Free money train rolling to a halt
The big bucks involved with slapping AdSense on domains during their free five-day grace period may dry up completely if Google takes action on the subject.
That grace period proved profitable for domainers who used Google's AdSense for Domains program. Free domains plus ad revenue brought one domainer $3 million per month, according to Domain Tools blogger Jay Westerdal.
Note that the $3 million came after Google took its cut. If Google truly ends the ability for domainers to drop AdSense onto tasted domains, the company wipes out a chunk of revenue for itself.
Westerdal cited a confidential informant on this, saying Google will stop monetizing domains less than five days old. With millions of domains in play, domainers would see their massive paydays evaporate.
It isn't as much a case of "don't be evil" for Google, as it is "let's limit our legal liability." Westerdal said lawsuits by Dell, BMW, and Yahoo against those domainers for trademark violations could end up adding Google's name as a defendant.
Since Yahoo has been a plaintiff in these cases, Westerdal thinks it unlikely Yahoo will permit its advertising to be placed on tasted domains.
Andrew Goodman, commenting on his Traffick blog, said, "Who would have thought that the whole domain name system would have remained such a wild-west realm for so long?"
If rumors are true, there's a new sheriff in town, it's high noon, and Google's got the fastest draw on the Internet.
No comments:
Post a Comment