$100 minimum!?

[diddle32]

Well...I can't say that I didn't see this coming when DomainSponsor bought Snapnames. Minimum bid is now up to $100. I think DS is essentially telling people that they don't want you to buy the domains because they want to keep them for themselves.

[Acro]

The domains that they already keep never make it to the auction.

[tonyk2000]

Today I noticed min. $100 on live auction for all auctions closing today.
However, auctions closing tomorrow or on Sunday are not (yet?) "all $100".
If they are actually increasing the prices for late bids... then they want us to bid earlier and they would subsequently publish our bids in "most active auctions lists" which would attract even more bids and more money to snapnames.
My findings with regards to "live" snapnames auctions are:
1) If I bid earlier - I would see other bids on almost any domain I selected.
2) If I do not bid at all - most domains I selected would receive no bids and would be dropped by snapnames in 5 days window. Those "live auction" domains are low quality anyway, it is what snapnames caught in their raw tasting business with no preorders placed...
3) Most of the domains I referred to in para. 2, after snapnames deletion, can be handregged after a few more testing/deleting cycles by other tasters.

Therefore, with current pricing model, snapnames is paying $0.20 or whatever icann fee is for any domain they delete; With other pricing model, myself or other members might pay snapnames $9 or sometimes $19 - those are the only reasonable starting bids for "live auction" domains. And, the funniest thing is that a good number of domains in question can be handregged later anyway. Just need to wait for 3 or 4 tasters to autoreg and drop them.

[Acro]

The tasters are the vultures of domaining.

[tonyk2000]

So, earlier, if I wanted to get the domain which snapnames (over)priced at $39 or $59 or $99 at the "live" auction, I did not bother to bid at all... And handregged it later...
Once I waited for some particular domain for 10 weeks and noted that some tasters regged and dropped it a few times (tester1 -> tester2 -> tester1(again) etc) , most likely to make sure that they do not need it
Now there is no reason to bid even on $9 or $19 domains at live snapnames auctions.

[worldengine]

I sent a note to snapnames support and they said the varying pricing is still in place, i.e. they won't all be $100.

"This will not be the standard price from here on out. It just is that is the reserve price on the domain names and they just happen to be all today. You should see varying prices as you have before."