godaddy.com GoDaddy stole my domain after I searched for it on their website, Internet

Because nobody could tell me when the "redemption period" would expire, on the night that the domain I'd been researching came available, HugeDomains.com snapped it up.  It had been taken since 2003, and was expiring...the womain didn't renew.

It's my freakin' name, for God's sake.  Not something catchy, something few people would want.  I am an artist, and my NAME IS MY BUSINESS.  It is my identity.

But I DID call GoDaddy and ask them questions about the expiration.  And something happened...I don't know whether GoDaddy turned this information over to "their partner" HugeDomains.com, but HugeDomains is sitting on over 600,000 domain names...isn't that against the federal Anti-Cybersquatting Consumer Protection Act?

I've known several people who have lost domain names after either calling GoDaddy or doing a search and coming back the next day.  Something is NOT right.

Dear Tony

Go Daddy sincerely values your business. We also understand your concerns and want to share the following information with you. 

The scenario you have described sounds like a process known as front running. Front running is where a domain registrar monitors customer domain searches and then registers the domain names for their own purposes. Rest assured, Go Daddy has never engaged in and does not engage in front running. We do encourage customers to purchase domains in a timely manner considering the competitiveness of the industry.  

Every day millions of domain availability searches are performed. As the industry has grown it has also spawned domain word combination and phrase software generators. Often, ideas thought to be unique have been discovered by others. A quick search in your favorite search engine for domain name generator tool may yield some surprising results.

Please let us know how we may contact you by emailing us at reportreview@godaddy.com with the subject line of Report: #996270. Our goal is to bring clarity to this issue for you and ensure that your experience with us is a positive one going forward.

The property was the word combination. I didn't give permission. GoDaddy definitely didn't invent it. So how exactly this is not stealing ?

If they wanted to be honest about this, they could have made it clear: "We reserve the right to register this ourselves if you do not register within XYZ amount of time." That would have been much much much better.

Even better than that, they could have made it clear that I can still buy it from them after XYZ for a while longer (say, 2 * XYZ) for a modest fee, say 100 bucks. Not 50000 !

"Snap it up before someone else does" implies that someone must guess the combination first, which obviously does not convey the correct probability of that happening.

The reason this is bothering me so much, is because how can I trust anything related to the domain registration anymore? How do I know that anything whatsoever stands true with this industry ? My trust in "American honesty" has been shaken.

Yes Tony, I work for Go Daddy. If you were to read other comments on this web site you would discover that I also work for several finance companies, auto dealers, and retail stores. Last month I was the police chief of Montgomery, Alabama.

When you performed your search, Go Daddy posted a recommendation: xxx.xx is available. Snap it up before someone else does. We forewarned you.

Stealing is defined as taking the property of another without permission. A company or individual must register a domain before they can claim ownership. You did not register the domain; therefore it is not possible for it to have been stolen from you. That is an argument you cannot win. If you had claimed their (ok, our) actions were unethical, then you may have a valid claim.

You're trying hard, but it's not working.

Your argument boils down to the fact that in one case we have a privacy law that protects the user against this kind of abuse, and in the other case we do not.

Your analogy with the car is not conveying the **piece of information** that is in discussion here.

If you provide a car finding service, and I come to you and TELL YOU that I am interested in one particular car because I think it's a great value for a certain reason, and then you go around me and buy the car yourself, then yes, you are being a very low person (whether there is a law that condemns you or not).

Try to concentrate dude: *I* give you a *piece of information* that does not belong to you. I only give it to you so that you can execute what you promised you would. Not so that you would take advantage of it.

Try this for an SAT test: the emails are to Google, what [fill in the blank] is to the GoDaddy site (namely: user owned data) 

If I write a haiku poem in that stupid search box, is GoDaddy going to register it and say: I invented that poem ? Are the neurons firing yet ?

"The point is not that I owned the domain"

That's correct. The point is that you did not own the domain.

"Another equivalent would be google reading emails on their servers and trading stock based on what they read in the private emails."

That would not be equivalent because the hypothetical case you described would be an unlawful invasion of privacy.

Here is a better analogy: If you were to ask me if a car is for sale and I answered, "yes", it would not be stealing if I buy the car five minutes later. If you then decide you want to purchase the car, I have the right to offer it at any price I choose.

Are you that stupid ? You don't see any conflict of interest here ? What if VCs were doing this to all new ideas instead of funding them ? The point is not that I owned the domain, the point is that they used an information that did not belong to them. Another equivalent would be google reading emails on their servers and trading stock based on what they read in the private emails. If you don;t see a problem with this then you are a complete moron

"stole my domain" It is not unlawful to purchase something with the anticipation that it may increase in value. This is a very common business practice. You did not own the domain; therefore, it was not stolen from you. Commonly known as You Snooze, You Lose.