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The Official Name.com Blog (21 unread)

January 31, 2012
5:29
Building A Company Vision From The Inside Out
» ‎ The Official Name.com Blog

(This is the first in the series inspired by a meeting where our CEO admitted while we’ve worked our tails off, we’ve been as non-corporate as a company can be, and need to step it up and set goals and … Continue reading →
January 28, 2012
0:04
The WINNER of the $250 David Walsh Promo Code Contest
» ‎ The Official Name.com Blog

It was back in November of ’11 when the David Walsh deal went down. While at another registrar, Walsh’s domain was stolen, and the story exploded on the social-o-sphere like Justin Bieber had gone missing. Anyway, long story short, in … Continue reading →
January 26, 2012
8:17
An Introduction to Conversion Rates
» ‎ The Official Name.com Blog

It’s time to analyze a buzzword that seems to pop up all over the Internet these days. Conversion. What is conversion and why does it matter? Simply put, an online conversion occurs when a website visitor does what you want … Continue reading →
January 24, 2012
1:43
Geeks vs. Nerds… Hilarious Infographic
» ‎ The Official Name.com Blog

All right, we admit… as a bunch of domain name developers, web hosting tech lovers, SEO number crunchers and website building internet lovers, we probably fall into this category. The question is… which one? P.S. Yes, we got bitten by … Continue reading →
January 22, 2012
7:55
A Great Infographic on The Effect of Multi-Tasking
» ‎ The Official Name.com Blog

Thought this was a great follow up to the “importance of Focus” blog post. Here a university professor shows the actual negative effect on the brain that multi-tasking has when compared to a singular focus. So remember, whether it’s buying a new domain name, setting up your web-hosting, building your website, or getting traffic via search engine optimization… focus!

(Thanks to Rasmussen University for the infographic!)
January 21, 2012
5:06
One Heck of a Week: SOPA, PIPA and POWER (yours)
» ‎ The Official Name.com Blog

I don’t mean to be mean, but you know you’ve done something right when Senators’ websites are crashing. This means THE VOTERS CARE, (and that maybe our nation’s leaders should get better hosting.) But here’s the deal, many of us have learned an important lesson: if you don’t take a stand then there’s some lobbyist somewhere that’ll be glad to do it for you. That’s not to say all lobbyists are bad and out to get you, but when they’re shaking hands in DC to jack with our Internet, well then there’s a problem.

So we stood up, and we Tweeted and we blogged, and many of you probably spoke your piece thinking, “This is pretty easy compared to Syria.” And it is.

We’ve got it pretty good in America, and our efforts will make it even better. SOPA has been shelved and PIPA has lost a lot of friends, and we can only hope that those who make these deals know that we’re watching…and we will do something about it.

Rock on.
January 18, 2012
21:40
The Best of the Anti-SOPA Anti-PIPA Media
» ‎ The Official Name.com Blog

A great way to learn is to laugh. Personally, I’m a fan of The Oatmeal, and if you don’t mind a little blasphemous, R-Rated humor, then this is your go-to link for a quick lesson in SOPA/PIPA.

Like a little song? Love some American Pie? YouTubers LaughPong have done an amazing redux of the Don McLean classic to teach us more about the legislation (and why the web is so dang awesome.)

What the heck is a LOLcat? (Imagine a post-SOPA/PIPA world where Wikipedia is blacked out all the time.)

Who doesn’t love cartoons? This incredible mix of live action and animation is clearly made by dedicated & passionate people, and it is an all-in-one tutorial. Get educated!

PROTECT IP / SOPA Breaks The Internet from Fight for the Future on Vimeo.

I’m sure there are many more great protest media. Let us know about them!
11:40
Shedding Some Light During the Blackout (SOPA & PIPA)
» ‎ The Official Name.com Blog

Isn’t it Ironic “Ironic” is a term that gets overused and even misused a lot, but I think we’ve got a solid case of Irony here: the freedom and innovation inspired by the openness of the Internet is the very thing that clobbered the bill that would have stifled the freedom and innovation of the Internet.
It’s true, the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) has been shelved. SOPA was authored with hopes to curb online piracy by preventing the likes of Google and Yahoo from sending users to sites distributing stolen materials. It would also allow for litigation if copyright was being infringed. It’s a concept backed by the likes of cable giant Comcast as well as the Motion Picture Association of America. They point to lost revenues as a reason for the legislation, but underneath SOPA’s pirate-fighting veneer is an ugly and misguided soul.

