who owns website names?

i have an idea and a name for a company/business that i would like to start up at some point giving me more free time to do what i like doing most. it isn’t going to happen tomorrow but, can i reserve the name for a website?

i’m guessing it’s going to cost. if so, who does the money go to?

are there ways of not having to pay?

cheers

J

You do have to register the name but it isn’t very expensive.

You need to get yourself a domain name service provider, different ones cost different prices, as do different names. As far as I know you do have to pay, but it’s not much, I think i pay under $10 a year with namecheap.com

even if it’s .co.uk .de or .at (germany and austria respectively).

Have a poke about and see what you can find: domain name providers

.uk domains pitch up somewhere around £3 per year (2 year minimum), .com/net/org will work out more like £9. Just register them and hang onto them, I’ve got about 10 that I never use but might

Try ukreg.com, they give bulk discounts and don’t Cyber Sit which can happen if you check a domain names availability with GoDaddy and a couple of others.

Get the domain, but also if you’re serious register the trademark in the right class with the IPO people.

http://www.ipo.gov.uk/

I looked into buying a domain name a while back and because it was a single word they said “ooh its gonna cost you” but gave an offer box, in which I was supposed to say how much I was willing to pay. I put £10, it said don’t be daft so I left it.

Related true story – used to work for an IT outfit within a financial Company A and one guy had to fix a VIP’s laptop one day. He was snooping a bit and found an e-mail saying they’d be launching a new product and needed a website for it. IT guy phones his mate and says buy this url and sure enough when Company A come to buy it, they can’t have it. So they offer £5k for it and job’s a good un.

uk2.net – click me

So they offer £5k for it and job’s a good un.

It’s called Domain Squatting, and you can get ’em taken off you/run up court costs if you don’t bend over.

Sure, anyone can register, but unless you use it, and can prove use of it, then it’s not a great day in court.

brant is right on that….

I have a bunch of domains for sale – any one for some nice sustainable domains?

home-energy.co.uk
home-solar.co.uk
natural-paint.co.uk
sustainablenetwork.co.uk
sustainablebuildingsupplies.co.uk
sustainablebuildingsolutions.co.uk (PR5 and a load of incoming links…)

and some others shhhhh that no-one need know about yet, for the reasons brant mentions…. :p

etc etc