cliff Beer has joined Epik as Chief Financial Officer and General Counsel. Cliff and I go way back.? Cliff joined my previous company, Global Market Insite (GMI) in 2000. He was with GMI from 2000 to 2006, during which time we

Over the weekend, I had an opportunity to catch up on some reading.? A few of the articles I read were particularly helpful to understand what is going on in the world. The first 3 articles are also related to my recent posts about China and the outlook for the US dollar. The last article?

This past week was historic.? For the first time in probably a century, the President of the United States was not the most important person in the room.? As a US citizen — albeit of Dutch blood — this is not exactly the easiest thing to watch unfold. While troubling on one level, it just

Quick heads up.? Epik's domain auction platform is out of beta. There are a couple of domain auctions that are closing later today which I think are interesting. They also happen to be bargain-priced. ShakeFlashlights.com is a domain that we acquired on the drop on November 5 using Epik's integrated backorder platform.? We paid reg-fee for...

Boom! Why domains are better than dollarsThe Sage of Omaha is a pretty smart guy. He also may be the ultimate insider trader who happens to be tight with Lloyd Blankfein of Goldman Sachs, Barack Obama, Bill and Melinda Gates, and pretty much anyone else in the world with a major part in the global

The blog post entitled Ka-ching was a popular one and continues to get reactions and comments.? It described where I believe money is being made on the internet, and by inference, which types of domain names might be worth owning and monetizing through development. The Ka-Ching #1 post did not explain a key aspect of

Rick Schwartz served up another provocative post this week and then chased it today with another — suggesting that Microsoft should acquire a very large cross-section of the most valuable domains for the princely sum of at least $8 billion.? The $8 billion dollar question is does Microsoft have a domain strategy.? As near as

Greetings from the TRAFFIC conference in NYC where the RickLatona.com auction has wrapped up, and the evening function — sponsored by Skenzo — is starting. Earlier today, the conference delegates at TRAFFIC heard from CNN News personality, Rick Sanchez, who addressed the group with lunchtime keynote. The central theme of Rick's unscript...

For clues as to who is making money during the economic downturn, take a look at the quarterly earnings reports for Amazon and NetFlix. Read to the end of this post to see how domainers can ride the same wave. Amazon crushes it and Netflix impresses In case you missed the news today, Amazon reported quarterly revenues

Domain development is a popular topic these days in the domainer community.? Domainers with large portfolios have the challenge of having to develop and maintain a number of sites. For large portfolios there has historically been little or no economies of scale. After all, to get any sustainable traction, each domain had to be hand-crafted,

The news of JustDropped.com joining forces with Epik has prompted a number of reactions in the domainer community.? It also raised some questions about Epik's motivation to integrate drop-catching capability as a service offering and in particular whether we will continue to make domains available cheaply. The addition of JustDropped preceded by th...

The recent media attention about the Chris Bosh case is worth noting. While the case itself is not news, it is noteworthy because it raises public awareness around the alternative courses of action that are available beyond UDRP. It is also a reminder of the the potential consequence of registering a name in bad faith

Earlier this week, Epik led the purchase of HardDrives.com.? Epik had already developed the site and was familiar with the site's statistics. The buyer is new to the business of buying domains but he got a fair outcome. The seller got a fast close.? Buyer and seller are both happy. We are now running a similar

There has been increased public debate about the various approaches to domain development. As a category, Minisites in particular, took a drubbing this week.? Part of the problem here is self-inflicted. A quick search on Google for the term "minisites" reveals a litany of get rich quick schemes when in reality developing worthwhile and differentiat...

Epik is pleased to announce the acquisition of DNKO.com.? DomainNameWire.com told the story first, and well. This acquisition adds a key component to the platform for managing domains across the life-cycle, from acquisiton to sale.?? We look forward to announcing exciting improvements to the Epik auction platform, with a notable emphasis of helping...

The time has come to to tell the Epik story.? August 19, 2009 marks the birthday of Epik's blog. The idea of Epik has been under development for more than 2 years.? It was not a direct route. There have been wins along the way. We also had our share of false starts and dead ends.??