Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

How Microryza Acquired the Domain Experiment.com

priceonomics.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

71–80 of 89 posts

Re: How Microryza Acquired the Domain Experiment.com

#71

Post by eru »

wpietri wrote: post #58
wpietri wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not a lawyer, but I believe a semblance of conscience is sadly not allowed for in a bankruptcy. If the Experiment.com people, like most startups, fail to make it, then I'd think they're by default obligated to get the best price possible for the assets. I think doing anything else (e.g., giving a company asset to a founder) would require a founder to agree. Like goatforce suggests, I would have made sure the deal…

Sorry, total fail in that first paragraph, and I missed the edit window. I should have said: I think doing anything else (e.g., giving a company asset to a founder) would require all investors to agree.

Or rather, all creditors?

Re: How Microryza Acquired the Domain Experiment.com

#72

Post by tacticus »

jameswburke wrote: post #21
primitivesuave wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Expensive domain registration would make it cost prohibitive for average people to start a website. The better thing to limit is how many domains you can own, or at least how many domains you can park.

Treat domains like a trademark registration. You have x amount of time to show that you're actually using it for something. And that something has some kind of value. There's issues with what's considered value, but our existing system is nonsense.

So what happens when you have internal domains?

Re: How Microryza Acquired the Domain Experiment.com

#74

Post by wpietri »

eru wrote: post #71
wpietri wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sorry, total fail in that first paragraph, and I missed the edit window. I should have said: I think doing anything else (e.g., giving a company asset to a founder) would require all investors to agree.

Or rather, all creditors?

Yeah in a bankruptcy, definitely. I was thinking back to my last company, which we wound down in an orderly fashion, so only the shareholders mattered. But I definitely said bankruptcy, where it's creditors (and, I suppose, the judge who approves the settlement) who matter.

Re: How Microryza Acquired the Domain Experiment.com

#75

Post by jeremyjarvis »

"The founders conferred. They were prepared to settle for Ryza.com, but suddenly Experiment.com was available. That’s like being engaged to a high school boyfriend only to learn that Brad Pitt is interested in dating you. Never in their wildest dreams did they consider that they could get a domain like that. What to do?"

Stick with the person you love, right. Yeah, tell Brad Pitt to take a hike. Yep, that's definitely the right thing to do. Aww, high school sweethearts. That's lovely. What a nice story.

Oh. Wait. Huh? you dumped high school sweetheart for that wally off of the Chanel ads?

Sigh, I suppose it was... "inevitable" (http://youtu.be/mGs4CjeJiJQ)

Re: How Microryza Acquired the Domain Experiment.com

#76

Post by mjn »

jjoonathan wrote: post #17
gbelote wrote: post #2

I like the Experiment.com brand name so much better, as cool and quirky as Microryza was. Congrats on a good find and sane price!

Mycorrhizae are pretty darn cool. Two kingdoms of life abandoning a history of distrust to form an intimate partnership and solve a Hard Problem. It's symbolic. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arbuscular_mycorrhiza "experiment.com" sacrifices the neat science and the symbolism. The only appeal I see is utilitarian. Given their difficulties with "Microryza," I understand that this is enough to motivate the change, but it…

Huh, I hadn't made the connection to mycorrhizae. I just read microryza as straightforward micro-ryza, "small root", with a meaning of building up science from small contributions. A pun on myco (fungus) vs. micro (small) totally went over my head, if that was the intent...

Re: How Microryza Acquired the Domain Experiment.com

#80

Post by freehunter »

tacticus wrote: post #72
jameswburke wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Treat domains like a trademark registration. You have x amount of time to show that you're actually using it for something. And that something has some kind of value. There's issues with what's considered value, but our existing system is nonsense.

So what happens when you have internal domains?

If it's 100% internal, you don't need to register them. If it's internet-facing but designed for use by registered users only, it'll still have some sort of authentication page, which should be enough proof that you're using it for something.
Post reply on HN