What Name.com Is Doing

We’ve gathered some talking points that better explain SOPA, and it’s creepy little brother, PIPA (Protect IP Act), not simply to better illustrate the House and Senate bills, respectively, but so that we can all be prepared when these pop up again. And they will. SOPA isn’t dead, it’s just being retooled for another run. PIPA is still alive as well (this video is an amazing PIPA primer.)

We at Name.com know we’re but a small vibe in the collective voice that sent shock waves to Washington, D.C. Back on December 29th we showed our support by offering to donate 10 cents for every retweet of our #stopSOPA page explaining both our stance and why this is such an important issue. However, when the dust settled the total contribution it would have required was not enough. Instead, to pay tribute and support those who make their life’s work to keep the Internet the bastion of freedom that it is, we are going to make $1000 donations to each of the following organizations:
Electronic Frontier Foundation – For over twenty years they’ve been confronting cutting-edge issues to defend free speech, privacy, innovation, and consumer rights.
Creative Commons – Borrowing directly from their About Us page: “To achieve the vision of universal access, someone needed to provide a free, public, and standardized infrastructure that creates a balance between the reality of the Internet and the reality of copyright laws.”
The Case Foundation – Jean and Steve Case worked on the Internet before most knew there was an Internet. Their foundation works, in part, to, “broaden the use of new technologies to make giving more informed, efficient, and effective.”
What the Critics Are Saying

It’s important you get the chance to read for yourself about SOPA and PIPA. We have, and we’re happy to have our thought’s articulated by the following people and organizations (here are your talking points):
The White House: “We will not support legislation that reduces freedom of expression, increases cybersecurity risk or undermines the dynamic, innovative global Internet.” It even threw in that they would not support a bill that tampered with the “technical architecture of the Internet.” Steve Benen, Washington Monthly: “Misguided efforts to combat online privacy have been threatening to stifle innovation, suppress free speech, and even, in some cases, undermine national security. As of yesterday, though, there’s a lot less to worry about. “ Congressman Darrell Issa (on the #OPEN alternative): First, Americans have a right to benefit from what they’ve created. And second, Americans have a right to an open internet. Our duty is to protect these rights. That’s why congressional Republicans and Democrats came together to write the OPEN Act. But it’s only a start. Visit www.KeepTheWebOpen.com to see the details, comment, collaborate, and help build a better bill. Google, via CNET: “Like many businesses, entrepreneurs and web users, we oppose these bills because there are smart, targeted ways to shut down foreign rogue websites without asking American companies to censor the Internet. So tomorrow we will be joining many other tech companies to highlight this issue on our US home page.” As a for-profit company reared in a free-market capitalist society, we must be prepared to defend our opposition to legislation that proposes to save money. Freedom and shared creativity can’t always be quantified for the skeptical person wondering why we wouldn’t quickly capitulate to the bottom line. (After all…freedom IS the bottom line!) Turns out, however, that Tim O’ Reilly has been thinking about this:
Tim O’ Reilly: While the existing music companies were focused on fighting file sharing, Apple went on to provide a compelling new way to buy and enjoy music, and became the largest music retailer in the world. While book publishers have been fighting the imagined threat of piracy, Amazon, not pirates, has become the biggest threat to their business by offering authors an alternative way to reach the market without recourse to their former gatekeepers. Hollywood too, has a history of fighting technologies, such as the VCR, which developed into a larger market than the one the industry was originally trying to protect. In short, SOPA and PIPA not only harm the internet, they support existing content companies in their attempt to hold back innovative business models that will actually grow the market and deliver new value to consumers.

So the very forces fighting for SOPA and PIPA are actually hindering their own progress? Now that’s irony.

Let’s all hold hands and sing…

We want to thank Google, AOL, Mozilla, eBay, Facebook, Linkedin, Twitter, Yahoo! and Zynga for using their muscle to in a signed letter to the members of the Congressoinal Judiiciary Committee. We also want to give huge shoutouts to Reddit, Wikipedia, BoingBoing and countless other sites observing the 24-hour blackout to show their opposition to the bills. And like an Oscar acceptance speech that’s gone too long…thank you @namedotcom Twitter followers who kept us informed like @techzader, @bfeld, @livet0ski and @swirlee…let us know if we’ve overlooked you!
Now, get the word out! Tweet, Like, Share, and Email this page to everyone! Then, send people to HERE to get code to black out their own site.

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4:35

Affiliate Getting Started, Series 1: Choosing An Affiliate Network

» ‎ The Official Name.com Blog

by Caroline, Name.com Domain Concierge

We’re assuming you already know what an Affiliate is and have a desire to start making money by promoting services/products in your niche on your blog. A quick way for locating Advertisers in your niche is through an Affiliate Network. Affiliate Networks act as intermediaries between you the Affiliate and the Advertiser. Affiliate Networks allow you to compare various offers from Advertisers and you can choose which offers to participate in and promote via your blog.

