Talk about fishy, I just got an email from GoDaddy saying they already transferred my RegisterFly domain(s) and created an account for me. What the????
First off, I don’t use GoDaddy nor do I want to. Nothing against it, but it’s just not for me.
Second, how did they get my email? It’s not one I put publicly on the web, or used for my whois information. So where did they get it?
Third, this seems like a scam. Or a really bad promotion. By telling me they already took my domains and created an account in my behalf, without my knowledge, just seems wrong.
What’s going on GoDaddy? You’re pissing me off before I even become a customer. That is if I ever decide to become one.
Update: There may be more to this than I think. It may be legit and I just wasn’t properly informed. The buzz seems to be that GoDaddy was giving all of RegisterFly’s domain names for legal reasons. Interesting.
ICANN has appointed GoDaddy as the registrar to take all the domains formerly registered with RegisterFly. We had no choice in this and I agree the way it has been handled is disgraceful.
Then what else can we expect from ICANN. They allowed RF to get away with their scam for at least two years.
GoDaddy got your email address from RF along with all your other account details. The email declaring that an account had been set up for you was clumsy as there was no indication why it had been set up.
If I understand it correctly registrants will have to wait for 60 days before they can transfer out of GoDaddy and of course a transfer fee will have to be paid.
The good news is that we have at last got our domains back and GoDaddy has honored the remaining registration time that we all paid RF.
Go to the ICANN blog for more details: http://public.icann.org/node/14 and http://www.registerflies.com/index.php for a lot more about RF.
Here is the intresting thing about this story. When you registred your domain with registerfly they didn’t have the ICANN Accredition yet. They registred domains under eNom. Now since RegisterFly didn’t get a chance to transfer your domain to RegisterFly under the RegsiterFly Accrediton when they got that accrediton a couple months later all domains under the eNom ICANN on the RegisterFly Reseller Account were all given control to eNom and eNom give the domain owners there login information. Too bad GoDaddy is a great company and they added for free a year on your registration when the transfer was complete.
Even better is that eNom couldn’t take control of all my domains registered though RegsiterFly without me paying more. So now I guess I’m with GoDaddy for those. This is just one freaking big mess. To bad the customers didn’t get to decide where their domains get to go.
Here’s the deal, and I can speak with some authority on this, as long as I am allowed anonymity. :o)
RegisterFly was, once upon a time, a reseller for eNom. However, they then became an accredited registrar in their own right. This means that their portfolio had some domains registered at eNom and some registered through RegisterFly proper.
RegisterFly is, for many very good reasons (IMHO), being de-accredited by ICANN (is “de-accredited” a word?). They have become a reseller again, this time for TuCows.
So, there are 3 types of domains “registerred through RegisterFly:” those registered through eNom, those registered through RegisterFly, and those registered through TuCows.
ICANN is taking away RegisterFly’s domains that were registered through RegisterFly themselves, or at least that’s my understanding of it. GoDaddy worked out a deal that I have heard described on other sites as a win-win-win: RegisterFly gets some money for the domains (terms not to be disclosed), as opposed to just having ICANN yank them and coming up empty; customers get control of domains that, through RegisterFly’s apparent inept management, would have otherwise been deleted at the registry (and probably sucked up by a prospector like eNom right away and held ransom for a price); and GoDaddy gets more customers and domains. Sure, some people will want to transfer away from GoDaddy when the ICANN-imposed 60 day transfer restriction expires, but lots of customers have been very happy with GoDaddy for “recovering” their domains. It’s my understanding that the former RegisterFly customers are even getting called one-on-one by GoDaddy customer service to make sure as many domains as possible get “recovered.”
As for honoring the amount of years we might have paid for our domains at RegisterFly, please recognize that this is not entirely something GoDaddy can control. GoDaddy will receive only the years that RegisterFly actually credited *at the registry*. RegisterFly is not the only registrar in the world that engages in the questionable (IMHO)practice of not always renewing your domains at the registry for the same number of years you pay for. For example, if you paid up 4 years at RegisterFly, they might only give that to the registry one year at a time, so that you might have up to three years that the registry knew nothing about. Because of this, GoDaddy would not know about the extra years either. If you wind up in that boat, you might be able to try to show GoDaddy some proof of purchase, or you could just pony up the $7 per year (or whatever) – it’s still a pretty cheap way to get a dead domain back under your control, especially when you consider that normal “redemption” of an expired ICANN-certified domain can cost more than $50 *plus* the renewal fee as well.
That’s about all I can say about this. Hope that clears up some of the confusion.
Cheers,
Chris
Some complaints have arisen from former RegisterFly customers (whose domains were transferred from RegisterFly.com to Go Daddy in the May 29, 2007 agreement with ICANN) that Go Daddy is refusing to allow transfers out to other registrars. Go Daddy is citing ICANN rules which they claim allow them to deny transfers within the first 60 days of a previous transfer. Customers contend that this rule only applies to Holder-Authorized Transfers and note that the transfer from RegisterFly was involuntary.
This does sound pretty fishy by both GoDaddy and ICANN. GoDaddy gets the business — ICANN favors one registrar over the others.
But take it from me, it’s a LOT of work to get a domain back when a company has disappeared. It took weeks and there was really no one to ask how to go about it. ICANN took control of the problem and now at least all the people who have been cut off from their domains know exactly what they have to do to claim them.
It wasnt fishy. ICANN had to move those domains from registerfly to an accredited company that was stable and they didnt have to worry about them going under just like registerfly did. Since Godaddy is the largest and most stable registry in the world then what better choice.
Also if you domain used to be with registerfly and then was moved to Godaddy you should be very thankful. Now you can choose to keep it with the #1 registry in the world or transfer it away to some place else if you choose. At least you didnt lose your domain by the huge flop of registerfly.
You can consider yourself lucky.
In May 2007 in panic, I’ve regstered for transfer from REGISTERFLY to GODADDY. I’ve paid to Registerfly ntil May 2008, then I’ve paid for one year to GODADDY, they asked me to obtain the key. Johny Kim from ENOM promissed help to recover the key, what was obvious to me, as REGISTERFLY was reseller of ENOM.
ENOM tricked me to get the key with my help, and then they pirated domain. Fo hijacked domain they requested RANSOM to release the key.
I refused immediately and firmly stated nobody will blackmail me.
Nobody? I didn’t know Internet gangsters, they continue to harm my business. They do not break windows, they do not demolish equipment – they placed on my webpage some junkadvertising.
As my domain itself has no value, they blocked all my emails with my domain.
After 3 months period of blocking domain, they introduces EXTENDED REDEMPTION. I’ve stated again – no chance I will pay ONE DOLLAR OF RANSOM, they cut in half required money.
It is nearly one year and they block access to my emails, to my domain.
ICANN does nothing – I had a feeling they participate in this fraud.
I guess there are tens of thousands of domains pirated by ENOM, most of them ourside of USA.
Unfortuna
I’ve asked ENOM to help me to recover domain from registerfly.
i have several websites hosted at Godaddy and i am pretty much satisfied with this domain name registrar. it is also very easy to get coupon codes for Godaddy.