Interesting timing in that I just posted here on the blog about the large loss in readership suffered by the USA’s largest newspapers. The morning news (front page Yahoo) featured an article about both of Philadelphia’s largest newspapers being sold at auction after having declared bankruptcy.

The Philadelphia Inquirer and The Philadelphia Daily News have both gone under, and are being offered up in a private auction held in New York City. Executives of Revlon are making a bid for the Philadelphia papers along with creditors and a Canadian investment firm.

Fox News reported that the two papers had accumulated $390 million in debt by February 2009 forcing the Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing. The Philadelphia papers employ more than 4000 people in the area.

One has to wonder if the outcome would have been much different had the Philadelphia papers acquired and transitioned their companies to something like Philadelphia.com or Philadelphia.US. Boulevards New Media own Philadelphia.com, and Kraft Foods own Philadelphia.US. The missing ingredient is a premium city domain name.

Update 4/29/10: Bloomberg report that the auction concluded with both Philadelphia newspapers being acquired for $139 million by a group of lenders that included Angelo Gordon & Co. and a Credit Suisse Group AG unit. The sale must still be approved by a U.S. bankruptcy judge. The new owners have committed to preserving employees’ jobs.

.US Domain Names .us, city domain names, newspapers

America’s newspapers continue to lose favor with readers in a persistent negative trend which seems to go on and on. The latest report finds that U.S. newspapers lost another 8.7 percent of their readership in just the last 6 month period. That’s incredible.

These figures were released April 26, 2010 by the Audit Bureau of Circulations. Even the ever popular Sunday edition of local papers dropped a sharp 6.5 percent.

USA Today, once the most popular paper in the country, is reported to have lost 13.6% of its circulation. That’s enormous. My theory is that developed premium city domain names in leading web addresses will eventually replace the traditional local newspaper. The logic, familiarity, and instant public recognition built into a pure city domain name creates the ideal portal for local news.

Local newspaper ad revenue is reported to have also slipped further although the degree of loss appears to be slowing over time.

Interestingly, the Audit Bureau report stated The Wall Street Journal is the only paper among the top 25 that actually experienced an increase in readership! It’s circulation increased .5% allowing it to surpass USA Today as the nation’s most read paper.

What this means is nearly self-evident. The news delivery model has experienced an unprecedented sea change, and traditional hardcopy news organizations found themselves on the wrong side of a new internet equation. Many of them continued to brand under an old moniker that was illogical, and yesteryear.

Want to see it done right? Visit Boston.com! They’re receiving over 3 million visitors per month and in excess of 20 million monthly visits (source: Compete.com). Try competing with that.

What about the #3 circulation, The New York Times, you ask? The answer: A staggering 8.5% loss of circulation in their weekday readership. No matter how it’s sliced, times are changing. The question is … what will these news organizations have to do to reinvent themselves? I believe they must look to the Boston.com example. Therein lies about 75% of the answer.

More on this topic …

Huge Newspaper Investor Pulls Out, Way Out!

More Shocking Newspaper Decline

Newspapers in America Being Led to the Exit

.US Domain Names, Internet Domains city domain names, news, newspaper

A .TV auction concluded recently at online brokerage house, Sedo. Several notable sales of .tv web addresses included:

• Christmas.tv for $32,000
• Business.tv for $100,999
• Shows.tv for $20,500
• Learn.tv for $41,000
• Vacation.tv $14,000
• Fantasy.tv for $10,600

The .TV domain extension has been limited in its adoption for many years due to its registry not being clear enough with registrants on the exact plan for future renewal fees. The up front cost for acquiring premium .TV domains was relatively high and the renewal fees sometimes in the thousands of dollars per year.

This was largely rectified by Verisign with these newly purchased premium domains now being subject to only a nominal annual registration fee ($20 – $30 per year).

My favorite from the Sedo auction was Business.TV although all of the above keyword domain names qualify as premium choices in any top level domain extension. Business.com became one of the most impressive and interesting sales in domaining history, and inspired legions of domain investors to stake their claim in the new domain name frontier.

Robert DeMartinis (from Philadelphia) acquired the ultra premium domain name, Business.US, some years ago. This is a multi-million dollar internet domain name by any definition, and will one day make a tremendous asset acquisition for a U.S. based corporation.

Similarly, Business.TV has great potential for branding as a business-centric media portal. Currently, the domain’s whois is not yet reflecting the new registrant owner so it’s not possible to determine if the buyer is a private individual, a group of investors, or a single corporate level end-user.