Soo…How the heck do you choose an Affiliate Network? We thought http://www.imediaconnection.com/content/4388.asp had a few great suggestions for you to consider when selecting a network. We then took those suggestions with a few of our own and applied them to 3 Affiliate Networks who score pretty high on ranking sites. Check it out…

Tracking Methods (can you see real time results, can you customize your data)
Payment Methods. How the network pays commissions.
Payment Threshold. you have to earn before you are paid. If you are just starting a lower threshold –such as $1.00- will mean you receive money faster depending on payment cycles)
Ways to earn money (Type of programs they specialize in-Pay Per Lead, Pay Per Sale, Co-Registraion) If you are new to Affiliate Marketing then a range of ways to earn money gives you a chance to try different methods with your blog readers. See which method works best for your blog then seek advertisers who pay based on that method.
Industry Verticals Specific industries the network focuses on (or has success in). Make sure they support the industry you wish to promote.
Support/Training. Support provided to you as an Affiliate. Look for training opportunities too with an Affiliate Network. Networks want you to be successful and that starts with your success. You’ll want to make sure the help desks are easy to navigate and support is timely.

Category	Company
CJ.com	Clickbank.com	LinkShare.com
Tracking	Real time tracking	real time tracking, options to customize	near real-timer reporting, will work with you on customizing
Payment Methods	Check, Direct Deposit	Check	Check, Direct Deposit
Payment Threshold	Check $100.00, Direct Deposit $50.00	$100.00	$1.00, however Advertisers can customize the threshold
Ways to Earn Money	Advertiser Choice (Possible options: Perecent of sale, Cost per lead, Cost per Click)	Percent of Sale	Advertiser Choice (Possible options: Perecent of sale, Cost per lead, Cost per Click)
Industry Verticals	Finance, Travel, Automotive, Consumer Products, Education, Health and Beauty, Retail, Business, Entertainment, Special Interest	Arts & Entertainment, Betting Systems, Business / Investing, Computers / Internet, Cooking, Food & Wine, E-business & E-marketing, Education, Employment & Jobs, Fiction, Games, Green Products, Health & Fitness, Home & Garden, Languages, Mobile, Parenting & Families, Politics / Current Events, Reference, Self-Help, Software & Services, Spirituality, New Age & Alternative Beliefs, Sports, Travel	Auto, Business & Career, Clothing & Accessories, Computer & Electronics, Department Store, Entertainment, Family, Financial Services, Food & Drink, Games & Toys, Gift & Flowers, Health & Beauty, Hobbies & Collectibles, Home & Living, Internet & Online, Mature/Adult, Miscellaneous, Office, Sports & Fitness, Telecommunications, Travel
Support/Training	Tips and Training articles and webinars, support ticket support from within account	Monday-Friday 7am-6pm Mountainn Time. Blog, PodCast, Webinars, all for ongoing education	Email, Help Center, LinkShare University, Blog

Of course these are not the only 3 Affiliate Networks. Try this Google search for researching your own Affiliate Network to join. Best of luck with your Affiliate business!

January 17, 2012
22:47
Win $500 in Subscriptions and Services from Name.com: Your odds have never been better
» ‎ The Official Name.com Blog

It’s time to kickstart your business with the .BIZ-ness Giveaway! It’s what we do here, give people the tools and support to get online and magnify their moolah, and now we’ll shower you with the goods…for FREE. All you need is a .BIZ and you can enter to win $500 in subscriptions and services. That includes a one-year subscription to our easy, step-by-step SEO Tutor, and a whole year to our unlimited PageZen web builder. Both are easy to use and geared to get your .BIZ roaring up the ranks of Internet Search Engines.

And here’s the best part: According to what we’ve tracked as far as entries into the contest, YOUR ODDS ARE FANTASTIC:

ENTER NOW! You’ll be in an exclusive club.
January 16, 2012
21:52
Name.com Community Evangelist Loses Bet, feels awkward
» ‎ The Official Name.com Blog

Because Tim Tebow couldn’t hit the broadside of the sun during a supernova, and the Denver Bronco defense gave Tom Brady enough time to make footballs out of a live pig, I am wearing this jersey. Long, painful story short, I lost a bet with Name.com customer Mike Maddaloni, the owner of pro-Patroits website, GoPats.com.

