OK, I’ve got a little web page. It’s been down for awhile, but I’ve still got a few things I put up over there and I like having it around. And I like that I have my own domain name, politicalhobbyist.com.
Well, HAD my own domain name.
See, my domain was set to expire in early April. I knew this. I was prepared for it. That is why in early March, I went to my hosting provider (www.freehostingweb.com) and paid for a domain registration. Heck, I got the confirmation email and everything, and the charge showed up on my credit card statement. So I assumed everything was hunky-dory.
Wrong.
As the expiration date neared, I kept getting expiration emails from dotregistrar (which is apparently who freehostingweb uses). YIKES! I thought. I sent emails to everybody. I finally got email back from a guy at freehostingweb on the date my domain was set to expire confirming that the matter had been resolved. Whew! Everything’s great, right?
Wrong.
I went to visit my web page today and it’s redirected to some popup site from hell, with a notice that my domain has expired.
GODAMMIT.
You ignorant incompetent fucking pigfuckers. What on earth do you fucking need to do something fucking right? I gave you nearly a fucking month’s heads-up on the fucking registration. I fucking contacted you when there was a fucking issue. YOU FUCKING TOLD ME YOU HAD FUCKING TAKEN CARE OF IT. And now I’ve probably fucking lost my fucking domain name because of your amazing fucking stupidity.
This wouldn’t piss me off nearly so much if it was just personal crap I had thrown up there. But I have all my class outlines from back when I was in law school on my web page. One of the nice things about my page is twice a year I get emails from law students thanking me for making them available. It doesn’t make me any money, but it is a nice ego boost. That archive is linked to by several other law-related web pages. If I get another domain, it’s going to take a long time for folks to find their way there. Fuck.
Well, according to WhoIs, nobody has grabbed that domain yet; it’s listed asexpired. So hopefully this is just a screwup or delay in the reg process that can still get fixed.
It always pays to deal with the source, in this case the actual registrar not a go between. I feel your pain though and hope you don’t lose your domain.
Heed EasyPhil’s advice! “Owning” a domain through an ISP can turn ugly when the ISP in question goes under, as it’s not really yours. If they want to, they could sell it. (This kind of thing happened a lot after the whole dot-com crash thing…).
If I were you, I’d buy it up myself, and deduct it from the next ISP payment. (Assuming you’re sticking to it, or that they stick around.)
Be wary of who you ‘buy’ your domain through, though. Even some dotregistrars are sleazy enough to keep the actual registration in their name, and ‘let’ you use it for the term of the registration.
Does anyone know when an expired domain becomes available for sale? I checked godaddy.com (which I’ve read is a responsible registrar) and I can’t buy it there yet.
Dewey, I think it’s up to 45 days. (I’m not 100% sure, though, but it’s something like that.) I’ve been through this sort of thing too.
I would suggest (as others have) contacting the original registar and seeing if you can update your registration through them. Unless they put their name as the owner of the domain, instead of you. In which case, avoid them.
I learned to NEVER register a domain through a web hosting service. NEVER NEVER NEVER. Never again. Repeat after me: NEVER AGAIN.
Register it yourself, (through godaddy.com, Register.com, one of those places). It’s not hard to do, is sometimes less expensive, and you are always free to up and dump a bad web host and switch to a better host. If your domain name is “tied up” with your hosting company, how do you think your web host will take it when you ask them to change the domain nameservers so you can change web hosts? (Oh sure, probably they’ll eventually give you the login information on your domain registration, so you can go in and change info, but they may take their sweet time. It sucks.)
I would have dealt with the original registrar (DotRegistrar) if my hosting provider hadn’t said they would take care of the problem – they were the ones sending me renewal notices. Now DotRegistrar wants a whole boatload of money to fix the problem. Given that this isn’t a site that’s making me money (and given my current lack of employment), that’s not an option I can really pursue.
I’ve sent emails to my hosting provider telling them the deal, but if they don’t remedy this in the next day or two I’m just gonna register a new domain (and call my CC company to cancel the renewal charges, and find a new host). I’ll re-register the old one when it goes up for sale if no one else grabs it. Suggestions for a new domain name are welcome.
