Hi, I was just curious if anyone else would be interested in seeing OpenSRS offer escrow services in relation to domain names that are bought and sold, and registered via OpenSRS. Right now, there seems to be 3 options that I'm aware of:
1) Afternic (owned by Register.com) -- charges 5% or $50, whichever is more, but there have been a lot of complaints about not getting paid in a timely manner. 2) GreatDomains (owned by Verisign) -- charges 15% or 20%, depending on the extension (15% for .com). 3) Escrow firms that don't specialize in Domains (e.g. Escrow.com and Tradenable.com) The advantages of an OpenSRS solution (I don't work for them, just tossing out the idea) would be: 1) offer lower fees than GreatDomains 2) more timely/reliable payment than Afternic 3) ability to LOCK the domain, and verify that ownership has truly passed to the 3rd party (i.e. a good audit trail), for domains that are registered at OpenSRS (something that others can't really do, since they're not the registrar; the WHOIS can easily be changed without giving the new buyer the password of the domain) 4) partly related to #3, folks would need to transfer to OpenSRS to start the escrow process, so that means more registration fees over time A "quick" implementation might involve partnering with someone like Escrow.com to handle the financial backend, whereas OpenSRS/Tucows specializes on the marketing and technical aspect related to the secure name transfer (with audit trail). Does anyone else think this might be a desirable service? Sincerely, George Kirikos http://www.kirikos.com/ __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Make a great connection at Yahoo! Personals. http://personals.yahoo.com
