Christian Ross

Domain Squatters: Dregs of the interwebs

I find ways to remind myself daily of the multitude of levels of incompetence I possess. One of my many traits that lend a hand in the process is my ability to procrastinate on almost any given task. Especially the minute ones.

About 2 weeks ago, I used a site to test the availability of a couple of domain names thinking that I would later return to pick the one I wanted up. Instead of doing what normal people do and taking the extra three minutes while I sat there staring at it, I procrastinated. And to reward me for my procrastination, a kind fellow (or lady) by the name of Kim Tae Young in Korea snatched it right up. Upon visiting Mr. (Ms.) Tae Young’s site, I noticed not a word of it was in English. And since I wasn’t searching for a Korean domain name, one has to wonder what exactly is the need for said person to purchase the exact domain I was looking for.

I can only assume that Kim Tae Young is what is referred to as a domain squatter. One of the lowest forms of life on the internets ranking in stature right along with forum trolls, spammers and email forward abusers. His whole goal is to search around for possible purchasable domain names and snatch them up hoping to make a quick buck. (Or in the case of the kind German owning my .com, 10K euros)

Thanks again procrastination, you really did me in on this one. Here’s a preview of my conversation with client tomorrow:

“Hello, client? Slight changes ahead…”

This one ranks right up there with some of my other all-time biggies like:

• It’ll be a good idea to wait until the last week to produce the entire assigned workload for current semester long Internet class.
• Even though I know it burns 10W-30 at a quart a week AND that it holds 4 quarts AND that I last put oil in it 6 weeks ago, a few more days can’t hurt.
• What do you mean waiting until the Thursday before Prom to ask a girl to go is considered bad practice? You mean they all have dates already?

Here’s to hoping that one day I will learn… and that I’ll never use www.ajaxwhois.com again.