Go Daddy on the block for $2.5bn

Domain hijacks

I've seen too many domain names hijacked by GoDaddy because of spam/abuse/fraud complaints. It doesn't seem to matter whether the complaints are actually genuine. There's many many many forum posts about how to screw over a competitor if their domain was purchased through GoDaddy. A few well crafted emails and GoDaddy will simply take it away from the owner.

So basically, I'm hoping they do sell and the new owners clean up that shambles of an operation. Then maybe people will come back to GoDaddy.

Bob's seen the writing on the wall

GoDaddy may have market share, however the market has shrunk considerably, almost all holders of what seemed like good names have reduced their portfolios, so the domain name business is a shrinking business, not an expanding one

Bottom line is, that in almost all cases, you need to build a website with traffic, real value and a real money making business or the name is worthless

Yes, there may be a blip in increased business with all the new TLDs, but that's all hype and those TLDs will all fail ( watch what happens to .xxx in 2 years and look into the value of having a .biz domain now )

It's likely the hype behind these new TLDs that is pushing the price up beyond the $1 billion that's been floated months ago, and I'm sure there is still profit in GoDaddy, but it is at best a level business in these poor economic times with little hope for growth.

Bob's a smart guy, getting out and moving on, while the getting is ok .. if he had been a genius though, he would have gotten out by 2004 and probably gotten $10 billion for the business

The Ryanair of domain name services

I have a couple of Godaddy accounts and they work reasonably well. Nothing special but they work. So service is ok.

What isn't ok is the constant nickel and diming going on. You start off being told one price for a domain on the front page and by the time you've gone through a maze of options and settings you discover the price is actually double or triple.

The controls are also laden down with links, upselling and so on making it a burden to administer accounts without constantly feeling under pressure from a pile of superfluous links and advertising. Oh and not a day goes by without some discount voucher spam.

I feel dirty from using their service and I'm sure other customers do too. Moving provider requires a little work but I expect in many cases it's not a huge amount. Next time a renewal notice rolls around I expect I'll be looking elsewhere because if Godaddy is going to treat me like shit then my loyalty to them in future will reflect that.