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2006-06-06, 08:46 PM
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米农们的圣经!!
香米原创编译《Masters of their Domains 域名大师》米农们的圣经
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 香米原创编译《Masters of their Domains 域名大师》米农们的圣经 香米的话：此文原作为英文版http://money.cnn.com/magazines/busi...64591/index.htm，为我们揭示了域名大师们神奇的域名投资一面，堪称米农们的圣经，尤其是其中以1.64亿美元卖出其10万多个域名投资组合的叶云的故事，引人入胜。由于在网上我尚未找到中文版本，特此不遗余力编译出来，与大家分享） 《Masters of their Domains 域名大师》 By Paul Sloan，December 1，2005，（Business 2.0） 作者：保罗·斯隆，发表于2005年12月1日的《Business 2.0》杂志，原创编译者：香米，首发于其博客网站www.xiangmi.cn（网上可随意转载，但请尊重劳动成果，注明转载出处，谢谢！如有新闻媒体需发表此译文请联系xiangmicn@126.com） 舍弃那些在公寓大楼和商业区上的投资吧，投资在网络上的房地产——“域名”可以带来更多的回报。网络上那些高明的投机者是怎样从他们对网址的投资组合中赚到数百万美元？ 10月下旬，一个宜人的夜晚，数百名参加聚会的人，大多数穿着红色或蓝色夏威夷衬衣，包下了位于佛罗里达州的德尔雷海滩的德鲁克斯夜总会。这是个值得炫耀的地方——户外舷板、两个酒吧、床式毛绒沙发遍布，开着大巴士和加长悍马车到达的人群。许多人向着一个抽着雪茄、穿着篮球靴的人走去，就象是1999 年时那样。 他们称自己为域名投资者，靠买卖域名和大量的网络流量为生，并赚了大笔现金。他们云集在德尔雷海滩是为了参加一个名为“网络流量”的商业展会，据称今年的这一届有300 名付费出席者，比2004年第一届举办时的两倍还多。 会议的组织者瑞克·施瓦兹非常高兴，而此时他并不是在玩动作射击游戏抽奖，或者舞池中穿着比基尼泳装的女孩正在脱去她们的上衣。52岁的施瓦兹在10 年前开始致力于收购域名。像许多早期玩家一样，他倾向于购买一个金钱聚集的行业的域名，那就是色情行业。他抢购的域名包括Ass.com、Makeout.com、Porno.com，还有其他一些。这是一个快速致富之路: 那些成人站点而不是主流站点在慷慨地为网络流量付费。 今天，施瓦兹拥有大约5000 个域名，不到三分之一是“成人”类型的。 他是这个产业最大的促进者，向任何人愿意聆听的人宣扬着域名的力量，并把域名投资者集合起来，其中有金融家以及来自于像Google、Yahoo网站那样的出资者。他左腕上戴着价值65000美元的劳力士手表，右腕上戴着价值 $32,000 钻石手镯。令人震惊的是，他只是个从社区学院的退学生，却在博卡拉顿市的滨水区住宅里过着皇室般的生活。 “我不喜欢工作”，施瓦兹大声叫喊着，似乎试图使听力范围内的每个人信服，如果他们去工作，他们就是傻瓜。“我认为世界上的任何一个傻瓜都可以投入时间去为他们自己工作。 我只有一台笔记本电脑，没有员工，没有产品——什么都没有! 这就是魔术。”他所说的这个魔术给他带来了每年两百万美元的收入。 或许您认为在网络公司不景气的时候，域名抢注者会消失。然而，目前网络广告发展很快，支付每次点击的广告模式也取得成功，使得过去的90 年代与它们相比，看起来发展相当缓慢。那时，购买一个域名完全靠投机，如抢购Whatever.com，然后舒服地等待一些愿意为网络营销付出任何费用的大公司，提供给你足够过一辈子的钱来购买。 现在收入的涓涓溪流汇成大河。一个单个单词的好域名，如Candy.com（糖果网），Cellphones.com（手机网），Athletesfoot.com（香港脚网），每天能带来上百美元的收入。有时候，它的域名所有者几乎不用动一个手指。例如Schwartz提供中介服务，把他拥有的网络流量引向许多小公司的其中一个，而Google和Yahoo网站这些巨人使之成为可能。中介就象召集者一样，做所有粗重的活，设计站点，在搜索引擎广告网络为最佳的支付链接添加标识。许多其它的域名投资大师删去了中介，创建他们自己的网页，直接为Google和Yahoo网站工作。 秘诀是什么？你必须懂得如何引导直接键入的访问，或者象华尔街术语所说的——“直航”访问。也许看起来很奇怪，即使是在强有力的搜索引擎时代，还是有成千上万的网络冲浪者根本不使用搜索引擎。相反，他们在浏览器地址栏里键入他们想要查寻找的。 想买糖果？键入Candy.com，一个被施瓦兹在2002 年5月花了108000美元买来的域名，在其网页上会出现大量与糖果相关的产品链接。点击其中一个广告，广告业主就会支付给Google网站，而Google网站则会支付其中一部分给施瓦兹和运营Candy.com的公司。有些时候，Candy.com会每天给施瓦兹带来300美元的利润，仅用了一年半的时间该站点就赢回了投资。 没人确切地知道，有多少网络流量来自“直航”访问, 而Google和Yahoo网站运营商并不会谈论它们。但私底下，在“网络流量”会议的一次深夜聚会上，一位Yahoo网站人士估计“直航”访问能占到15%的搜索量。总部设在西雅图的Marchex公司，其发展战略主要基于“直航”访问，他们估计“直航”访问几乎占到全球有偿搜索市场的10%的份额, 预计今年会达到9亿美元，而2009 年将会达到23亿美元。 那就是为什么一些域名能够获得6至7 位数的标识价格和吸引到有着大量资金的玩家。私募资金管理人斯图亚特·拉宾减少了对域名投资者每周两至三次的一些检查。2004 年11月, Marchex公司花了1.64亿美元以获得一个域名投资者的投资组合。甚至一些风险投资公司也在购置筹码。年初，总部设在波士顿的Highland投资公司花了8000万美元购买了50万个域名，许多人都知道这笔交易。Highland投资公司负责人理查德·德·西尔瓦不愿意证实上述价格，他说，“这些域名都是赢利机器。” 域名投资者有他们的英雄，其中最神奇的一个是住大不列颠哥伦比亚省温哥华市的中国人，他叫叶云。当他卖了超过10万个域名的投资组合给Marchex公司时，推动了整个域名投资市场的繁荣。 叶云的域名投资组合每年给他带来了超过2千万的收入和19 00万的赢利。根据SEC文件中提供的数字，Marchex公司支付了8.6 倍于叶云每年收入等价的金额。 “他是我们的神”，当域名投资者迈克尔·巴利亚那克斯在德尔雷海滩聚会上听见叶的名字时说。每个域名投资者都知道叶，但只有少数人曾经遇见过他。29岁的域名投资者凯塞·索兹说，“我的律师碰巧是他的律师，但那是我能和他最接近的关系。” 叶云是位程序员高手。在90 年代晚期和21世纪早期，他用自己开发的软件获得了大批域名，建立了他的域名帝国。他成为了一位域名大师，并因抢注和购买那些被人们放弃或忘记支付每年注册费的域名而出名。当时的域名注册系统是秘密运行的, 域名投资者得设法推测什么域名会在时候到期。在黑夜里，叶云会像指挥官一样，坐在一堆电脑前，火速下单，发送请求购买域名。 他的高超技术很快就显现出来。一位印第安纳波利斯州的域名投资者乍得·富尔克宁注册的域名，在那些年间因此被搅乱秩序，有时错过了续费的最后期限。他注意，叶云以闪电般速度抢注了他拥有的到期域名。在叶云抢购了他的100个到期域名后，富尔克宁决定需要与叶谈谈。“我要把叶云吃穷、睡晕、喝倒，”他说。发给叶云的电子邮件没有回复，打过去的电话也没有人接。到了2001 年底，富尔克宁去到圣约瑟市附近旅行，来到一个在叶云注册域名信息上面登记的地址。“我打算走到他的前门，敲敲门，并且说，‘叶云，我必须见到你，’”现在已经有了7000 个域名的富尔克宁说。然而，地址把他带到了一个信箱前。富尔克宁在叶云的信箱上贴了张便条，叫叶云回复他。 过了两、三天后，叶云给富尔克宁发了封电子邮件，但两人还是没有见面。两年后，富尔克宁的一些相识熟人在洛杉矶市的酒巴搞了次聚会，叶云也参加了。“我谈了许多，然后他离开了，” 富尔克宁回忆道。直到第二天富尔克宁才知道和他喝酒的是另外一个叶云，真正的叶云在电子邮件中向他证实了这一点。 （叶云的律师约翰·巴雷希尔说叶云不会与新闻媒体接触，并且他补充道，“我不回答任何关于叶云的问题。”） Forget condos and strip malls. Domain names, the real estate of the Web, have been delivering far greater returns. How some of the savviest speculators on the Net are making millions from their URL portfolios. On a balmy night in late October, hundreds of partiers, most sporting red or blue Hawaiian shirts, pack the Delux nightclub in Delray Beach, Fla. It's a swank place--outdoor decks, two bars, plush, bed-size sofas scattered throughout--and the crowd arrives in chartered buses and stretch Hummers. Many head straight for the guy rolling cigars and toss back shots as if it were 1999. Which, to them, it might as well be. They call themselves domainers. They make their living buying and selling domain names and turning their Web traffic into cash--lots of it. They have gathered in Delray Beach for a trade show called Traffic that this year boasts 300 paying attendees, more than twice the number that came for the first show, in '04. The man behind the conference, Rick Schwartz, couldn't be happier--and he isn't even around when midnight strikes and bikini-clad women take to the dance floor to raffle off prizes and peel off their tops. Schwartz, 52, began buying up domain names 10 years ago. Like many early players, he gravitated to where the money was: porn. He snapped up names like Ass.com, Makeout.com, and Porno.com, to name a few. It was a quick path to riches: Adult sites were paying handsomely for the traffic; mainstream sites were not--at least not yet. Today, Schwartz owns about 5,000 names, with less than a third falling into the "adult" category. He's the industry's biggest promoter, preaching the power of domains to anyone who will listen and bringing domainers together with moneymen and execs from the likes of Google and Yahoo. He sports a $65,000 Rolex on his left wrist, a $32,000 diamond bracelet on his right, and is astounded that he--a community college dropout--is living like a king in a waterfront house in Boca Raton. "I don't like to work," Schwartz says, almost yelling as if to convince everyone within earshot that they're fools if they do. "I figure any moron in the world can generate work for themselves and tie up their time. I have one laptop, no employees, and no product whatsoever--none! This is magic." Magic, he claims, that's earning him $2 million a year. And you thought the domain grabbers vanished with the dotcom bust. The boom in Internet advertising and the success of the pay-per-click ad model are making the go-go '90s look sluggish. Back then, buying a domain name was pure speculation: Snap up Whatever.com and sit back until some big company with a get-on-the-Internet-at-any-cost mentality offers you a set-for-life payday to buy it. Now it's all about the income stream. A single good domain name--Candy.com, Cellphones.com, Athletesfoot.com--can bring in hundreds of dollars a day, in some cases while the owner hardly lifts a finger. Schwartz, for instance, directs his traffic to one of the many small companies that serve as go-betweens with Google and Yahoo, the two giants that make this all possible. The middlemen, known as aggregators, do all the heavy lifting, designing the sites and tapping into one or the other of the search engines' advertising networks to add the best-paying links. Many other big domainers cut out the middlemen, creating their own webpages and working directly with Google or Yahoo. The secret? It has to do with what's known as type-in traffic, or, in Wall Street jargon, direct navigation. Though it may seem odd in the era of powerful search engines, it turns out that millions of Internet surfers don't use search at all. Instead, they type what they're looking for right into the top of their Web browser. Looking