For those of you not into into American football (kind of the direction I’m heading these days), Name.com is located in the town of the Denver Broncos. The Patriots beat the Broncos by a lot of points (I had to turn it off in the fourth quarter.) I’m wearing the jersey of Brady, the quarterback of the New England Patriots. It feels very, very wrong.
January 14, 2012
4:51
Name.com Experiences A Tim Tebow Miracle
» ‎ The Official Name.com Blog

Or maybe Beeracle?

The Denver Broncos quarterback is surrounded by miracle and mystery. We’re glad he could share…but hoping we didn’t tap him of his mojo right before the New England Patriots game.
January 13, 2012
21:57
How To Series: Add Twitter and Facebook Login to Your Site
» ‎ The Official Name.com Blog

Everyone has seen those things before, right? In this glorious How To blog post we are going to show you how to implement those two buttons on your website using the JS libraries that both companies provide for free. We … Continue reading →
January 12, 2012
23:05
Sometimes Innovation Precedes the Need: A Take on the New gTLDs
» ‎ The Official Name.com Blog

As many of you know, Brad White the Director of Global Media Affairs for ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers) flew out last week to help spread awareness around the new gTLD program. Here’s a quick background in case you’re not familiar with the new program: gTLD stands for generic top-level domain such as com, net, org (to the right of the dot). The new program will allow anyone to apply to own and operate their own extension (more info here.) I’ll try to be casual here but this is undoubtedly the largest change to the Internet since its inception…! If you don’t know, now you knowww (Biggie reference there, anyone?) Anyway, introducing new gTLDs to the Internet landscape has been a hot topic with much controversy and debate as many have asked, “Why are you doing this? What is the need?”

When faced with this question last week Mr. White responded, “Sometimes innovation precedes the need.” This turned the conversation to Twitter, iPads and iPhones. Did you know you needed any of those before they existed?

I’ll be the first to admit that change can be scary. You can greet it by kicking and screaming or you can embrace it, the choice is yours. I’m not arguing that every big brand out there should necessarily embrace new gTLDs, but what I am wondering is what happened to the dreamers? The go-getters who are totally bent and psyched on creating a completely new experience for customers that’s never been seen or experienced before. Where’s the excitement?

A great article by Adrian Kinderis hit my inbox this morning that strikes the same chord, “Remember, all great differentiators are unproven before they are accepted as the norm. Even American industrialist Henry Ford understood this valuable lesson: “If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses.”

Let me be clear, new gTLDs are not for everyone. The application fee alone is $185k, maintenance and renewal fees run around minimum $25k yearly, it’s an extremely technical endeavor and a lot of capital and knowhow are needed up front. Even Name.com, a company that could potentially benefit from new gTLDs, has had its own internal debate about implementing such a massive change. My only question is of what are we so scared? Why isn’t there more enthusiasm around opening up and unleashing the Internet? It is a wide-open playing field where the opportunity to be an innovator could not be any more clearly presented.

