Recently in Domains & Hosting Category

Remember 365 selling to UK company Names.co.uk?
Well seemingly Names.co.uk like to overcharge their clients ...

I already mentioned their pricing policy on co.uk transfers out, but they've since gone on to expand that to include com/net/org/info/biz domains. Don't believe me?

Check out this screenshot from the Register365 / Namesco control panel (click to enlarge):


Or how about this invoice a client paid recently for the "right" to move his domain elsewhere (click to enlarge):


So in simple terms if you are NOT happy with their service and want to change provider you will get billed for changing YOUR domains to a new provider.

Aren't they great?

Companies behaving in this manner give a bad name to the entire industry and really make me sick. While I may have had my differences with the previous owners of register365 I somehow doubt that they'd have stooped this low!

And to make matters all the more interesting ..

I'm getting reports from some clients that the charges are being imposed, while others are being told that they can leave without having to pay - what about the people who don't question charges?

NB: Yes I have a vested interest in the hosting and domain industry and I don't hide it. On the other hand I would never be interested in running a company that abused registrants in this manner - there are plenty of ways to make money, messing your clients about isn't one of them

I'm really tired of the shenanigans involving the IEDR and the IE namespace, so I wrote this rant.

Feedback welcome (on that site :) )

Since I post to more than one blog it may appear at times that my activity here is pretty low key.

Over on FilmReviews.ie I've posted a couple of reviews of films I've seen recently including:
Wanted
Hancock
Alatriste
Incredible Hulk

While over on my domain news blog I've posted a few short posts about updates and some more in depth ones like the one the IEDR annual report

The company blog hasn't been that active recently, but I am trying to post to it a couple of times a week. We've been rather busy with the new rollout chez Blacknight, so my energies have been focussed elsewhere (fixing websites to read in English without boring people to death takes time!)

I've also got a few more project ideas in the pipelines, though whether I'll get the time to do anything about them is a totally different matter. (Pipelines is anywhere between vague idea and fully functional website and covers everything in between)

One of the hot topics that will be under discussion at the upcoming ICANN meeeting in Paris will be the introduction of new TLDs.

I've mentioned a few of the campaigns previously on my domain blog (expect more activity on there while I'm at ICANN!)

So how many new TLDs will there be?
How many applicants can we expect to see?

I had been thinking about the entire thing a small bit over the last year, but Anthony Van Couvering decided to go one step further and conducted an informal poll

He emailed a group of people from within the domain industry, including myself, and asked us what we thought. The numbers and comments are quite diverse, but based on the conversations I've been privy to, they're hardly surprising.

Hosting365 have announced that they've sold Register365, which is their shared hosting and domains business to Namesco a UK provider.

So now Ireland's largest provider is no longer Irish. According to the press release Hosting365 are going to focus on their managed services.

What does that mean for the Irish hosting market?

It could be interesting times ahead, as Novara was already swallowed up by Irish Telco Digiweb earlier this year.

Are there more acquistions and sales in the pipeline?

I'm always amazed at the silly / insane / nonsensical junk that comes out of some companies and organisations.

Enterprise Ireland seem to be funding a Template Monster clone, which is linked into Digiweb. Why should tax payers be paying for another Eoin Costello project? If it's commercially viable shouldn't it be able to stand on its own two feet? And does the world really need another template monster?
Why would anyone in their right mind pay that kind of money for a such a horrific "design" when so many free site building tools would do as good a job if not better?

Ammado are a very odd business. Judging by what people have been saying this morning it looks like they spammed quite a few bloggers this morning (Justin Mason, Donncha O Caoimh and Damien Mulley that I know of). I have an account with them, so while I thought the email looked dodgy I wasn't going to complain to them formally.

Twitter has been down more than up over the last few days. If anyone wants an invite to jaiku I have a few.. If you want to see what people are blathering about check out Twit.ie (love the name!) which pulls in the latest posts from both jaiku and twitter from an ever growing list of Irish based users.

UPDATE: Justin has blogged about Ammado and also points out that they're signed up to Habeas!

UPDATE 2: Someone from Ammado has posted an "apology" in the comments on Justin's blog. I'm beginning to see a pattern emerging here..

UPDATE 3 - Looks like quite a few people weren't that impressed with being "targetted" by Ammado: Alexia, Maman Poulet, Damien,

I'm back in the office this morning and trying to catch up on emails etc.,

If you've emailed me in the last week or so and haven't got a reply now you know why :)

Of course if your email didn't have a semantic subject line I probably won't find it ever - sorry!

I've also got a bit tired of clients being negatively affected by Wordpress' dumb caching (or simple lack of it!) which has led to this.

All I'll say is this. When this site made it onto the frontpage of Digg the server barely flinched. If I'd been using a default install of Wordpress the site would have taken out the entire server...

It looks like Bebo.ie is returning to its rightful owners!