to buy candy? Type in Candy.com, a name Schwartz bought in May 2002 for $108,000. A page filled with links to candy-related products comes up. Click on one of the ads and the advertiser pays Google, which in turn sends a share to Schwartz and the company that runs Candy.com. Some days Candy.com makes Schwartz $300 in profits; the site paid for itself in a year and a half. No one knows for sure how much Web traffic comes from type-ins, and Google and Yahoo execs won't discuss it. But privately, during one of the late-night parties at the Traffic conference, one Yahoo official estimates that type-ins could make up 15 percent of its search business. Marchex, a Seattle-based public startup whose strategy rests largely on type-in traffic, estimates that it accounts for nearly 10 percent of the global paid search market, which is projected to soar from $9 billion this year to $23 billion in 2009. That's why some domain names are commanding six- and seven-figure price tags and attracting big-money players. Private money manager Stuart Rabin is cutting those sorts of checks to domainers two to three times a week. In November 2004, Marchex shelled out $164 million for a single domainer's portfolio. Even a few venture capital firms are now placing bets. Earlier this year, Boston-based Highland Capital paid $80 million to acquire BuyDomains, a company with 500,000 names, according to people familiar with the deal. Says Highland principal Richard de Silva, who wouldn't confirm the price, "These are profit machines." Domainers have their heroes, and one of the most mysterious is a man named Yun Ye, a Chinese citizen living in Vancouver, British Columbia. He is credited with boosting the entire market when he sold his portfolio of more than 100,000 domains to Marchex. His names were bringing in more than $20 million a year in revenues--and $19 million in profits--when Marchex paid the equivalent of 8.6 times annual earnings, based on figures provided in SEC documents. "He is our god," says domainer Michael Bahlitzanakis the moment he hears Ye's name uttered at a Delray Beach party. Every domainer knows of Ye, but few have ever met him. He's the domainers' Keyser Soze. "My attorney happens to be his attorney, but that's as close to him as I can get," says Bahlitzanakis, 29. A onetime hotshot programmer, Ye used his software chops to build the bulk of his domain empire in the late '90s and early 2000s. He became a master at what's known as "catching," or buying up domains that were dropping because people gave up on them or forgot to pay the annual registration fee. At the time, the system was secretive, and domainers were trying to figure out what names were expiring and when. In the dark of night, Ye would sit before a bank of computers and, like a conductor, launch programs he wrote to shoot rapid-fire requests to purchase names. His prowess quickly became clear. Chad Folkening, a domainer in Indianapolis, was disorganized in those years and sometimes missed renewal deadlines. He noticed that Ye was grabbing his expired names with lightning speed. After Ye had snapped up 100 of them, Folkening decided he needed to talk to Ye. "I was eating, sleeping, and drinking Yun Ye," he says. E-mail drew no response. Nor did phone calls. So in late 2001, Folkening traveled to an address near San Jose listed on Ye's domain registrations. "I figured I was going to walk up to his front door, knock, and say, 'Yun Ye, I just had to meet you,'" says Folkening, who now owns 7,000 names. Instead, the address led him to a Mail Boxes Etc. outlet. Folkening stuck Post-It notes on Ye's box asking him to call. Ye sent Folkening an e-mail a couple of days later, but the two never met up. Two years later, some acquaintances of Folkening's set up a get-together with Ye in a Los Angeles bar. "I did most of the talking, then he left," Folkening recalls. It wasn't until the next day that it dawned on Folkening that the man he'd had drinks with was probably an entirely different Yun Ye, which the real Ye confirmed to him in an e-mail. (Ye's attorney, John Barryhill, says Ye won't talk to the press, and he adds, "I don't answer questions about him.") 未完待续
