An important message from Snapnames

[TheLegendaryJP]

Can anyone varify the drop auctions are giving large buyers dicounts or " cash back/ credits " ?

[denny007]

Can anyone varify the drop auctions are giving large buyers dicounts or " cash back/ credits " ?

I asked this Nelson and he claimed they do not, several times. But I was always convinced they do give on PENDINGDELETE auctions.

[TheLegendaryJP]

I asked this Nelson and he claimed they do not, several times. But I was always convinced they do give on PENDINGDELETE auctions.

Considering how honest he turned out to be who knows now lol


If so that would imo be an unfair practice, who would bid against someone who is getting cash/credit back?


It would make sense though, Ive ALWAYS mentioned how odd it was the likes of Frank, Kevin and BD's etc spend 50%-150% more on drops. Its one thing to claim you use drops only to buy and not boards because they offer security in trade but its another to grossly over pay for acronyms and generics like they do/did. I guess when you have enough money you dont need any brains or business sense OR youre getting cash back lol.

[JMJ]

Ok so I mentioned the two separate accounts. Well the strangest thing. 1 account which is tied to a well known non domain related site over the course of years "halvarez" was all over the place. As in a very high percentage of participation in nearly 400 auctions. The other account is tied to a different "domain related" company and only in existence since Dec '97 Jan 98 168 auctions and I can't seem to find him anywhere...

[Fearless]

About a year ago I asked Monte if he was Halvarez. I can't remember the details but a response from Nelson made me believe Nelson was Havarez. He clicked out of turn some kind of way. I wasn't 100% sure though or I could have saved people a lot of money.

My long term clock is not so good. It was about 2 years ago.
I dug up some old emails to better explain this. In January 2008 someone was using my registrar to drop catch.
I started promoting the service. I told a few people about it. Then I figured I'd email Halvarez since he seemed to backorder everything.
I also wanted to see if he was for real.
We emailed back and forth. He asked questions about the registrar behind it.

One of his emails he said this: "No offence, but another drop catcher is not desirable. However it it
exists
then...

So if I use your service who am I dealing with?"

He never backordered anything. And the same day of my last email from Halvarez, I got an email from Monte asking me about my new drop service.
I called Monte and asked if he was Halvarez. When he said no. I asked how he found out about the new drop service. He said Snapnames customers told Nelson about it.
At this point I knew either Nelson was Halvarez, Monte made up the Nelson story and Monte was Halvarez or one of the few people I told about the new drop service told Nelson about it.
So I couldn't prove Nelson or Monte = Halvarez.

Also very shortly after my communications with Nelson/Halvarez Verisign stopped the guys using my registrar from doing something that was very effective in the drops. That killed the service.

[EstateNIC]

As of many of you knows that a guy in snapnames shilled the bids. All i want is, how he made money with it ? Only making profit from this is the snapnames since they are having more benefit from a domain than its usual price.

Only the way he can make money is co-operating with snapnames? That is in my logic, or am i missing something ?

Thanks

[theinvestor]

Well...I just went through all my bidding history for 2006 and 2007.

It appears to me Halvarez wasn't a factor at all in the auctions i was in. As a matter of fact even other auctions such as 3 letter domains and 4 letter domains i don't even see him in the bidding history.

Maybe it's just my auctions...but no influence here.

Was he not active in 2006-2007?

[fischermx]

Question:
I have at least 3 domains, spanish names, where halvarez drove the price up.

Did anyone that has to receive an email receive it already?

[DaddyHalbucks]

There are still alot of unknowns, but one thing that was mentioned was refunds:

SnapNames wrote in their letter to customers: "SnapNames further discovered that, on certain recent and limited occasions, when the employee won an auction, the employee secretly arranged to refund from SnapNames to the fictitious account a portion of the winning bid amount."

Domain parking may have been another avenue. Also, someone has posted that he sold a bunch of names to iREIT, but I don't have that list.

[denny007]

am i missing something ?

Yes you are, maybe try to read forums and blogs first

[TheLegendaryJP]

Rob, I have a question and do not see any reason for you not to answer straight.

Do specific bidders get a discount at snap based on their buying habits? And please dont play on words, you know what I mean, do the big buyers get a break?

[EstateNIC]

Believe me i did. I just couldnt find any info, and i have looked the blog comments too. noone mentioned. I just dont want to waste more time.

Only i have found was that guy had a "secret" way to refund money.

I think this is the most important thing that the media, people should dig into! How is that possible ?! They should tell this secret, and should take their own measurements. That doesn't smell good.. I dont really feel that snapnames is very innocent..

Or please enlighten me what i am missing here..

[RatherGood]

What type of bulk discount, do we know this for sure and is this a fair practice?

A lot of domainers developed the gut feeling that the only way to explain the behavior of "halvarez" was that he was a snapnames insider.

so, since we are still using our gut instinct and BS detectors: what are the odds that the smartest people in the upper crust of this industry (ie, players like BD) have been knowingly overpaying at auctions for all these years?

[TheLegendaryJP]

A lot of domainers developed the gut feeling that the only way to explain the behavior of "halvarez" was that he was a snapnames insider.

so, since we are still using our gut instinct and BS detectors: what are the odds that the smartest people in this industry (ie, players like BD) have been knowingly overpaying at auctions for all these years?

I hope soon we shall see.

I had a lengthy discussion once with saggydimes, remember him errr her?

If there isnt a discount I can only assume stupidity and playing fast and lose are to blame. The truth is the big guys do not know the day to day market values of much of anything, their busy doing other stuff than following market values of LLL, can only explain paying $25k for kxq and $3k for random LLL .net. Not to mention $5k for a three word generic here they could buy for $500.

The truth is these guys have great portfolios, obtained early, making money and they are not grass roots traders, they spend spend spend and from what I see with little care or understanding of why they shouldnt be. Just padding their portfolios. Finally now the market has caught up to them to a degree, by over paying for years and with 50% drops in market values theyll be shoppin that portfolio for another 10 yrs. Mind you big business is just as fast and lose .... theyll get their sucker.

[ShytKicker]

Who was this bidder "fatjobbie"? Same bid patterns as halvarez.

[thevirtual]

Increased revenue to his company by shill bidding
Won traffic domains and typos to make $$$$
Won generic domains to sell and make $$$$
Reduced his out of pocket costs by refunding his own fees

[demaxxus]

http://www.dnforum.com/f557/importan...ad-197282.html

[strongvis]

JP I've been told that there was a buy 3 TMs get 1 free policy for the big guys. You weren't in on that ?

[EstateNIC]

Increased revenue to his company by shill bidding
Won traffic domains and typos to make $$$$
Won generic domains to sell and make $$$$
Reduced his out of pocket costs by refunding his own fees

In that scenerio, only the company would benefit, not hardavez, but according to the company, he was doing this action without the knowledge of them( of course they might say like that ..)

And plus, your second and third options are inconsistent to your first option. Because even if he won, he had to pay for the domains... Or the snapnames would pay.. (same here)

[Doc Com]

Yes you are, maybe try to read forums and blogs first

hmm, we're in agreement on this one.