iPhone.com used to look like this
I can confirm Apple has bought IPhone.com from Michael Kovatch. Michael would not disclose the sale prices but he said it was well worth it to sell. I know this was at least a million dollar sale.
Michael started an ISP in 1993 and was in the right place at the right time. He knew the Internet would allow telephone calls one day and that is why he registered IPhone.com. Little did he know the 12 years later – Apple would reveal a product with his name and all this would make him an instant Millionaire.
His seven digit sale goes down in History as one of the biggest sales for a domain name.
Not really cybersquatting, of course. The dude has been trying to build a business with the site for a while. But, becoming an instant millionaire ain’t bad.
Well, I dont know about the instant part, it took 12 years but well played.
I’m surprised Apple didn’t sue him for it.
Lucky Duck!
Let me express one advantage of cybersquatted domain names.
Indexing
Because the cybersquatter wants to sell, he actually puts a nice page up that Google’s and other spiders accept & process.
When you buy it, like I did for Info Extreme dot com, my page ranking compared to a fully new domain name, was right at the top.
Well worth the $$$ I had to pay for the name.
IOW, I “exist” in all the search engines everywhere in the world, without ever registering a single time.
Food for thought…just negotiate, extremely, those guys are on commission.
Just before and during the iPhone rollout people were selling email addresses on eBay with the word iPhone in the address such as iphonesRus@whatever.com or unlock_iphone@isp.com. Bidders were paying hundreds for some of these addresses. I don’t get it but then I’m not an entrepreneur either.
BTW- I saw some 8 gig iPhones sell for $1500 on eBay Saturday morning and by Saturday evening they were selling for closer to a $200 premium. Can you imaging being the guy that paid $700 more than he could have just so he could say he was a proud owner 8 hrs earlier then the next guy? Ouch!
If you admit he was “Not really cybersquatting” then why did you accuse him of it?! He legally obtained a domain name that Apple wanted and he was compensated.
Even if he obtained the name for the sole purpose of selling it later, there should be nothing wrong with that. People buy objects and real property all the time for the sole purpose of reselling at a higher price. Our entire economy is based on people doing just that.
The problem is that these old multinational corporations didn’t get the internet until it was too late and a lot of cool names were already taken. Rather than pay a fair market price for those names, they called the practice “cybersquatting” and made all kinds of laws making it easier for the big guys to take names from the little guys.
We should cheering this guy, not defaming him!
Boy, aren’t you the know-it-all, Jerk-Face. Unfortunately, much of what you say is inaccurate. Apple was not remotely late to the Internet. It even had a Web community called eWorld. And, your claim that Universal is the heavy in the iTunes stand-off is also laughable. You should do some research instead of making authoritative sounding claims that don’t hold water.
#5 – I don’t get it but then I’m not an entrepreneur either.
Neither are those guys… :-/
But I’m sure there is a word for what they are.