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2006-06-06, 09:16 PM
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感謝分享。之前也曾說要和版友們共同翻譯此文，結果還是不了了之
 特此轉成繁體以利台灣版友閱讀： 香米原創編譯《Masters of their Domains 域名大師》米農們的聖經 香米的話：此文原作為英文版 http://money.cnn.com/magazines/busi...64591/index.htm ，為我們揭示了域名大師們神奇的域名投資一面，堪稱米農們的聖經，尤其是其中以1.64億美元賣出其10萬多個域名投資組合的葉雲的故事，引人入勝。由於在網上我尚未找到中文版本，特此不遺餘力編譯出來，與大家分享） 《Masters of their Domains 域名大師》 By Paul Sloan，December 1，2005，（Business 2.0） 作者：保羅·斯隆，發表於2005年12月1日的《Business 2.0》雜志，原創編譯者：香米，首發於其博客網站http://www.xiangmi.cn（網上可隨意轉載，但請尊重勞動...icn@126.com） 舍棄那些在公寓大樓和商業區上的投資吧，投資在網絡上的房地產——“域名”可以帶來更多的回報。網絡上那些高明的投機者是怎樣從他們對網址的投資組合中賺到數百萬美元？ 10月下旬，一個宜人的夜晚，數百名參加聚會的人，大多數穿著紅色或藍色夏威夷襯衣，包下了位於佛羅裏達州的德爾雷海灘的德魯克斯夜總會。這是個值得炫耀的地方——戶外舷板、兩個酒吧、床式毛絨沙發遍布，開著大巴士和加長悍馬車到達的人群。許多人向著一個抽著雪茄、穿著籃球靴的人走去，就象是1999 年時那樣。 他們稱自己為域名投資者，靠買賣域名和大量的網絡流量為生，並賺了大筆現金。他們雲集在德爾雷海灘是為了參加一個名為“網絡流量”的商業展會，據稱今年的這一屆有300 名付費出席者，比2004年第一屆舉辦時的兩倍還多。 會議的組織者瑞克·施瓦茲非常高興，而此時他並不是在玩動作射擊遊戲抽獎，或者舞池中穿著比基尼泳裝的女孩正在脫去她們的上衣。52歲的施瓦茲在10 年前開始致力於收購域名。像許多早期玩家一樣，他傾向於購買一個金錢聚集的行業的域名，那就是色情行業。他搶購的域名包括Ass.com、Makeout.com、Porno.com，還有其他一些。這是一個快速致富之路: 那些成人站點而不是主流站點在慷慨地為網絡流量付費。 今天，施瓦茲擁有大約5000 個域名，不到三分之一是“成人”類型的。 他是這個產業最大的促進者，向任何人願意聆聽的人宣揚著域名的力量，並把域名投資者集合起來，其中有金融家以及來自於像Google、Yahoo網站那樣的出資者。他左腕上戴著價值65000美元的勞力士手表，右腕上戴著價值 $32,000 鑽石手鐲。令人震驚的是，他只是個從社區學院的退學生，卻在博卡拉頓市的濱水區住宅裏過著皇室般的生活。 “我不喜歡工作”，施瓦茲大聲叫喊著，似乎試圖使聽力范圍內的每個人信服，如果他們去工作，他們就是傻瓜。“我認為世界上的任何一個傻瓜都可以投入時間去為他們自己工作。 我只有一台筆記本電腦，沒有員工，沒有產品——什麼都沒有! 這就是魔術。”他所說的這個魔術給他帶來了每年兩百萬美元的收入。 或許您認為在網絡公司不景氣的時候，域名搶注者會消失。然而，目前網絡廣告發展很快，支付每次點擊的廣告模式也取得成功，使得過去的90 年代與它們相比，看起來發展相當緩慢。那時，購買一個域名完全靠投機，如搶購Whatever.com，然後舒服地等待一些願意為網絡營銷付出任何費用的大公司，提供給你足夠過一輩子的錢來購買。 現在收入的涓涓溪流彙成大河。一個單個單詞的好域名，如Candy.com（糖果網），Cellphones.com（手機網），Athletesfoot.com（香港腳網），每天能帶來上百美元的收入。有時候，它的域名所有者幾乎不用動一個手指。例如Schwartz提供中介服務，把他擁有的網絡流量引向許多小公司的其中一個，而Google和Yahoo網站這些巨人使之成為可能。中介就象召集者一樣，做所有粗重的活，設計站點，在搜索引擎廣告網絡為最佳的支付鏈接添加標識。許多其它的域名投資大師刪去了中介，創建他們自己的網頁，直接為Google和Yahoo網站工作。 秘訣是什麼？你必須懂得如何引導直接鍵入的訪問，或者象華爾街術語所說的——“直航”訪問。也許看起來很奇怪，即使是在強有力的搜索引擎時代，還是有成千上萬的網絡沖浪者根本不使用搜索引擎。相反，他們在瀏覽器地址欄裏鍵入他們想要查尋找的。 想買糖果？鍵入Candy.com，一個被施瓦茲在2002 年5月花了108000美元買來的域名，在其網頁上會出現大量與糖果相關的產品鏈接。點擊其中一個廣告，廣告業主就會支付給Google網站，而Google網站則會支付其中一部分給施瓦茲和運營Candy.com的公司。有些時候，Candy.com會每天給施瓦茲帶來300美元的利潤，僅用了一年半的時間該站點就贏回了投資。 沒人確切地知道，有多少網絡流量來自“直航”訪問, 而Google和Yahoo網站運營商並不會談論它們。但私底下，在“網絡流量”會議的一次深夜聚會上，一位Yahoo網站人士估計“直航”訪問能占到15%的搜索量。總部設在西雅圖的Marchex公司，其發展戰略主要基於“直航”訪問，他們估計“直航”訪問幾乎占到全球有償搜索市場的10%的份額, 預計今年會達到9億美元，而2009 年將會達到23億美元。 那就是為什麼一些域名能夠獲得6至7 位數的標識價格和吸引到有著大量資金的玩家。私募資金管理人斯圖亞特·拉賓減少了對域名投資者每周兩至三次的一些檢查。2004 年11月, Marchex公司花了1.64億美元以獲得一個域名投資者的投資組合。甚至一些風險投資公司也在購置籌碼。年初，總部設在波士頓的Highland投資公司花了8000萬美元購買了50萬個域名，許多人都知道這筆交易。Highland投資公司負責人理查德·德·西爾瓦不願意證實上述價格，他說，“這些域名都是贏利機器。” 域名投資者有他們的英雄，其中最神奇的一個是住大不列顛哥倫比亞省溫哥華市的中國人，他叫葉雲。當他賣了超過10萬個域名的投資組合給Marchex公司時，推動了整個域名投資市場的繁榮。 葉雲的域名投資組合每年給他帶來了超過2千萬的收入和19 00萬的贏利。根據SEC文件中提供的數字，Marchex公司支付了8.6 倍於葉雲每年收入等價的金額。 “他是我們的神”，當域名投資者邁克爾·巴利亞那克斯在德爾雷海灘聚會上聽見葉的名字時說。每個域名投資者都知道葉，但只有少數人曾經遇見過他。29歲的域名投資者凱塞·索茲說，“我的律師碰巧是他的律師，但那是我能和他最接近的關系。” 葉雲是位程序員高手。在90 年代晚期和21世紀早期，他用自己開發的軟件獲得了大批域名，建立了他的域名帝國。他成為了一位域名大師，並因搶注和購買那些被人們放棄或忘記支付每年注冊費的域名而出名。當時的域名注冊系統是秘密運行的, 域名投資者得設法推測什麼域名會在時候到期。在黑夜裏，葉雲會像指揮官一樣，坐在一堆電腦前，火速下單，發送請求購買域名。 他的高超技術很快就顯現出來。一位印第安納波利斯州的域名投資者乍得·富爾克寧注冊的域名，在那些年間因此被攪亂秩序，有時錯過了續費的最後期限。他注意，葉雲以閃電般速度搶注了他擁有的到期域名。在葉雲搶購了他的100個到期域名後，富爾克寧決定需要與葉談談。“我要把葉雲吃窮、睡暈、喝倒，”他說。發給葉雲的電子郵件沒有回複，打過去的電話也沒有人接。到了2001 年底，富爾克寧去到聖約瑟市附近旅行，來到一個在葉雲注冊域名信息上面登記的地址。“我打算走到他的前門，敲敲門，並且說，‘葉雲，我必須見到你，’”現在已經有了7000 個域名的富爾克寧說。然而，地址把他帶到了一個信箱前。富爾克寧在葉雲的信箱上貼了張便條，叫葉雲回複他。 過了兩、三天後，葉雲給富爾克寧發了封電子郵件，但兩人還是沒有見面。兩年後，富爾克寧的一些相識熟人在洛杉磯市的酒巴搞了次聚會，葉雲也參加了。“我談了許多，然後他離開了，” 富爾克寧回憶道。直到第二天富爾克寧才知道和他喝酒的是另外一個葉雲，真正的葉雲在電子郵件中向他證實了這一點。 （葉雲的律師約翰·巴雷希爾說葉雲不會與新聞媒體接觸，並且他補充道，“我不回答任何關於葉雲的問題。”）