So will you ask for more horses? Or take on the challenge and start dreaming?
January 11, 2012
6:03
So you want free web hosting? An Amazon EC2 How-To
» ‎ The Official Name.com Blog
Do you have a bit of technical know-how or at the very least the willingness to try and acquire some? Want free web hosting on enterprise level servers with best in class infrastructure and bandwidth? Well then, keep on reading and I will tell you how to get some using Amazon’s EC2 (Elastic Compute Cloud) via AWS (Amazon Web Services). I’ll also tell you how to setup your DNS using Name.com‘s DNS management in order to point your domain to your shiny new hosting environment. First of all, for those of you that do not already know, Amazon offers a myriad of cloud based products through their AWS platform. Hosted in the same environment and on the same infrastructure that hosts the universally famous Amazon.com e-commerce website, AWS truly provides a top notch service that anyone can use for just about any online purpose imaginable. What we are going to focus on in this article is setting up a virtual private server that you can use to host your domain on, for free. Amazon offers a free usage tier of services for first time customers for up to one year. Yes, you will need to be a new AWS user in order to take advantage of this offer. Once the year is up you will be charged the normal price for the services you use. For a micro instance the fees are quite nominal and you will also have much more flexibility, should you want it, over a shared hosting environment. However, even if you do not qualify for the free tier you will still be able to use these instruction in order to setup your own hosting environment if by some chance you do not know how. If you happen to have some Linux experience most of this will be a breeze. If you don’t, put on your safari hat and khaki pants because you’re about to go on an adventure. Ok then, lets get started.
Warnings
There are a few warnings that I want to get out of the way before we get started:
- The free usage tier does have some requirements that you must meet. If you do not meet those requirements or you use more than allowed you will be charged.
- EC2 by default uses dynamic IP addresses. This means that each time you restart your instance the IP address changes. Static IP addresses are available but they do cost a small amount of money.
- EC2 disk storage by default is volatile. This means that when the instance is shut down either accidentally, by Amazon, or purposefully, any data being stored on it will disappear forever. There are backup mechanisms and ways of creating persistant storage but they cost money and require more advanced administration than will be covered in this article.
- A micro instance is Amazon’s smallest instance in terms of CPU, memory, and disk space. It is more than adequate for testing, most personal websites, and probably most small business websites. If it ends up not being enough to fulfill your particular requirements a larger instance that costs money would be needed.
- We are not responsible for any fees you may incur or havoc you may cause.
Step One: Setup your AWS account.
- Go to http://aws.amazon.com/ and click the button on the right side of the screen that says “Sign Up Now”.
- If you already have an Amazon account you can login using your current credentials. If not, choose “I am a new user” and click the sign in button to create a new account. You will go through a typical account creation process that should be pretty self explanatory.
- They will ask you for billing information. You will have to enter this information in order to create your free web hosting virtual server. The reason for this is in case you happen to use more than what is allowed for the free tier or use any additional services that do happen to have a fee associated with them.
- After you go through a verification process, I recommend the phone verification method, it will generally take a couple of minutes before you receive an account activation email. Once you receive the email you can go to http://aws.amazon.com/account/ and begin managing your account. Now the real fun begins.
Step Two: Navigate Your Way To The Management Console
- First, make sure you are at http://aws.amazon.com/account/.
- Click on the “Manage Your Account” link. It’s the bottom option on the left. You will probably be asked to login which you can now do using your current Amazon account or the one you just created. From this point forward if you are asked to login again, do it.
- You should now be at the “Manage Your Account” screen and there should be quite a few options shown under “Services You’re Signed Up For”. Ignore all of that and go to the “My Account / Console” drop down on the top right side of the screen and select “AWS Management Console”. Alternatively you can just click here, which we could have done at the beginning of this section but I wanted you to see the “normal” way of getting there. Once all is said and done you should see something resembling this:
Step Three: Firing Up Your Instance
- In the EC2 world your servers are called “instances.” You should currently be at the “AWS Management Console“. On the top there are multiple tabs. The one we are interested in is labeled EC2. Click it.
- Since this is a new account you should see a little message telling you that you have no running instances followed by a button that says “Launch Instance”. Click that button.
- From the “Request Instance Wizard” choose either “Basic 32-bit Amazon Linux AMI…” or “”Basic 64-bit Amazon Linux AMI…”
- Make sure you have 1 in the “Number of Instances” box and that “Micro…” is selected from the “Instance Type” drop down. You can choose a particular “Availability Zone” if you want but for now it’s easier to just leave it set as “No Preference”. Click the “Continue” button.
- Leave everything set to the defaults and click the “Continue” button again.
- To the right of “Name” enter a name for your instance. You can leave this blank but if you ever decide to startup more instances this is a handy way to keep track of them.
- Now things get tricky, you need to create a key pair in order to securely log into your server. You can also use this key pair for other future servers that you may launch in the future. Enter a meaningful name and click “Create & Download your key pair”. Save it to a place where you will not forget it and make sure you keep it secure. If someone has this key they can log into your instance and do bad things. I’ll leave the actual act of securing the key as an exercise for the reader. For now, lets keep moving and click the “Continue” button.
- A security group is a set of firewall rules for your instance. In our case we want port 22 for SSH and port 80 for HTTP opened up. Port 22 should already be in the set of existing rules that are shown in the blue box:
  
  To add HTTP select “HTTP” from the “Create a new rule” drop down box and then click the “Add Rule” button. Now we can login via SSH and view web pages over port 80. Click the “Continue” button.
- You should now see a confirmation window that shows all of the settings for your shiny new instance. Click the “Launch” button and then click the “Close” button when the next window shows up.
- After being in the “pending” state with a yellow light for a few seconds your instance will eventually show up as being in the “running” state with a green light:
  
