A Cautionary Tale... Don't Let This Happen To You!

This story, whilst not directly creating content related, nonetheless can serve as a warning to others who start a business and don’t take ALL the steps to safeguard it’s intellectual property.

Or, in the words of the Bard, ‘Tis A Somewhat Cautionary Tale…

Many, many, many years ago (in internet terms anyway, in the real world it was about 15), a domain name was registered. This is not an unusual occurrence I am sure you will agree, however in this case, although the name was needed to be a part of a business setup, instead of going through an established registrar (such as GoDaddy say), it was purchased via an acquaintance who had just started a business as a reseller. It was seen as a bit of a help to her and means of a “kick along” so to speak.

Over the years, this domain name became the major email address and point of contact of the business. Thankfully, the website associated with the business retained its autonomy on a different domain and WAS registered through an established reseller company.

Now about a few weeks back, this business received regular emails from a Big Search Engine Company that its “workspaces” was about to expire and it was necessary to renew ie ie: pay some money., Not ever remembering ever signing up or buying any such “workspace service”, these emails were ignored, just like many others purporting to be renewals or upgrades that are received on a regular basis.

Then, shock, horror, just over a week ago, another email was received that advised the workspace in question, AND its associated domain, had been suspended. To get it back operational, of course money was needed to spent.

And this is when the grief REALLY started.

You see, to do that it was necessary to use the very email attached to that domain name to complete the process. But with the domain name suspended, you cannot do that, obviously, as the subsequent two part authorisation the Big Search Company sends for verification ends up in a big bit bucket somewhere.

The solution is to get onto the original domain name registrar, and do an email redirect for that domain name to another email account that does NOT use that domain name.

Easy? Well, in this case, no.

The registrar (not reseller) as shown in the official records says it is not them; being an “old” account, it is “legacy” and therefore another company has it. That other company says as it is “old”, “legacy” AND was originally sold by a reseller (who of course no longer exists) it is held now by someone else. And surprise, surprise, that someone else is an on-line web building company with no point of access via phone or email available.

For some odd reason I cannot fathom. Silly me, I thought the original listed registrar was the listed registrar. Apparently not.

So, the only approach is to get back to the Big Search Engine Company who started the ball rolling. And of course there are no phone numbers you can actually use to talk to a person, so you are caught up in an endless loop of online forms and requests that simply generate more online forms and requests.

Ad infinitum.

Eventually after some serious searching and calling in a few favours and following a contact via a very welcome and knowledgeable source, there was a glimmer of hope. A real person was found that pointed me in a direction, and a form was received escalating the situation and request special assistance for The Fix.

But then, despite a fix being available, we are back on then merry-go-round. In order to make the fix and un-suspend the domain name, you had to simply show the Big Search Engine Company you owned it, by placing a text entry into its registration info online. Just get onto the registrar, get this done and all will be well.

Older readers might at this point be reminiscent of a Harry Belafonte song from the 60s I believe – “There’s a Hole In The Bucket Dear Liza, Dear Liza”…

Back in the real world, this issue is still ongoing and I am awaiting more info from you-know-who. My take is that they initiated this whole thing, and they therefore are also capable of fixing it. I accept their support people (and systems) have rules that need to be followed, but there MUST be a way and means somewhere of overriding those rules when there are exceptional circumstances.

If all that is needed is proof of a domain name ownership, a simple check of the official online record will say who owns it and then all that is needed is for that you to demonstrably prove you are that person via a passport of even a full 7 point (or whatever it is) government / banking ID type check.

It surely cannot be that hard. I’ll let you know of any progress.

Of course, the real moral of the story is twofold.