Scumbag domain squatters

DigMe · #1 03-30-2005, 08:51 AM

No matter what you think of chistians or christian music you've gotta agree that the following situation is a cruddy move:

There are some christian artists who now primarily use the name of their band.com as their website. However, they previously used a site called _____ministries.com (don't care to give out the actual name). That site name that they previously used is printed on most of their CDs and they've sold hundreds of thousands, first as independent artists and now as signed. However, one little problem...they forgot to renew their domain name. Yes, that is their fault. However, now some creep that was, I guess, watching their domain name, has swooped in, purchased the domain and is displaying porn on it. I don't know what kind, I haven't visited it and I don't care to, I'm taking their word for it. So basically by putting porn on this website that this christian band has printed on all their CDs he's basically forcing them to pay him money. It's either that or smear their name and cause a lot of people to be angry with them. Last I heard they were trying to buy it back.

This is just disgusting though. Sure, they should have renewed the domain name but this is just out of control. Do these kind of people make a living solely by squatting and basically blackmailing people into buying the domain back? I've heard about early cases of this where people registered microsoft.com or something but this is the first time I've heard of these kind of low blackmailing techniques.

brad cook

tekhna · #2 03-30-2005, 08:54 AM

Well, it is a pretty scummy move. But it is their own stupid fault for not renewing. Not much sympathy really.

DigMe · #3 03-30-2005, 08:58 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by tekhna

Well, it is a pretty scummy move. But it is their own stupid fault for not renewing. Not much sympathy really.

What if it happened to your favorite band? What if it happened to YOUR band? Would you say "Oh well, I should have renewed,"? Doubtful. You'd probably be scrambling to fix it. Again this was a site that they weren't really using anymore but it got printed on all but their most recent CD, many of which are still out there for sale. They'd not checked the site in a while, I think it just redirected people to their current site. It could happen to any busy, self-contained band that is on the road a lot.

brad cook

srxplayer · #4 03-30-2005, 09:04 AM

It is an absolute SCUMBAG thing to do to anyone.

As a Christian I take offense to that kind of stuff when it is done to anyone. But to display porn on that site is the same as if the NAACP forgot to renew their domain name and the KKK took it over. It's salt in wounds and a very vindictive form of blackmail.

It is very easy to forget to renew your domin name. Especially when setting up and dealing with your website and domain registration is not a primary function of anyone in the company.The company I work for has forgotten to do it twice in the last five years. Luckily nobody has burned us like that.

Against Will · #5 03-30-2005, 09:28 AM

Domain squatters can be real *****es. This actually did happen to one of my favorite bands a while back. Granted, they had already broken up, but it was still jarring to type in the URL to see if there was any news on the members were up to and end up with porn.

Did the band run the website themselves or did they have a webmaster handling it?

Joe Nerve · #6 03-30-2005, 09:30 AM

as christians i'm surprised you guys don't take offense at using the term scumbag so loosely on a board that invites kids of all ages. if you had a 10 year daughter and she called somebody a scumbag don't you think you'd get a little upset? what's up guys? what's up with the moderators these days. what's up with me - i must be in a really crappy mood.

anyway - i think it's pretty obvious when such things happen that it's not the doing of the bands. i sincerely doubt anyone is going to think they turned their christian site into a porn site. i don't consider it blackmail. i consider it complete stupidity to give in to these people and give them any money. there are creeps in the world. the ministries people screwed up by not being on the ball. it happened to a really good guy I know bumblefoot, edited by Smash - hardly an appropriate link for TB, especially during a workday when people might be surfing from work and could lose their jobs for accessing a site with those keywords. And Speaking of children as you are, would you want them to read that site? (his real name) was the site he had for fans that were close friends of his . he missed his renewal date. check out his site now.

ps. There's a site on the net called jesusloves------ . People will do all kinds of things to get a rise outta someone. It's the nature of the internet, and unfortunately the nature of some people who are struggling spritiually and emotionally.

Toasted · #7 03-30-2005, 10:09 AM

Joe, you're my hero.

Joe Nerve · #8 03-30-2005, 10:15 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Joe Nerve

edited by Smash - hardly an appropriate link for TB, especially during a workday when people might be surfing from work and could lose their jobs for accessing a site with those keywords. And Speaking of children as you are, would you want them to read that site?

DOH! my apologies bigtime. although i dont think any of those links were real. not sure exactly what i was thinking when i posted that. not sure that i was thinking would be more acurate.

glad you caught it. now please change scumbag to lowlife.

and toasted - i got the joke.