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#5
2006-06-06, 10:34 PM
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文章有一點虎濫...
internic 有一定的 API 可以註得域名. 十年前的註冊方式: Step1: 先取得 nic_handle 管理者的編號. Step2: 再事先將申請的 domain_form 資料填好 Step3: 抓 domain 掉出來的系統時間. Step4: 丟出 domain_request_form Step5: 看誰的運氣好, 先讓 internic 接受申請表格. The_End
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#6
2006-06-06, 11:03 PM
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參考資料: Domain_request_form
引用:
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#7
2006-06-09, 02:01 AM
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（续上）
当叶云建立他的域名投资组合时， 只有一种方式来通过域名挣钱——那就是转售它们。直到2003年付费搜索市场开始腾飞的时候，情况才开始有所改变。当时Overture公司开发和推动了付费搜索市场的发展，现在这家公司已经成为Yahoo公司的一部分，而目前的市场领头羊是Google 公司。推动着事情发展的技术是复杂的, 但基本的商业模式并不复杂: 只有当某人点击他们的广告后，广告业主才予以支付。同时为了他们的链接能排在搜索结果的前面，或列在浏览器里键入域名能登陆到的域名投资者的网页上面，他们纷纷为关键词竞价掏荷包。 普通单词的域名对于域名投资者是金子，针对具体受众的域名也有较高价值。例如，人们在搜索关于厌食症或易饿症的信息时，他们会在Yahoo网站的搜索引擎里键入词组“饮食失调”。这时，一个位于亚利桑那州威肯勃格的Remuda Ranch治疗中心的广告，就会横跨出现搜索结果的上面。为了赢得这个位置，Remuda Ranch治疗中心会为每次点击支付给Yahoo网站3.06美元，这是《Business 2.0》杂志在上旬11月查询到的报价。但许多人寻找同样信息的方式是将www.eatingdisorders.com 键入他们的浏览器，那会将他们导向对有着5个各种治疗中心链接的网页上面，并且Remuda Ranch治疗中心也会出现在网页的顶部。其中的区别在于: 点击这个网页的Remuda Ranch治疗中心广告时，治疗中心会支付3.06美元给Yahoo网站和拥有这个域名的域名投资者分享。 在这个例子中，富兰克·席林，一个悄然无息地成为进入世界上的最有实力和最受尊敬的域名投资者行列的隐士，他在2002 年底的一场拍卖中，以1100美元的价格购买了eatingdisorders.com这个域名。它使得聪明的席林意识到饮食失调是普遍存在的。“我从来没有意识到，”他说，“每天超过100 个人下意识地在地址栏里键入eatingdisorders.com这个域名。” 他说，现在该网站每天能够得到大约120 次点击，提供稳定和轻松的现金。 讽刺的是，就在叶云卖掉其域名投资组合的时候，席林也差点卖掉他的域名投资组合。但是迪克·切尼副总统无意中说服了他继续建立他的事业。这是2004 年10月5日的晚上，36岁的席林正在佛罗里达州那不勒斯市的丽嘉酒店监测他的网站。自从一个月前飓风伊万袭击了他们在开曼群岛的房子时，他和全家就住了那里了。当席林扫描网络流量数据时，他注意到有件事情不对劲，巨大的网络流量正在暴涨，使得他的服务器快要挂机了。 他查看了Google 新闻，迅速发现原因所在。副总统辩论正在切尼和参议员之间约翰·爱德华兹之间展开，为了辩护他的纪录, 切尼告诉观众去查看Factcheck.com。实际上切尼指的是宾夕法尼亚大学负责运行的Factcheck.org网站，而Factcheck.com 是属于席林的一个网站。 这时席林有两个选择：如果关闭他的服务器，那将会花掉他上万美元去引导他的其它网站流量，或者将 Factcheck.com的域名解析到别处。流量的暴涨对他来说是没有用的，毕竟，只有但访问者点击广告业主的链接时，他才能挣到钱。席林不是布什政府的支持者，他想到了金融家乔治·索罗斯刊登在华尔街时报上的反布什广告。几秒钟后, 他把暴涨的流量引向了GeorgeSoros.com。就这样，当上百万人寻找切尼的纪录而登陆到这个网站时，迎面而来的是“我们为什么不让乔治·布什再次当选”的欢迎信息。 对于席林来说，这是件突然冒出来的事情。当时，他的桌面上放着一份他的域名投资组合销售合同，报价超过1亿美元。席林没有透露名字的这位潜在买家，正在审核着席林的投资。一群人蜂拥着横跨网络到他掌控的网页上的经验，使得希林意识到，域名的价值会随着时间成倍的增长。“敲击几下键盘，看可我所做到的，”希林说，翻转着他的披肩长的金发，悬空敲击几下键。“这是完全超现实的。”自从辩论把那晚以后，他在他的域名投资组合上增加了10万个域名，使得他的藏品超过了30万个域名。产生着现金流的普通单词域名会再度吸引良好经济基础的逐利者。 那些逐利者当中有一个叫拉宾，他说话温和，夹克衣服口袋里有一张白色手帕。拉宾掌管着一笔来自雅可布松家族投资的私募资金。这个家族在卡耐基音乐厅塔楼第56层办公，他们的套房能将中央公园和纽约住宅区的景观一览无遗。对于拉宾来说，一个贴切的看法是，2005年的网络看起来就象100 年前的曼哈顿——充满房地产投资的机会。 一年前，拉宾开始和哈佛大学培训出来的财务专家鲍伯·马丁，以及域名投机商马克·奥斯托佛斯凯合作。据奥斯托佛斯凯称，他们将公司命名为Internet REIT公司，花了2.5亿美元，可能更多的金额，快速地购买他们所能发现的域名所有者持有的好域名。（据记录称，奥斯托佛斯凯于1999 年12月，以750万美元的价格公开销售了Business.com域名。） 当马丁、奥斯托佛斯凯和拉宾合作创建事业时，拉宾对域名知之甚少。他随后开展了一些研究，并被研究成果震惊了。“直航”访问流量是一种增长中的现象，而固定成本是最小的。预计美国广告业主在2010 年以前将在网络上投入260亿美元，大致相当于目前的两倍。他立刻联想到十年前的广告牌产业，那时Clear Channel和Viacom公司大量收买小操作员。“我们还处于了手工卷制雪茄烟的阶段，”39岁的拉宾说，“这个市场容量可能将达到十亿美元级别。" 马丁、奥斯托佛斯凯和拉宾的团队在德尔雷海滩会议期间辛苦地运作着。作为一名销售商，奥斯托佛斯凯直截了当地询问：“你的域名是什么？你的域名月流量是多少？你在寻求多高的增长倍数？”奥斯托佛斯把叶云的崇拜者巴利亚那克斯拉在一旁如是问到。巴利亚那克斯在纽约市皇后区他的公寓里运作着网站，拥有不到100 个域名，但至少其中一个域名是极其难得的: Cellphones.com。这个网站上只有一个简单的网页，上面有些相关的链接，能够给他带来平均每天1300美元的收入。 昨晚，巴利亚那克斯把整个晚上都花在德尔雷海滩参加Internet REIT公司的聚会上，不断地将灰鹅伏特加酒和补剂一饮而尽。当他凌晨回到他的旅馆客房时，发现他的门底下有一份总报价为420万美元的合同。而1996 年，他仅为Cellphones.com这个域名花了90美元。“当我回到我的母校第10 高中参加同学聚会时，我自己暗想，‘谁能笑到现在？’”巴利亚那克斯说。 