New manager for domain names
By Anick Jesdanun
Associated Press
NEW YORK — GoDaddy.com, the leading registration company for Internet addresses, has agreed to take over and manage more than 850,000 domain names belonging to customers of a troubled rival, officials announced yesterday.
The deal, reached with the support of the Internet's key oversight agency, means that customers of that rival, RegisterFly, could once again renew names, or transfer them elsewhere if they do not want to stay with GoDaddy.
Those names had been in limbo following financial and operational troubles at RegisterFly. In some cases, individuals, groups and businesses were finding their Web sites inoperable because they could not properly renew their addresses before they had expired, nor could they move them to another company, officials said.
"For the past few months, they were pretty much in the dark and there was a lot of frustration there," GoDaddy Chief Executive Bob Parsons said. "All that is a thing of the past."
Parsons refused to disclose terms of the transfer deal, saying they are confidential. But he said GoDaddy isn't buying RegisterFly, so any lawsuits and other previous disputes remain with RegisterFly.
The deal calls for RegisterFly to give GoDaddy its customer databases. Transfers of names will be automatic, and GoDaddy will notify existing RegisterFly customers about the switch and set up a Web page and telephone hot line.
The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, the organization in charge of the Internet's addressing policies, said the deal was good for RegisterFly customers.
"GoDaddy is a well-known, large customer-service-driven organization, and so that should diminish the sorts of problems people have experienced," said Paul Levins, ICANN's vice president for corporate affairs.
The deal also marks a win for GoDaddy, which can make money when those names are up for renewal.
"If it wasn't for that, our interest in doing the deal would be diminished quite a bit," Parsons said. "It is going to take a certain degree of efforts on our part. We're going to have to answer any questions customers have and resolve any issues."
ICANN already had moved to yank RegisterFly's accreditation and sued the company for its databases. Levins said ICANN would proceed with the lawsuit in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles, saying the company still wasn't prominently notifying customers of the decertification decision.