  Green light means go, so lets go!
Step Four: Logging Into Your Instance
- Now you have a running EC2 micro instance that should qualify for the free tier of services. Remember though, if you use above and beyond the free usage tier, you will be charged for those services and amounts that do go above. It isn’t much though, so even if you do get charged it’s not too bad.
- Click on your instance in the management console and the bottom of your browser should show some important information about your instance. Find the value labeled “Public DNS”. This is the external hostname of your instance and you will need this to login.
- As stated in the warnings, your instance has a dynamic IP address by default. You can add an “Elastic IP” to make it static but it does cost a small amount of money. There is an “Elastic IP’s” menu option under “Navigation” should you want to play around with this feature.
- Remember that key you downloaded? You’re going to need it now. Depending on whether or not you are on Mac, Windows, or Linux the application you use to login will be different. For Mac and Linux you will probably use SSH and it is probably already installed. If you are on Windows I recommend using PuTTY. For PuTTY on Windows checkout this tutorial on how to setup PuTTY using the EC2 key you downloaded. For SSH simply issue the following command using the path to your key and the IP address or external hostname of your instance: ssh -i PATH-TO-KEY ec2-user@IP-OR-HOSTNAME
- Beyond what I just wrote I’m going to leave figuring out how to login to your EC2 instance up to the reader. There is a lot of information on the Internet about how to do just that. When you do successfully login you should see something like this:
Step Five: Setting Up Your Instance
- I’m assuming that at this point you have successfully logged into your instance. Now we are going to install some basic software for hosting a basic website using the LAMP (Linux/Apache/MySQL/PHP) stack.
- From the command line issue the following command: sudo yum -y update; sudo yum -y install httpd php mysql mysql-server This will update the software on your instance and install the basic LAMP stack.
- From the command line issue the following command: sudo /etc/init.d/httpd start; sudo /etc/init.d/mysqld start This will start up the MySQL database and the Apache web server.
- From the command line issue the following command: sudo chkconfig –level 2 httpd on; sudo chkconfig –level 3 httpd on; sudo chkconfig –level 4 httpd on; sudo chkconfig –level 5 httpd on; sudo chkconfig –level 2 mysqld on; sudo chkconfig –level 3 mysqld on; sudo chkconfig –level 4 mysqld on; sudo chkconfig –level 5 mysqld on This will make it so that your web server and database will restart after a reboot.
Now you have an EC2 micro instance running the LAMP stack. Find the external hostname for your instance, enter it into a web browser, and you should see the Apache welcome screen with basic instructions on what you can do next:

You can install WordPress, Drupal, or almost any other PHP based application. Step Six: Setting Up DNS Via Name.com
- Log into your Name.com account and navigate to the DNS management section for the domain you would like to point to your instance.
- The easiest thing to do is simply create a CNAME record for *.YOURDOMAIN.TLD and just YOURDOMAIN.TLD. Under the “Record Answer” section put the external hostname of your instance for both CNAME records.
- Alternatively you can ping the external hostname, get it’s IP address, and create A records using the IP address as your “Record Answer”. You would want to do this if you have other records on that domain such as MX records for email.
- Properly setup DNS using CNAMEs will look like this under DNS management:
- Once your DNS is setup and propagated (usually within 5 – 10 minutes) you will be able to get to your webpage and instance via your domain.
Bonus Stuff
- Want to make it so that you never have to go through all of that again when creating a web hosting instance? Right click on your instance in the AWS Management console and select the “Create Image…” option. This will put it under your “IMAGES” -> “AMI’s” section of the “Navigation” menu. In the future you can simply right click on the image and select “Launch Instance”. If the content of your site rarely changes this could work well for your backup solution. The image will use storage space at Amazon and may incur some nominal fees.
- As we already mentioned the storage on a default instance is volatile. You can use the “Elastic Block Storage” service to create persistant storage. I won’t go into details here but searching for “how to create and mount elastic block storage” on Google will yield all sorts of how to results. You will need to remap your Apache and MySQL configurations as well in order to make that data persistent but for a real world server you will probably want to do just that. The additional storage does have a price but it is more than reasonable.
- If you need to know more remember that Google is your friend.
If we get some requests from you all and these sorts of posts seem popular we may do future articles on how to install various applications and do more using your instance. Should Name.com offer easy one click EC2 instance setup for various web services? Let us know!
January 09, 2012
23:17
The Importance of Focus: Small Business Leadership Series
» ‎ The Official Name.com Blog

Whether you’re a small business owner, individual, or an entire company, one of your biggest enemies may be multi-tasking. I’m not talking about the fire hydrant you took out last week while driving and trying to check your email and talking on your cell phone…that’s just insanity. What I’m talking about is the much simpler idea of focus–of taking one idea and moving it forward, intentionally, wholeheartedly, and very consciously at the expense of all others–and it’s exact opposite, multi-tasking.

To get an idea of just how big of a problem this is for you or your company, count how many projects you’re working on right now. Add them up… how many did you get? 5, 10, 20, 50? Usually I range anywhere from 5 to 15 individually, and as a company I would say we’re usually anywhere from 100 to 250.

