If you are unable to read CDMotion, you’re not alone. createdigitalmotion.com’s domain was not properly renewed by our previous registrar, 1&1, because of a foul-up with closing out an account with them for hosting. (Early in CDM’s history, the site – small at the time – was hosted by 1&1.) I’ve verified with 1&1 that this domain isn’t getting sold to anyone or anything like that — it’s in the ICANN’s redemption period, so I’m working on getting it back. It’s an embarrassing situation, and my apologies to readers. All the rest of CDM’s domains are happy and healthy in one place; the transfer of this one had simply been botched (by me). We’ll certainly correct the issue and keep you posted.
Question for Internet geeks out there — I am a bit disturbed that while 1&1 says it’s in redemption, they say it’ll take up to five business days to get it back, AND they appear to have parked a search page there. I thought that the domain simply shouldn’t resolve. Got any tips on expediting or what this shady business is with Sedo Parking and DomCollect? Let us know. Maybe, as with other things we’ve learned over the years publishing online, we can at least guide others. -PK
Good luck. My dad's site was through 1&1 and when I closed it to move his domain under my hosting, I wasn't able to access the name for 6 months by a faulty transfer. Granted, it wasn't urgent so I wasn't pursuing aggressively.
Hey Peter,
Is there any way for us to access the motion articles in the mean time? There are a couple I saw in the RSS feed I wanted to check out.
I tried just changing the domain to music to see if it was the same box with a different skin but was denied!
What strikes me as weird is that it appears that the whois changed on the day of expiry – and it didn't change to whois privacy, but rather to a domain investment arm also part of the group of companies 1&1 is part of.
I don't recall seeing this before.
PS: It does not usually take 5 business days to get a domain out of the redemption period – also the redemption period only starts after the registrar deletes the domain name at the registry, which clearly hasn't happened here yet.
Yikes. Yeah, in my experience you're pretty much at the mercy of the registrar. Dunno if you're trying to transfer elsewhere but you'll probably have better luck renewing the domain with 1&1 and then trying to transfer after this has all blown over—giving them more money could inspire them to, well, not deliberate quite so long.
I'd start thinking up a new domain name ASAP…
http://www.google.com/search?q=%221+%26+1+interne…
hey peter…
yeah that would be a bit annoying..
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🙁
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Went through this a few months ago with 1&1 over a half dozen domains. It took me over 2 weeks of constant e-mails/phone calls bugging them before the transfer was finished. Best advice, although it's too late now, would be to transfer while you are still being hosted at 1&1, then cancel your account. Bummer dude.
Thanks, folks. We're not losing the domain createdigitalmotion.com.
But yeah, it looks like 1&1 is more than a little strange in how they handle this.
The good news is that you have a very high profile site to discuss this situation on. If 1&1 doesn't handle things well, they'll get a lot of bad publicity (and vice-versa, of course).
Now if you'll excuse me, I'm off to check my domain expiry dates…
http://www.measuredup.com/review/1-amp-1-Internet…
Interesting article on legal action against 1and1.
This is the story that currently concerns me about 1&1:
http://patterico.com/2008/10/24/11-internet-has-a…
Obviously, I hope that this is not the case. I can confirm that the domain is not currently available for transfer or sale, and I've been assured by 1&1 that it's safe.
They're currently claiming that the domain expired in September, not December, in conflict with what the whois records say. But they have said they've initiated a domain transfer process. Frankly, so long as they actually do this, I'm satisfied as far as my own needs.
I'll keep readers updated.
I should just mention that they may not have parked a search page there. The DNS you use (either from your ISP or another available DNS) can display a landing page if a domain doesn't exist. A lot of ISPs do this for mistyped domains to get some advertising money.
In this case it kind of looks like they actually did park a landing page there though. That's really shady. I've had a couple domains lapse (though I let them on purpose) and it really is amazing at how quickly they get switched over/snatched up. I think some companies literally look at what is registered and put them on essentially back order. If one lapses they swoop in and snatch it. Thankfully there is some recourse for situations like this, but it's never fun. Good luck getting it back!
