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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

#251

Post by IncRnd »

ted0 wrote: 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 am very happy with the domains that I have purchased from namecheap. We host our own sites and email servers, so namecheap's fast ala-carte service has worked great for us for a few years.

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

#252

Post by timcederman »

ted0 wrote: 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 Namecheap. Your legal and abuse team says they have no obligation to prevent such registrations, but to instead take it up with the FTC or the hosting, both of which do nothing either.

Here's a recent article about the problem with bulk registrations and spam: https://www.spamhaus.org/news/article/795/weaponizing-domain...

edit: I highly recommend reading the article for more context on why bulk domain registration is problematic. Note the DOJ filed a temporary restraining order again Namecheap, and the office of the NY AG also contacted them due to their role in spam and scams.

To address some of the questions and comments below:

> A registrar is simple: request a domain, they check you match the requirement for said domain rules, take your money and register the domain for you. Very simple, very stupid, very non-opiniated.

Where do you draw the line on this? How do you feel about registering hate speech in a domain name, or someone else's trademark? Clearly there needs to be some level of regulation.

> do they have any obligation to investigate the purouse people want to use the domains for

Do domain hosts have any obligation to investigate what people are hosting? Does Google have an obligation to remove results from search? There are clearly multiple parties to hosting content on the web, and it's a shared responsibility to keep folks doing the right thing

> Are you asking Namecheap to take unilateral action against domain registrations with no due process?

No - what makes you think that's what I was asking?

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

#253

Post by tyingq »

jansan wrote: post #200
cloudwizard wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Whenever I talk to startups, I check their domain. If they are on GoDaddy, it means that they are technically incompetent.

>If they are on GoDaddy, it means that they are technically incompetent. Let's just say it can be used as an indicator.

One exception is domains picked up from a GoDaddy auction. I believe you have to pay for a year, which you might not want to waste. Or even a transfer takes a while to complete.

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

#254

Post by theogravity »

Marc_Bryan wrote: post #64

They are a bigtime scammers. Recently was assisting a friend to get access to a domain name which was registered in godaddy. They scammed him for a couple of hundred dollars for contacting the domain owner to get a deal on the domain and eventually nothing happened. Not even a mail was sent on behalf the scammed money as we found that the domain was owned by another friend and eventually got it transferred. He confir…

I'm not defending GoDaddy here and agree it's a bad service. I do want to add my own anecdote that I had an unused .com domain behind privacy protection with them and GoDaddy contacted me that someone wanted to buy it off of me.

I said yes and their process was extremely fast in the transfer and getting paid.

I use Google Domains now for my stuff.

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

#255

Post by hangonhn »

cloudwizard wrote: post #184
mdorazio wrote: post #33

I had this happen as well in the past when researching domain names for a new product. Pro Tip: Stay the hell away from GoDaddy for everything. I've had the unfortunate task of managing a server hosted with them and it's been consistently awful (ex. I literally cannot upgrade PHP because the VPS doesn't support it and there is no upgrade path without spinning up an entirely new VPS on a different, and of course more…

Whenever I talk to startups, I check their domain. If they are on GoDaddy, it means that they are technically incompetent.

I really dislike GoDaddy but this is not the best signal to use. A lot of startups are rather low in engineering talent early on when they're trying to find market fit and make a product. A lot of things about startups are just crap early on. People do things that they shouldn't or will have to pay for in the long run. Startups accumulate debt in many ways. Being on GoDaddy might be one of those. And if the DNS resolves just fine, many won't do anything about it except pay the yearly fees. More importantly, startups should ideally improve as they survive from year to year and not using GoDaddy is going to be pretty low on the list of things they need to fix.

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

#256

Post by DonHopkins »

Animats wrote: post #110

Amusingly, if you query GoDaddy for "godaddy-is-an-ongoing-criminal-enterprise.com", they claim it is "unavailable", although it's not in "whois" and other registrars say it is available. I was curious to see if GoDaddy would actually register that domain for themselves. Network Solutions used to do that, which was really annoying.

godaddy-murders-elephants.com is also unavailable on godaddy, but is available on other registrars.

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

#257

Post by AdmiralAsshat »

dlubarov wrote: post #229
AdmiralAsshat wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Google Domains did the same thing to me a few years ago. There's a reason my personal domain is nothingofvalue.org instead of .com. Because when I went to register the .com originally and backed out at the last minute to give myself time to setup a PO Box (didn't like the ICANN publicly displaying my mailing address), I came back two days later and noticed that someone had registered the .com domain.

Did you type nothingofvalue.com in the URL bar? If so, your ISP (assuming you use their DNS) might have sold that data to a squatter. You could be right that it's Google, but I doubt they would risk a scandal to make a few bucks like that.

No, only through Google Domains. And like I said, I got decently far along in the process before I stopped, due to privacy concerns. That probably flagged it as "of interest" to someone who then promptly squatted on it.

> You could be right that it's Google, but I doubt they would risk a scandal to make a few bucks like that.

I think this HN thread has shown that it seems to be something of an open secret among domain registrars, so I'm not sure it would necessarily be a "scandal", particular given how hard it would be for me to prove it.

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

#258

Post by cure »

echelon wrote: post #220
tehwebguy wrote: post #178

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…

> I'm at peace, and I've got a lot to look forward to.

Good for you! That's the healthy path.

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

#259

Post by drummer »

antihero wrote: post #144
aerovistae wrote: post #124

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.

CloudFlare (yes they are a registrar now) or Gandi are my go-tos! Never had an issue. GoDaddy are just bad in every conceivable way.

The same cloudflare whose ceo decided to deplatform a client not too long ago?

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

#260

Post by Hoasi »

notyourwork wrote: post #136
aviraldg wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

NameCheap (which I use) and Gandi are common recommendations on HN AFAIK.

I've had great experience with Gandi over the last 10 years.

Gandi is fine. Their domains are slightly more expensive than others.
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