Well, if DotRegistrar is expecting you to pay a lot of money, screw 'em. That’s crazy. I too have had domains “lapse”, and I never had to pay anything extra to renew the domain. Just the renewal fee. So I have no idea why they want a whole boatload of money, but they are out of line, I think.
I suggest going with godaddy.com (very cheap) or Register.com (very well established and probably won’t be going anywhere). I’m sure others will pop up to make recommendations for registrars. So far, I’ve had no troubles with either of these companies.
This will teach you (and all of us), DON’T let a web host take care of your doman name issues. Do it yourself. Yikes.
I’m following this with interest since I’m considering registering a domain name and wondered about this very issue. yosemitebabe, you say I (and everyone else) should refrain from registering the domain name through the web host. Do you mean I should always use two companies, one to manage the domain name, and one to host the website? The thing is, that this seems to cost extra. Furthermore I’m not sure whether registration companies are so helpful if you don’t host with them.
My brother has registered a domain name through register.com for $ 35 p/yr. When trying to make the domain point to the actual site, register.com adds its own banner at the bottom of the page. I can’t get rid of it.
And why would the registration company be any more trustworthy then the web hosting company?
BTW I also just checked some other threads and saw your clear post in here. This does explain your warning, but still leaves me wondering whether you in fact recommend using two companies. Seeing that a lot of people recommend godaddy, maybe I should recommend that to my brother, but should that be for registering or for hosting? Any advice and/or experience is welcome.
(Sorry Dewey if this constitutes a hijack, but since it is in line with your earlier post I hope you don’t mind)
I’ve used Verisign for my domain, and I have it hosted by another company. So far, thankfully, no problems. Now if I could only get a static IP for the home…
Have you told them you’re a lawyer? Let them know that you have records of the renewal transaction and quote some part of your contract stating their obligations. Don’t put up with this crap, it’s a screw-up on their part at best and a scam to get you to double-register(don’t laugh, it’s happened) at worst.
I’d got to a site like www.cheapestregistry.com and initiate a registrar transfer. This site will register your name for 1 year for $8.75. If the transfer doesn’t go through it costs you nothing, but if it does you’re good to go.
Are you the person with the alumni.utexas.net email address? If so you are the registrant and the confirming email for the transfer will be sent there. Good luck!
The web hosting companies offer the service because it’s an extra revenue stream. It’s always best to register the domain name with a registrar and then shop for the best hosting options for your site. It’s not really a whole lot more work and the registrar and hosting companies have abundant online help that will show you how to direct the domain to the site.
I say screw them as well, it seems like it’s their fault anyway. An appropriately written letter by snail mail may work wonders here.
I’ve used register.com and I think they’re full of shit, here’s why:
Last year my domain name was expiring they wanted $35 to renew for the year, I was shopping for lower priced registrars, found one and initiated a transfer. I get email from register.com telling me about how much they like my business, yadda, yadda, yadda. I call them on the phone and basically say; “Why I give you $35 for someting I can get done for $15?” They responded with offering me a special deal i.e. meeting the $15 per domain and I had 3 of them.
I did this through GoDaddy, but I’m not expecting the transfer to go through. GoDaddy basically says they can’t initiate a transfer within 10 days of expiration or after the expiration date has passed. If the transfer goes through, it’ll be because somebody screwed up.
It may not be a bad idea to set GoDaddy as your homepage and try and re-register your domain EVERY DAY until you either succeed or fail (read: someone else snatched it).
FWIW, I think a domain doesn’t go “on the market” until at least 30 days has passed. Probably not worth panicking until then.
Internic has just about all the info anyone could ever need about the DNS.
They have a listing of accredited registrars like Network Solutions, the registrar we used for our company domain. We’ve never experienced so much as a single problem with them.
Internic also has a handy form for registering complaints about problems with accredited registrars. I don’t know if yours is in the listing but it wouldn’t hurt to check.