当奥斯托佛斯凯评估域名时，他会谈到像“思想分享”等模糊的概念。但像所有顶级的域名投资者一样，他和团队会分析网络流量数据。Internet REIT公司会估算出一个域名能导向的公司所属的一些网站，如Officesupply.com（办公用品供应网）的虚拟库存上有着各种供货商和产品的链接。但他们期待的是， 支付每次点击的商业模式能够运作起来。 在他位于休斯敦市的办公室里，奥斯托佛斯凯每晚都会在网上反复地寻找预期卖家直到很晚。那也是为什么在费城9月的一个晚上，他之所以和玛丽及鲍伯·本兹夫妇在他们家中结束谈判的原因。玛丽及鲍伯·本兹夫妇都是医生，他们从1995年开始把购买域名当作一项爱好。他们买到了他们所喜欢的一些域名，如Heartdisease.com（心脏病网）、Highbloodpressure.com（高血压网）、Athletesfoot.com（香港脚网）。他们为其中一些域名开发了网站，增加了相关内容。他们还为其它一些域名设置了简单的首页及相关的广告链接。 在整整一个晚上的谈话后，奥斯托佛斯凯和本兹夫妇达成了交易，Internet REIT公司会为购买他们的101个域名支付360万美元。专门研究肾脏疾病的鲍伯·本兹说, “这比当医生更能赚得多。” 许多因素都能破坏掉域名投资者的聚会。网络广告可以转变风向。对于付费搜索产业而言，一些人可以编写程序反复点击付费链接，这样导致的点击欺骗产生了一个更大的问题，使得广告业主不情愿付费，整个模式因此完全改变。或者，网站因为变得商业化而被网络冲浪者厌恶。 但域名投资者认为，他们拥有的域名是财富。“如果您拥有房地产，” 拉宾认为，“人们在某个时候会很快就抛售掉。”他估计, 华尔街很快会开始普遍跟风，提供机会进入公开市场。然后，象鲁伯特·默多克、巴里·迪勒等网络大家将会大肆收购域名所有者手中的域名。一些人甚至推测正在进入付费搜索市场的Google、Yahoo或微软公司，将席卷域名投资者，删去中间层，让“直航”访问流量直接为他们的广告业主服务。 与此同时，Google 和Yahoo公司设法继续保持“直航”访问流量的来临，这两个公司的主管们都在利用参加德尔雷海滩会议的机会，寻找能够掌控“直航”访问流量的高手。当在德鲁克斯夜总会放松过后，14 名Yahoo公司的董事和一些域名投资者扎堆钻入加长悍马车里，其中包括席林，他手头拥有了一个Yahoo公司为他的网站上的所有广告提供服务的排他性合同。在州际95号公路上，大型高级轿车向着南边35 英里斯嘉丽绅士俱乐部驶去。在那里，大家可以在有着长毛绒和红色天鹅绒帷幕的VIP 房里尽情享受着。 当负责这个区域的女主管前来要求买单时，Yahoo公司的人员都显得紧张，没人想要递交1000美元的报帐单给总部的财务部门。最后，席林掏出一卷现金把钱付了。对于一个拥有一架喷气机股份的人来说，这不是一件大不了的事情。如果知道席林去年的网络流量收入超过Yahoo公司的36亿美元收入的1%的话，你会认为那些人的当中一个会站起来，一个人为整个团队买单的。 （完） When Ye was building his portfolio, there was really only one way to make money from names--reselling them. That began to change in 2003 as paid search--developed and pushed by Overture, now part of Yahoo, and current market leader Google--started to take off. The technology powering the whole thing is complex, but not the basic business model: Advertisers pay only when someone clicks on their ads. And to get their links listed high in search results--or on a domainer's page that someone lands on by typing a name into a Web browser--they bid on keywords. Generic names are gold for domainers, but names that target a specific audience are also valuable. Take, for instance, people looking for information on anorexia or bulimia. Type the phrase "eating disorders" into Yahoo's search engine and an ad from Remuda Ranch treatment center in Wickenburg, Ariz., appears across the top of the results. To win that spot, Remuda pays Yahoo handsomely--$3.06 per click was the price when Business 2.0 checked in early November. But the way many people looking for the same information go about it is to type www.eatingdisorders.com into their Web browser. That takes them to a page with five links to treatment centers, and again Remuda sits at the top of the page. But here's the difference: Click on it from this page and the $3.06 Remuda pays Yahoo for the referral gets shared with the domainer who owns the name. In this case, that's Frank Schilling, a reclusive man who has quietly become one of the world's most powerful and respected domainers. Schilling bought the name in late 2002 for $1,100, snapping it up in an auction. It struck Schilling as a smart one to own since eating disorders are common. "What I didn't realize," he says, "is that more than 100 people a day blindly type the name into their address bar." Today, he says, the site gets around 120 click-throughs a day, providing steady, easy cash. Ironically, Schilling came close to selling off his portfolio at the same time as Ye--until Vice President Dick Cheney inadvertently persuaded him to keep building his business. It was the evening of Oct. 5, 2004. Schilling, who is 36, was monitoring his sites from the Ritz-Carlton in Naples, Fla., where he and his family had been living since Hurricane Ivan leveled their house in the Cayman Islands a month earlier. As Schilling was scanning traffic data, he noticed that something wasn't right. An enormous