Toasted · #9 03-30-2005, 10:27 AM

You're still my hero

bassmonkeee · #10 03-30-2005, 10:28 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by srxplayer

As a Christian I take offense to that kind of stuff when it is done to anyone.

What does being a Christian have to do with it?

Do you think the porn site ONLY went after the name because it was a Christian band? I seriously doubt it. They buy 100s-1000s of website names that are not renewed by their original owners. And, most of them end up forwarding to porn.

I feel the same way about this as I do about people being dumb enough to put their tax return files in their shared music folders so it ends up on Kazaa, or grokster. Sure, it sucks for the person involved, but a small amount of awareness goes a long way.

karrot-x · #11 03-30-2005, 10:37 AM

Happend to me, I forgot to renew karrot-x.TLD becuase I primarily use karrot-x.net

*Warning it's a porn site now

EDIT: Took away the tld's so kids or whoever couldn't find it

DigMe · #12 03-30-2005, 10:49 AM

Does the word scumbag have some sort of lewd meaning? I always thought it just mean the same thing as "lowlife." Why's it offensive, joe?

brad cook

**embellisher** · #13 03-30-2005, 10:52 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by DigMe

Does the word scumbag have some sort of lewd meaning? I always thought it just mean the same thing as "lowlife." Why's it offensive, joe?

brad cook

Yes, it does. Think 'used prophylactic device'.

bassmonkeee · #14 03-30-2005, 10:54 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by embellisher

Yes, it does. Think 'used prophylactic device'.

Heh. You phrased that better than I could have without a smartypants comment.

**embellisher** · #15 03-30-2005, 10:58 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by bassmonkeee

Heh. You phrased that better than I could have without a smartypants comment.

DigMe · #16 03-30-2005, 10:58 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by SMASH

As for these specific Christians, I have nothing against them or any Christians of course. I'm born and raised within the church myself. However, I'm not quite outraged either given how many times "Christians" (if not these exact same people) bust regular law-abiding citizen's balls and try to hamper their rights such as with the PMRC, Ed Meese and Regan's ridiculous War On Porn (gee, that worked almost a well as the War On Drugs), people picketing 7-11 stores for selling Playboy (hidden behind the counter, no less), war on birth control, etc. etc. etc., often by means of defacto blackmail. It seems that others are now doing unto them.

Well I think that's an interesting way to look at that since these particular guys haven't been involved in anything like that at all. Why pigeonhole them with 7-11 picketers? That kind of generalizing hardly seems fair. People busting other people's balls, Christian or not, has little to nothing to do with this situation. Sounds like you just wanted to rant about Christians busting balls. Also sounds like a roundabout way of saying "They got what was coming to them."

Do unto others...? Well that's NOT how they've done unto others. How can you hold up someone else's action and apply that to these people that you don't even know?

Quote:

If it is legal and you do care, spend this time writing to your gov't representative to change the laws rather than posting about it here? Just IMO.

What a silly thing to say.
In that case why do we post anything here? Instead of telling people at TB how much one likes so and so band then why not write the band instead and tell them how much you like them? Why not do both? I posted it here for discussion just like any other thread. Why don't you post in all the other threads too and tell everyone else what they should be doing instead of posting here?

brad cook

DigMe · #17 03-30-2005, 11:00 AM

Sorry..personally I think it was used to mean 'lowlife' long before it meant that. I just looked in a dictionary and it only listed the "a despicable person" thing. I believe that the nasty meaning is a modern application. My apologies again to anyone that was offended. I changed it and I was not aware of the alternate meaning.

brad cook

**Josh Ryan** · #18 03-30-2005, 11:21 AM

Lame. Yeah, the band screwed up, but they are being exploited. Yes, Joe is right, but I would still love to see the current domain owner get sued.

Joe Nerve · #19 03-30-2005, 11:25 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by DigMe

Sorry..personally I think it was used to mean 'lowlife' long before it meant that. I just looked in a dictionary and it only listed the "a despicable person" thing. I believe that the nasty meaning is a modern application. My apologies again to anyone that was offended. I changed it and I was not aware of the alternate meaning.

brad cook

it's the other way around. perhaps the original meaning has become outdated and people don't even realize that's what it once meant.

MJ5150 · #20 03-30-2005, 11:52 AM

I had no idea scumbag took on a new meaning. I used that word the other day. Fortunately, I was with some "old-timers" like me who knew the definition I was using.

Brad....One of my friends set up a website for his family that generated a fair amount of traffic. He never figured in a million years hat someone was scouting his site. The day his lease expired, a porn company jumped on it and took over his site. If anything, it really sucked to see all of his hard work for four or five years gone in almost an instant.

-Mike