The .Mobi registry reserved 5000 of the best domain names when sales of the extension began. They are slowly releasing them to auction, most famously Flowers.Mobi which sold for $200,000 and created a great deal of interest in the extension. Several other names have sold for over $100,000 since then, but now it seems that the Flowers record may be surpassed.
The auction of Games.mobi will be a good test of the .Mobi market's potential. Games are a hugely profitable industry, highly relevant to the future mobile web, and one would suspect that the board rooms of the major corporations in the field have spent a great deal of time preparing to position their companies on the Mobile web. Nearly all pundits expect the mobile web to be a huge new venue.
The question often raised is how the .Mobi extension will be accepted by major industries such as the hand-held games industry. The bidding already shows serious interest. If the bids go to eye-popping levels then it will be seen by some as a strongly encouraging sign of .Mobi's acceptance. And a large, highly advertised website on Games.mobi would bring the attention of young, computer-savvy people to .Mobi - exactly the audience that can make .Mobi an important extension on the mobile web.
Auction of Games.mobi, Sports.mobi, Music.mobi, Movies.mobi and others at SEDO.com:
http://www.sedo.com/search/searchresult....nt=dotmobi&language=us
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3 of the top 6 names are game related:
1. games.mobi $140,000
5. game.mobi $16,500
6. juegos.mobi $10,600 (juegos=games in Spanish)
Juegos.mobi could be a bargain at that price. There are
420 million Spanish speakers compared to 510 million English.
There was 5 minutes left in the auction. Games.mobi stood at $300,000 - already having smashed the old record.....
and the servers crashed
If you heard agonized screaming from various offices around the world a couple minutes before Noon Eastern today that is why.
Sedo says:
"The auction will be up and running very shortly and will be extended by 20 minutes."
Apparently they will (try) to finish it within a few hours, although many bidders probably have hit the bars by now.
But anyway there will be a new .Mobi record; Music.Mobi was about $54,000 and the rest well behind that. Not too good, other than Games, but it seems
"To Be Continued...."
There is a new champ ----
Games held the lead until the final (extended) moments....
Suddenly Music.mobi pushed past and sailed to a win by 20 lengths.
music.mobi $616.000
games.mobi $401.500
sports.mobi $101.000
movies.mobi $82,000
juegos.mobi $61,000
game.mobi $61,000
photos.mobi $51,000
videos.mobi $51,000
Quote:Juegos.mobi could be a bargain at that price.
I think non-English generic domain names will probably be one of the best areas to invest in over the next few years.
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not .mobi related...18 yours to go...current bid $431K, reserve is $499K
http://www.sedo.com/auction/auction_deta...anguage=us&auction_id=21998&tracked=&partnerid=
Deep caca in Sedo/Mobi land.
There were a lot of invoices and contracts sent to the "winners" of the first auction part. Many did indeed go on about their day, only to find out later that the auction had been continued and someone else had won what they had thought were their domains.
Indeed One Someone had won six of the top names - Alvaro Albarracin had the high bid in the second segment for:
music.mobi $616.000
games.mobi $401.500
sports.mobi $101.000
movies.mobi $82,000
photos.mobi $51,000
videos.mobi $51,000
He is a speculator with not a lot of experience in domains and he plans to flip them before he is required by the terms to develop them (about six months).
Many on the forums consider him a fool, but if he can sell Google (for example) on them then he can make a great deal of money.
The next best bidder on Music.mobi was the earlier winner. He had received documents saying he had won at about $60,000 and he is now talking to lawyers. :'(
Moral - if you are going to have a big-money auction be sure to have backup for your servers.
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.Mobi declared this auction null and void. The auction has been rescheduled for 23 January 2008.
Quote:While Sedo takes steps to ensure the stability and security of our services, the crash that occurred could not have been predicted given traffic spikes more than ten times higher than anticipated by previous high-traffic auctions. Decisions were made with the intention of protecting all parties involved, but as we have learned from investigating the crash more carefully since December 5th, the auction was compromised and as such, DotMobi has exercised its right to declare the auction results void and will conduct a new auction at Sedo.com beginning on January 23rd, 2008. Sedo will be contacting everyone who participated in the auction to inform them of this decision...
full announcement:
https://www.sedo.com/links/showhtml.php3?Id=1619&tracked=&partnerid=&language=us
Quote:but as we have learned from investigating the crash more carefully since December 5th, the auction was compromised
Details on how it was compromised would be nice.