On $9 million Porno.com domain name sale — My thoughts

A mammoth domain name sale sends shock waves through the domain name business.

Rick Schwartz, aka the “Domain King”, has done it again.

As first noted by TheDomains yesterday, Schwartz sold the domain name Porno.com for $8,888,888.88.

Here are my thoughts on the sale.

1. First, a hat tip to Schwartz. He’s a polarizing figure, and you might not agree with everything he does or states. But this latest sale solidifies him in the halls of domaining. And, regardless of what you think of his antics, his big sales help all .com domain name owners.

2. I don’t know much regarding the online adult business. I hear that porn purveyors are struggling, but clearly a lot of the online distributors are doing quite well. In my book, the three top public domain name sales of all time are now porn related: Sex.com, Porn.com and now Porno.com. (I ignore Fund.com, since there was some funny business going on with the buyer.) Also, consider the premium sales .xxx has managed to pulled off in recent years. The firm that bought Porno.com has purchased many other valuable domain names.

3. I was a bit surprised to hear that this is the highest ever single domain deal transacted at Escrow.com. I believe the firm has done a handful of 8 figure transactions, but I guess those included more than one domain or perhaps other assets. It’s possible that the allocation of value in those larger transactions included a domain for more than $8.9 million, but Escrow.com wouldn’t necessarily be made aware of the split between domains in a multi-domain transaction.