So why is it a problem? Well, there are really two issues. One is the quantitative fact that it makes every single project take longer. The second, is that it allows people to hide failure, roadblocks and missed deadlines.

Steve Jobs Felt Your Pain

Issue #1: Every project takes longer
So here’s what it looks like if you focus on one project at a time:

Here’s what it looks like if you “multi-task” and try to do it all at once.

The more you switch back and forth, the worse the numbers: more and more switching time and the first two tasks finish later and later. This isn’t to say you lock yourself in a room (I’ll leave whether it’s padded up to you), crush your cellphone, and maniacally focus on one task… that’s unreasonable. All we’re getting at is there is a cost to switching back and forth between projects in terms of both wasted time and later finish dates.
Issue #2: It allows people to hide failure, roadblocks and missed deadlines
If you only have one project, then when you run into issues with that one project you have no choice but to deal with the issues. On the other hand, if you have two projects, then you can just move to the second project. That’s great news for efficiency because now there’s no “down time,” but increase the number of projects to 3, 4, 5…and I think you see the problem.

So why do we let this happen? It’s easy. Rather than do the hard work of actually fixing roadblocks and completing projects, you can just start another! Eventually, you have so many projects being “worked on” that it’s hard to keep track of what is stalled, what is moving smoothly, what is on time and what is late. Great if you’re someone looking for the path of least resistance, but a nightmare if you are an individual with a to do list or a company trying to meet deadlines!

The bottom line is that it takes discipline and focus to pick one project and see it through to the end.

What about you or your company? How many projects do you have going at once? Let us know below!
January 06, 2012
4:43
ICANN Rep Coming to Denver to Discuss Controversial Change to the Internet
» ‎ The Official Name.com Blog

Name.com to Host Denver Press Club Conference Friday, January 6, 2011 at 10 a.m.

On January 12, one of the biggest changes in the history of the Internet will begin to unfold, one that will change the way 2-billion Internet users think of online addresses…and the way that some Colorado organizations and businesses will brand and identify themselves in cyberspace.

On that date, ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers), the non-profit charged with coordinating the global Internet addressing system, will begin taking applications for new Internet address endings. Currently there are 22 generic top-level domains, like the familiar .COM, .NET, .GOV, etc. Under a new and extremely controversial ICANN program, that number will expand to include just about any word, in just about any language. Organizations can submit applications for names like .COKE, .ROLEX, .NYC, etc.

For some, the change marks a global branding opportunity, for others it translates into a trademark and intellectual property protection problem. It has become one of the most hotly debated subjects in the Internet’s history, attracting the attention of the U.S. Senate Commerce Committee which recently held hearings, and the House Subcommittee on Communications and Technology which held hearings last week.

The story is attracting the attention of global news outlets:

* National Journal * Washington Post * Reuters * BBC * Associated Press

Now we can discuss how it could impact you.

One week before the application window for this new program opens, Denver domain registrar Name.com will host Brad White, ICANN’s Director of Global Media Affairs, to answer local journalists’ questions about this new and controversial program. Please join Mr. White, local media and Internet organizations on Friday, January 6^th for a news conference at 10AM. We’ll be in the Denver Press Club at 1330 Glenarm place, third floor banquet room.

Name.com is a cool, customer-focused domain registrar that provides domains, websites, security and SEO to a growing global audience. Name is located in Cherry Creek at 2500 E. 2^nd Avenue. We have a kegerator. If you’re interested in attending, please email Jared [at] name.com.

Twitter.com/namedotcom Facebook.com/namedotcom Youtube.com/namedotcom Blog.name.com
2:30
Pro Tip: How to get rid of that pesky parking page.
» ‎ The Official Name.com Blog
When you register a domain with Name.com it automatically gets pointed to an ad supported parking page. The reason for this is simple: we make more money. In a business with margins as thin as they are in domain registration we look for additional revenue wherever we can find it as long as it makes sense to do so and it does not run afoul of best practices in our industry. Running DNS services for hundreds of thousands of domains is also not a cheap thing to do. The infrastructure costs no small amount of money and neither does the administrators time when dealing with DDOS attacks and general maintenance issues. I promise we are not trying to be shady, we have been running ad-supported parking pages forever. It is standard practice in the registrar world, and it is spelled out in our TOS. Now that we got the business reasons for this practice out of the way let me explain to you how one can go about removing this “feature”.