The Sedo .TV auction was successful, and attracted a considerable number of buyers offering them a new opportunity to enter the field of domain name investing and development.

.TV Domain Names, Domain Sales domain investing, enom, verisign

The premium geo domain name, Raleigh.com, is up for auction via Snapnames. The auction is occurring in association with the GeoDomain Expo® which will kick off in New Orleans on April 28. I just read about this very interesting geodomain sale on Michael Berkens’ blog, TheDomains.

Raleigh.com is one of many stunning geo domain names owned by Boulevards New Media. Boulevards have a massive stable of top-of-the-line city domains including Detroit.com, StLouis.com, Indianapolis.com, and Memphis.com to name a few. Raleigh is North Carolina’s second most populated city. It is the state capital, and home to Research Triangle Park and NC State University. Raleigh has been ranked as one of the fastest growing cities in America.

The current auction reserve on Raleigh.com is set at $1 million to $5 million dollars. This premium domain name is certainly an incredible portal for the Raleigh, North Carolina area and presents a once in a lifetime opportunity for the appropriate buyer to acquire a top domain.

Raleigh.info is owned by me. Raleigh.US is registered to Sigmund Solares, and Raleigh.biz was acquired by a South Korean registrant named Song Dongil.

Geodomains, Internet Domains geo domain, raleigh

Belgard is a leading interlocking pavers manufacturer who make high-quality materials used in the construction of beautiful walkways, driveways, gardens, pools & patio environments. You have likely seen their hardscape materials used in retaining walls and what is referred to as “outdoor rooms” often found in luxury estates.

Belgard is owned by Oldcastle who are a leading international materials company with 1900 locations and 40,000 employees worldwide.

Belgard have an extensive presence in both the United States and Canada with their products having been successfully used in thousands of residential and commercial projects.

The company are utilizing the .BIZ (Business) web address at Belgard.biz, and have designed an attractive website containing plenty of colorful photos of their many projects. Belgard have independent contractors in every state who are well versed on the various Belgard products. The company hosts ongoing training sessions across the country and provide several certifications as well as business development & expansion courses.

.BIZ Domain Names, Site Development .biz, belgard

A 2010 survey by property consultants, Knight Frank, ranked the most influential cities on the plant according to four factors. These factors were economic activity, political power, knowledge base, and quality of life. The results were reported by CNN.

Coming in on top as number 1 was New York City. Number 2 was London. Number 3 was Paris. And number 4 was Tokyo. Los Angeles made the top 10 list as did Berlin and Beijing.

Geo domain names have been of interest to a majority of domainers since the introduction of the internet and domain names in general. New York City (and Manhattan) are two geo domains that have been on my radar for a number of years due to their huge population, unrivaled luxury real estate market, and role as the economic center of the country.

The CNN report pointed out that several rising Asian cities have begun to garner increased economic relevance and political influence. But, they have not yet arrived as locations where the world’s wealthiest would have a first or second home.

The value (and price) of a geo domain name is not easy to calculate, and is heavily dependent on a variety of inter-related variables. Some of these include city proper population (within the city limits), surrounding urban population (larger metro/suburb area), city relevance as a center of business, importance of the city as a vacation destination, current growth rate, and projected importance in the state/region.

Internet Domains city domain name, geo domain, new york city

It was recently announced that CreditReport.com purchased the domain name, CreditScore.com, for an undisclosed amount. “Credit Score” is a high dollar, highly searched keyword combination and a topic of much interest to borrowers.

Eligibility for mortgage loans, good interest rates, lines of credit, and even credit cards is tied to an individual’s credit worthiness. This credit worthiness is largely based on a person’s composite credit score which itself is built upon the various debt, payment, and financial management patterns of the consumer.

TheDomains reported that CreditScore.com may have possibly been purchased for just north of $5 million based on a disclosure by a party to the deal. This domain qualifies as super premium since it easily passes the test for clarity, business relevance, generic in nature, and being immune to trademark infringement concerns. A Google search for the phrase “credit score” yields a plethora of advertisers competing for the phrase, and well over 9 million Google indexed pages.

PremiumDomains.US acquired CreditScore.biz several years ago and are certainly happy to see the growing viability of this phrase in the larger consumer and financial markets. The recent sale of the .com version will significantly enhance the buyer’s long-term market position.

Domain Sales credit score, creditscore.biz