Domain Names and all good things...

[brisray]

I'm so happy! A little story about what happens if you let domain names lapse.

Back in 2000, I registered brisray.co.uk as my main site domain name. In 2001, I moved from the UK to the US and thought I wouldn't want to use it again so let it lapse which it did on June 10, 2003. A little while later I realized I'd made a mistake and went to register it again.

I was too late! The cyber squatters got it and wouldn't let it go. One of them was even a comapny owned by the registrar! Every year, I looked up the whois database, and every year I was disappointed. Until today!

I was updating my site's about page and thought I'd check again. I nearly fell off my sofa when I saw it was back in circulation. It took a little over 20 years, but brisray.co.uk is now back where it belongs.

A little server reconfiguration and some DNS changes to change it from brisray.com to do but I'm happy, happy, happy.

If you're into website creation and in for the long-haul, don't ever let a good domain name lapse.

[Kolo]

Oh wow!!! That's incredible that you managed to get it back... and after 20 years too! It's almost poetic... after two decades, it's finally yours again :D I'm happy for you!!!

I've only had my domain since 2017 but I don't plan to let it expire either. It's my little home on the internet!

[bingus_baby]

That's a pretty neat story!! I've heard some horror stories about domains ending up in the wrong hands, and always wondered how they get resolved. I'm glad it went so smooth for you!! ♡ Out of curiosity, did you keep with the .co.uk as well as .com? Just for added security to know you have both just in case?

[Memory]

Congratulations, Brisray. Sounds like those domain vultures realised after 20 years, that the next Brisray Mega Corp isn't around the block to pay 1 million for that rather specific domain. But the question is rather, why your specific domain name gets this kind of treatment? I mean domain names with pointier names, which surely have a certain market value, got released quicker.

[vvinrg]

Hm, their registrar is currently GoDaddy. If that was the case back then I could see GoDaddy having some weird thing with getting people to nab domains after domain lapses. The only experiences I've had with them have been indicative of a company that tries to pull one over on you constantly.

That being said, glad you got the domain name back! Your site's interesting and aesthetically pretty unique.

[brisray]

brisray has been my online moniker for around 25 years now. I lived in the district of Brislington in Bristol so brisray became my email address on Yahoo and the username on my first posts to the old BBSs.

I wrote in one of Web Crafting threads about link checking. The porn industry is insatiable and worse than a domain name disappearing it gets taken over by one of those sites - it's even happened to links on the sites I wrote for work. It never happended to brisray.co.uk, but it got sat on for all that time for whatever reason. It has sentimental value to me but not enough to make me pay the hundreds of dollars and hassle they wanted to get it back.

I'm not sure why the co.uk domain got squatted on. Someone, somewhere, sometime thought it would be a good idea and maybe it got passed around various resellers as part of a block of names. Domain auctions, resellers, and brokers is an entire industry let alone the registrars. It wouldn't surprise me if the registrars are involved in reregistering domains themselves and then involved with auctioning them off to the highest bidder.

When I started buying domains the advice was to to buy things like .info, .net, .us, etc. as well as the main one. Now there's so many TLDs (Top Level Domains), it's not worth it. Now I'm thinking of not renewing some of those I have, maybe including some of the .com ones as none of my sites are commercial. Maybe I could have some fun with brisray.xxx ?

brisray.co.uk is now registered for the full 10 years, out to 2033.