This all happens because of wildcard DNS records on our name servers that we have set up for the various TLDs we support. If a domain is using our name servers and a given host does not have a record setup for it, it will resolve to our parking page. There are several ways to get rid of this behavior:
1. Remove the name.com name servers from your domain if the TLD allows zero name servers, which most do. This will effectively remove the domain from the root DNS zone and the domain will no longer resolve at all. This will also disable all services on the domain such as email, URL forwarding, etc so this may not be an option for you.
2. Use someone else’s name servers. You are not required to use name.com name servers. There are many third party DNS providers on the Internet and you can also run and operate your own name servers as well. This requires a bit of know how but if you have it this is an option for you. Going this route may also not allow you to use all DNS related name.com services such as URL forwarding, etc.
3. Setup a wildcard record for your domain. This method is probably the one that will work best for most of you. In the DNS management section for your domain, simply setup an A record for *.YOURDOMAIN.TLD and point it to one of your IP addresses. This is good practice anyhow since it will direct traffic to your website when someone mistypes “www” or some other subdomain that you operate. I’m assuming that you already have YOURDOMAIN.TLD pointed as well. If not, create an A record for only YOURDOMAIN.TLD as well so that when someone goes to just your domain they get to your website.Here is a screenshot of a domain properly setup that will no longer resolve to our parking page (click on it to make it bigger):
  
  If you are wanting subdomains to not resolve at all and would like an NXDOMAIN response from DNS, you will need to use one of the first two methods for getting rid of the parking page.
  
  There is also more information regarding this available on our support FAQ.
January 05, 2012
1:50
Ask a Name.com DEVELOPER…
» ‎ The Official Name.com Blog
It’s a new year and I’ve decided to create a new type of blog post segment titled “Ask a Name.com EMPLOYEE…”, where EMPLOYEE will change based on who our fine customers want to ask questions of next! See the bottom of this post for the rules. Each of these kinds of posts will have a prize for the best question asked, as judged by our staff of highly skilled best question picker outers. The prize this time around? Read on and you will find out soon enough.

Today we will be featuring Pat Ramsey, aka pFro, aka pFro Fo Sho, aka Pat “The Man With A Plan” Ramsey:

From the mean streets of Maine, pFro grew up with a love of snow that seems to know no bounds. He enjoys shredding the stuff pretty much every single weekend, sometimes twice. It’s a good thing he moved to Colorado where some of the best skiing in the US, and perhaps the world, is just a hop, skip, and a slow agonizing traversal up the automotive gauntlet known as I-70 away. Give this man a pint of ale, a freshly powdered hill, strap some fatty boards to his feet and he’s in heaven.

Aside from cutting up the slopes Pat is also equally adept at cutting up some code. PHP and Javascript are his mainstay when he’s deep in the bowels of the Name.com trenches but he also likes to dabble with Android development, Nodejs, and cutting edge CSS3 magic. So without further ado, ask away. And ladies, before you ask, the answer is yes, the man is single and his smooth deep voice is like steamed milk and honey on a cold winter’s day.

THE RULES:
- Ask your questions in a comment to this post.
- Make sure you check out our about us page and let us know who you want to ask questions of next.
- Not really a rule but you should probably tweet this out to your peeps so that they can get in on the fun.
- Play nice.
THE PRIZE:
- A custom video with Pat himself speaking a message of your choice, within reason of course, in his sweet summery baratone voice.
Like what you see and wish you could work for a company this mind blowingly awesome? Check out our careers page!
January 03, 2012
10:43
hello world
» ‎ The Official Name.com Blog

We are about to do three things that should make you happy:

1- Make the site much, much easier to use. We’re systematically going through the site page by page, click by click, and making it simpler. You deserve that.

2- Give our current customers lots of new friends, so they can look back and say that all the new guys are just “jumping on the bandwagon” and that “we were customers of Name.com before everyone knew about them.” Hey, it’s cool to be first. We’re going to help make sure the whole world knows how cool you are.

3- Help you. We work hard to make sure we have what you need, but this year we’re taking it to the next level. From video tutorials and guides on every page to educational blog content to 24 hour support (this will be the last half of the year… takes a while to staff!), this is going to be a banner year… for both of us.

That’s why the title of this blog post is “hello world.” In much the same way that those words marked the start of something great, something that would eventually change not only the world but the way we live our daily lives… this year is the start. The start of Name.com making the internet even easier, the start of getting the word out about our legendary support, the start of Name.com as a household name… the start of something great.

hello world… here we come.
January 01, 2012
20:32
January Promotions
» ‎ The Official Name.com Blog

Happy New Year from Name.com!

Use the promotional code, ‘NEW‘ for $9.25 COM/NET registrations & renewals.

Cheers to a new year and a new you!