burst of traffic was threatening to take down his servers. He pulled up Google News, quickly discovering the culprit. The vice presidential debate between Cheney and Sen. John Edwards was going on, and to defend his record, Cheney told viewers to look at Factcheck.com. Cheney had meant to say Factcheck.org, a site run by the University of Pennsylvania. Factcheck.com was one of Schilling's. Schilling had two options: Take down his servers, which could cost him tens of thousands of dollars in traffic to his other sites, or redirect Factcheck.com surfers elsewhere. The onslaught was useless to him, after all, since he only makes money when a visitor clicks on an advertiser's link. No fan of the Bush administration, Schilling thought of an anti-Bush ad that financier George Soros had run in the Wall Street Journal. Seconds later, he pointed the surging traffic to GeorgeSoros.com, so that anyone seeking out Cheney's record--and many millions did--was greeted with the message "Why We Must Not Reelect George Bush." For Schilling, it was an epiphany. At the time, he had an offer on the table to sell his portfolio for more than $100 million; the potential purchaser, whom Schilling won't disclose, was in the middle of auditing his business. The experience--a flood of people surging across the Internet and ending up at a page he controlled--made Schilling realize that the value of domain names would become exponentially greater over time. "A few keystrokes and look what I did," says Schilling, flipping back his shoulder-length blond hair and typing into the air. "It was totally surreal." Since the night of the debate, he's added another 100,000 names to his portfolio, bringing his holdings to more than 300,000--cash-generating generic names that are again attracting well-financed suitors. One of those suitors is Rabin, a soft-spoken man who keeps a white handkerchief tucked into his suit jacket pocket. Rabin runs a private fund called Jacobson Family Investments from the 56th floor of Carnegie Hall Tower, a suite with sweeping views of Central Park and uptown New York City. It's a fitting view, since the Internet in 2005 looks to Rabin a lot like Manhattan 100 years ago--awash in real estate opportunities. Rabin teamed up a year ago with a Harvard-trained finance whiz named Bob Martin and domain speculator Marc Ostrofsky. They named their company Internet REIT and, according to Ostrofsky, are spending $250 million, probably far more, buying out domain owners as fast as they can find good names. (Ostrofsky, for the record, was the man who pulled off the much-publicized sale of Business.com for a reported $7.5 million in December 1999.) When Martin and Ostrofsky approached Rabin about forming a business, Rabin knew little about domains. Then he did some research and was astounded. Type-in traffic is a growing phenomenon, the fixed costs are minimal, and U.S. advertisers are expected to spend $26 billion on the Internet by 2010--roughly double the current level. He immediately thought of the billboard industry a decade ago, before Clear Channel and Viacom bought up the small operators. "We've only just begun the roll-up phase," says Rabin, 39. "This market will likely be in the billions." The team of Martin, Ostrofsky, and Rabin is working the Delray Beach conference hard. Ostrofsky, the salesguy, dives right in: "What are your names? What's your monthly traffic? What kind of multiple are you looking for?" Ostrofsky pulls aside Bahlitzanakis, the Ye worshiper. Bahlitzanakis, who works from his apartment in Queens, N.Y., owns fewer than 100 names, but at least one is a gem: Cellphones.com. The site--a plain page with relevant links--makes an