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Tell HN: Never search for domains on Godaddy.com

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Re: Tell HN: Never search for domains on Godaddy.com

#272
post #226

Ted from Namecheap here. I cannot speak to GoDaddy's practices. However, I can say that for Namecheap, this is not something we would ever even consider doing. In my experience though, lookups are more complex than most think. We are querying so many different sources to give you availability status, some of which are less reliable than others. For example, with smaller TLDs like .ai or .is, lookups may be less relia…

and this is why Namecheap is awesome. Use them instead.

Re: Tell HN: Never search for domains on Godaddy.com

#273

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Recommendations for superior alternatives? I'm an indifferent GoDaddy user but would be happy to switch to something else since I've never liked them as a company.

I love http://domains.Google You get free email forwarding (even wildcard), free domain privacy, free website forwarding (with ssl), Google infrastructure behind all of that and the authoritative DNS they offer. Cloudflare also offers a registrar service and its good.

Does Cloudflare still require you to transfer in or can you actually buy domains from them directly now? The buy and then wait 90 days to transfer in thing is a hassle.

Re: Tell HN: Never search for domains on Godaddy.com

#275
post #226

Ted from Namecheap here. I cannot speak to GoDaddy's practices. However, I can say that for Namecheap, this is not something we would ever even consider doing. In my experience though, lookups are more complex than most think. We are querying so many different sources to give you availability status, some of which are less reliable than others. For example, with smaller TLDs like .ai or .is, lookups may be less relia…

I've been using Namecheap for domains and domain searches since at least 2009. I haven't used any of their other services, besides their WHOISGuard offerings. I have never had issues with them stealing domains after searches or any other problems w/ my account.

Same, I have a few local tld's I have to buy elsewhere but after moving away from Gandi some five years ago I haven't had the need to look back. Namecheap doesn't upsell like godaddy and it's affordable, if not the cheapest for many tld's. It's also a breeze to config dns rules with them.

Re: Tell HN: Never search for domains on Godaddy.com

#276
A few years ago I found a desirable domain for a friend. I told her in person, pulled it up on hover for the first time right on her machine and had it ready to buy and told her to buy it right then. She said she wanted to first ask her designer about the name. I warned her to tell the designer to not search on the domain name. The designer did a search anyway and when my friend clicked "buy" fewer than 20 mins later, the status had changed from "available" to "taken." The name was taken by Tucows. Either the act of searching on hover or the google search spilled the beans.

Re: Tell HN: Never search for domains on Godaddy.com

#277
post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Recommendations for superior alternatives? I'm an indifferent GoDaddy user but would be happy to switch to something else since I've never liked them as a company.

I use ipage for domains and hosting and never had a problem with it. I am looking at my past bill and I paid $96 for a year of hosting. I don't use it for much, just static HTML. I use ftp to push changes. Dead simple. Looking their site they have an intro deal going now to host for a year for $2/month

$96 for static hosting is a crap deal.

Re: Tell HN: Never search for domains on Godaddy.com

#278
post #226

Ted from Namecheap here. I cannot speak to GoDaddy's practices. However, I can say that for Namecheap, this is not something we would ever even consider doing. In my experience though, lookups are more complex than most think. We are querying so many different sources to give you availability status, some of which are less reliable than others. For example, with smaller TLDs like .ai or .is, lookups may be less relia…

Hi Ted - can you speak to Namecheap's stance on bulk spam domain registrations and the fact that Namecheap does nothing to stop it? There has been (at least in the Bay Area) a large increase in text spam. They all have a very similar format, e.g. pretending you missed a delivery, and try to get you to click on a link, usually a .info domain. They are all hosted on Alibaba Cloud, but they are registered in bulk via Na…

I’m interested to hear a response to this too instead of a sales pitch.

Re: Tell HN: Never search for domains on Godaddy.com

#280

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They defrauded you & violated your copyright. If the SoL hasn't passed you might want to consider filing a police report. It's possible that you could get the current registrar to give it back. It seems like they are still violating your copyright, so you might be able to go that avenue if the SoL keeps refreshing as they keep violating it (not sure though). GoDaddy has terminated accounts on copyright grounds before…

Thanks for the feedback. This happened back in 2008? SoL has definitely lapsed. I think it's better to just walk away. It hurt a lot at the time, but that pain has largely healed. Thinking about it doesn't cause me pain or regret anymore, just... I feel sorry for them? It doesn't change what I accomplished then. I'm still proud of what I built, and I know it could have been better with me steering it. Since then, I'v…

Good that it didn't kill your drive! Do you still share your account details with friends or did that stop?
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