Pew, wish you luck….
Sedo is a domain sales agency and DomCollect is a domain grabber. They have nothing directly to do with 1&1. DomCollect grabs domains if they are expired and collects them for Sedo. Both are trying to hide their business relationship.
Best thing to do right now is a dispute proposal via 1&1 against DomCollect to get your domain back. Don't wait for 1&1, be proactive and kick their asses…
Far too familiar. My site was down for a little while because of a related issue with 1&1. After hours on the phone for several days and a variety of misleading information, I finally separated myself from them and began trying to clean up the mess. As long as everything was automated and used their standard options, with no human intervention or choice, everything had worked fine. Then it didn't. Glad to be done with them.
I hate to sound like advertising but… Go straight to http://www.Pair.com for your hosting and domain registration needs. I've used them for over 10 years without a problem.
If 1&1 in u.s. is anything like in germany, i wish you best of luck … Can't advice on the domain issue, but be careful with them, send important stuff via registered mail or fax, emailing them got me nowhere.
Whew, I am so relieved (or at least I will be, when the site is back up). It was a jolt to have a search engine appear. Best of luck sorting it all out.
It's interesting but sad that 1&1 is so dumb that they drag their feet on an active site, particularly one that speaks to technology readers. It was a mistake on your part but one that's easy to correct. Max 24 hours. Pay the ransom, bring up the site. Done!
In the end this gives one a very clear view of what to expect from 1&1. I have hundreds of domain names and am pretty psycho about keeping them up so I haven't tasted this particular fruit… though, in the past I've helped a variety of clients recover from a similar lapse. The longest it's ever taken in the last 10 years is less than 24 hours.
REALLY BIG MISTAKE BY 1&1
Don't let up, follow through everyday until it's fixed. It's valuable IP regardless of your revenue.
The updated timeline by 1&1 is now to get this sorted by Thursday, December 24. I'm hopeful that we'll luck out and it'll happen sooner than that, but repeated attempts to get some sort of expedited results from 1&1 have been less than successful.
I will say, all indications are that the process was started and that we will get the domain back, which is the most important thing. And needless to say, I won't let this happen again.
Also, I think the difference on timeline is that the domain was never deleted; it was transferred, and was to be deleted after that (after they squeezed ad revenue out of the domain page). So we're now actually waiting for an ownership transfer. It still seems that should happen faster than they're making it happen, but I believe what they've done is to *queue* those requests based on the maximum amount of time allowed by ICANN to respond to a domain owner.
Transferring a domain does not take more than a day.
They are clearly using the popularity of the domain for profit and making actual owners wait. Disgusting attitude.
The ads are targeted to countries, one of the links say "defloration" in its vulgar form in my native language, can't see how it is related though.
Good luck sorting it out Peter – generally speaking persistence and a cool head are your greatest weapons with these sorts of things. I went through a similar struggle transferring my own domain a year ago. The main lesson I learned from that experience was to register my domain and host my site with two different companies. That way there's no business conflict, and the hosting company can't use your domain as an anchor to keep you with their hosting service (something that, sadly, they are often all too willing to do in various shady ways).
Today I manage my domain through gandi.net, and have web hosting through hostmonster.com. I sleep easier knowing that if my site starts behaving badly, I can drop the web host without worrying about losing my domain.
cheers,
j e f f
i'd prepare for some serious legal actions…
well 1&1 has a TERRIBLE track record (I'm a web designer and IT tech).
They've been burned legally here in germany many times with this scam.
Make no mistake it is willful.
It is done to make money from the ads that are placed on your domain until you get it back.
They are real bastards – and they've just bought up most of the large providers here.
Oh jeez, a monopoly, just what we needed….
Arrrghhh! How long must we wait! Keep pushing Peter and if there's anything we can do… let us know!
I was worried there for a second…Cant wait till its back up:)
yay cdm is back
[…] apologize for this happening and confirm that we won’t let it happen again. I wrote a bit on Create Digital Music about what took […]
8 years on and these scammers still stealing domains