average of $1,300 a day. Bahlitzanakis spends his last night in Delray Beach at an Internet REIT party, tossing back Grey Goose vodka and tonics. He returns to his hotel room in the early morning to find a contract under his door. Total price: $4.2 million. He paid $90 for the name in 1996. "I just went to my 10th high school reunion, and I thought to myself, 'Who's laughing now?'" Bahlitzanakis says. Ostrofsky talks about fuzzy concepts like "mindshare" when it comes to evaluating a name. But like all the top domainers, he and his crew also analyze traffic data. Internet REIT figures it will run some of its sites, like Officesupply.com, as virtual stores, with links to suppliers and products. But they're expecting that the pay-per-click model will drive the business. From his office in Houston, Ostrofsky trolls the Web late each night to find prospective sellers. That's how he ended up negotiating with Marie and Bob Benz at their home in Philadelphia one evening in September. The couple, both doctors, began buying names in 1995 as a hobby. They bought some they liked--Heartdisease.com,Highbloodpressure.com, Athletesfoot.com. In some cases, they developed the sites and added content; in others, they set them up as simple landing pages with relevant advertising links. After an evening of talk, Ostrofsky and the Benzes reached a deal, and Internet REIT is paying $3.6 million for their 101 names. Says Bob Benz, who specializes in kidney diseases, "It's a lot more lucrative than being a doctor." Plenty of things could spoil the domainers' party. Internet advertising could turn south. Click fraud, in which someone writes a program that repeatedly clicks on paying links, could become a bigger problem for the paid search industry, making advertisers reluctant to spend. The model itself could change entirely. Or sites could become so commercial that Web surfers sour on them. But the way domainers look at it, they own the property. "And if you own the real estate," Rabin says, "people are going to wind up there at some point." Soon, he figures, Wall Street at large will begin to catch on, providing opportunities to tap into the public markets. Then big Internet players like Rupert Murdoch or Barry Diller could buy out the domain owners. Some even speculate that Google or Yahoo--or Microsoft, which is entering the paid search business--will roll up the domainers, cutting out a layer and serving up the type-in traffic directly to their advertisers. In the meantime, Google and Yahoo are trying to keep the type-in business coming--and execs from both companies are using the Delray Beach conference to court the folks who control it. As the party at Delux winds down, 14 Yahoo executives pile into a stretch Hummer with a few of the domainers, including Schilling, who has an exclusive contract in which Yahoo serves all the ads for his sites. The limo heads 35 miles south on Interstate 95 to Scarlett's Gentlemen's Club. The men kick back in the VIP section, outfitted with plush booths and red velvet curtains. When the woman in charge of the area comes by and mentions the cost of the booths, the Yahoo crew gets nervous. And in the end, no one wants to submit the $1,000 tab to the expense department back at headquarters. Finally, Schilling pulls out a roll of cash and pays up. Not a big deal for a guy who owns a share of a jet. But considering that Schilling's traffic generated more than 1 percent of Yahoo's $3.6 billion in revenues last year, you'd think one of those guys could have stood up and taken one for the team. （end）
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2006-08-02, 03:15 PM
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