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Comment by yawnxyz | Hacker News Reader

I have no insight, but I always wondered what happens to the $100k+ domains that VC-funded startups buy and then go bust.

Do they sell them at a bargain?

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I have only one example (dont want to give any attention though) the company started maybe 5-6 years ago, lasted 3-4 years and last I checked the company sold to a "media company" who oddly just took the site and made it a generic "news" ad page.

My guess is these domains can be juiced for a few $1,000 in ad revenu just from people searching the old name.

So yes, they 100% do see off their domains to "media" compaines who fill them with ads.

I know of a few people whose relatively high traffic sites domains expired for whatever reason, and the sites reappeared under new owners with some of the content recreated from archive but now with a shitload of ads.

You are right, it probably just expired, might not have been "sold".

Back in the day I read that a lot of the desirable domains used by startups are leased, it would be interesting learn more how that part of the industry actually works.

It's good to be very careful about what you do with your email account at such a place. Most companies are tolerant of some incidental personal use of your work email address, but just remember that whoever gets control of the domain later will also receive all "your" email. So if you're using it as a recovery address for any personal online services, they will now have that.

Best policy is to use work email addresses strictly for work, even if they are OK with some personal use. This is true even if it's your own business. Are you going to want to pay for that domain forever? If not, keep it separate from your personal email.

It’s not an industry. It is an ordinary business practice that makes suing a company less attractive and less lucrative when successful.

Bob controls Acme.LLC and sets up Assets LLC. Assets LLC buys acmellc.com and leases it to Acme LLC for $1,000,000/year. Acme LLC now has less cash assets and no valuable domain name asset to loose in court. In addition there’s a $1,000,000 less net revenue to be distributed as profits among non-controlling Acme LLC shareholders and all that money went to Bob.

Setting up holding companies has been ordinary for many decades and is easy to do. It’s a practice not an industry.

I’m very familiar with IP/asset holding companies, but I am referring to an actual practice within the “domain industry” of leasing domains which is common and not just with high value domains (6-7 figures) but even with 5 figure domains.

Within the domain industry “leasing” is a little misleading because these are typically more like “rent to buy” deals where the original owner continues to retain maintain ownership until the leasee makes the final payment.

Leasing is leasing. Domains and desks are not very different from the supply side.

My advice is attend a domain leasing industry conference should such a thing exist.

My apologies for previously taking your question at face value and bothering to answer. I did not intend to bruise anyone’s ego.

> My apologies for previously taking your question at face value and bothering to answer.

That’s a weird response on account I didn’t ask a question, you apparently replied to my comment answering a question that never existed.

> I did no intend to bruise anyone’s ego.

Far from it, I am a corporate transactional attorney that structures holding companies and drafts the licensing agreements you were attempting to mansplain as you confused that with the practice of domain leasing.

Good luck to you.

They sell them, not usually at a bargain. They used to have vastly more SEO juice than they do now -- there is a little more intelligence going on these days from the search engines in regards to domain registration changes.

Still, lots of newspapers and magazines have great "page rank" for their domains, and they are going out of business at an extraordinary rate, being bought up, all the content pulled from Internet Archive and replaced to make them seem legit and then a couple of links installed in the footer to your favorite off-shore casino.

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