To Auction Block in May — Sex.co Headed

Sex.co domain name to be auctioned off in May.

That’s not a typo in the headline.

Sex.com may be off the auction block, but the owner of the Colombian ccTLD Sex.co hopes to cash in this May. Mobile Entertainment Group of Colombia plans to auction off the domain name at Sedo.

I talked to Mobile Entertainment Group founder Jan Leijnse by phone today. He explained that he’s not sure how much traffic the domain name gets as it was parked at Sedo only recently.

You may be wondering how his firm got the second level domain name ahead of .co relaunches. Remember, anyone who registered a third level .co domain name prior July 30, 2008 can get rights to the corresponding second level domain name. Leijnse’ firm owned Sex.com.co and therefore was able to register Sex.co. There is no restriction on transferring these second level domain names to other entities.

Colombia has historically been really strict regarding who can register domain names, requiring an exact match to a trade name or trademark. Alas, here’s a registration for Sex.com.co.