Random Snapshot of the NNNNN.com Landscape

Post-buyout, it is interesting to look at what the NNNNN.com landscape looks like. This is hopefully the first of many random samplings of the NNNNN.com's to see whether they are developed sites and what types of sites they are and who owns them. This is a very crude analysis, I just looked quickly to see whether it was an Chinese site, Marchex site, or parked, and if there was no site or parked, I made a brief survey of who the owner was (if there was any Asian-sounding name, I just marked it as Chinese, with no intent to offend anybody just to get a quick survey). Here is the results from looking at 102 randomly generated 5-digit numbers:

50 are Marchex zip code sites
12 have no sites but Chinese owners (it appears)
8 are parked sites with Chinese owners (it appears)
8 are parked sites with unknown owners (I couldn't find them using a quick whois lookup)
8 have been deleted and are available
7 are parked sites with US owners (it appears)
5 have developed Chinese sites (it appears)
2 have no sites but have US owners (it appears)
1 is a parked site with a Japanese owner
1 is pending delete

Although the sample has a significant margin of error, it seems to comport with previous random samples in terms of the number of Marchex sites, and it comports with the recent random samplings suggesting that about 10% of NNNNN.com's are available, whereas before the buyout in February, 2008, about 20% of NNNNN.com's are available. Of non-Marchex sites, 26 have Asian owners, 9 have US owners, and 8 have unknown owners. Not surprisingly, all the non-Marchex developed sites are Chinese.

Here is the list of sites from the random sample:

02293		Marchex
03085		Deleted
03161		Parked - US Owner
04073		Marchex
07983		Marchex
09909		No Site - Chinese Owner
10377		Parked - US Owner
11189		Parked - Chinese Owner
13104		Marchex
13853		Parked - Chinese Owner
14949		Parked - Unknown Owner
15377		Marchex
15479		Marchex
16054		Marchex
18241		Marchex
19397		Marchex
19421		Marchex
19486		Marchex
19710		Marchex
21771		Parked - US Owner
21934		Deleted
22699		No Site - Chinese Owner
23363		No Site - Chinese Owner
26474		Parked - Chinese Owner
26673		Parked - Chinese Owner
28490		Parked - Chinese Owner
29295		Parked - Unknown Owner
29379		Marchex
30929		Parked - Chinese Owner
31647		Marchex
31703		Marchex
32234		Marchex
33603		Parked - US Owner
33654		No Site - Chinese Owner
33718		No Site - US Owner
34005		Marchex
35871		No Site - Chinese Owner
36072		Marchex
36153		No Site - Chinese Owner
37631		No Site - Chinese Owner
37663		Marchex
40356		Marchex
41001		Marchex
42754		Marchex
44602		Parked - Unknown Owner
46460		No Site - Chinese Owner
46864		Marchex
47016		Marchex
47124		Marchex
48622		Marchex
49323		Parked - US Owner
50006		Marchex
51659		Parked - US Owner
52485		Deleted
53451		Deleted
54570		Deleted
54690		Parked - Unknown Owner
55251		Parked - Japanese Owner
56093		Marchex
56152		Marchex
56175		Marchex
56412		Chinese Site
56503		No Site - Chinese Owner
56691		Parked - Chinese Owner
57433		Marchex
58090		Parked - Chinese Owner
58140		Deleted
58310		Marchex
58781		Marchex
59826		Marchex
60082		Marchex
61104		Parked - US Owner
61415		Marchex
69310		Parked - Unknown Owner
69580		Chinese Site
70821		Chinese Site
71387		Parked - Unknown Owner
71474		Marchex
71706		No Site - Chinese Owner
72328		Marchex
72348		Marchex
72456		Marchex
72856		Marchex
73082		Marchex
73102		Marchex
76033		Marchex
76494		Deleted
76894		Deleted
79587		Parked - Unknown Owner
84649		Marchex
85904		No Site - US Owner
86507		Marchex
87837		No Site - Chinese Owner
88679		Pending Delete
88747		Chinese Site
91219		No Site - Chinese Owner
92311		Marchex
92664		Parked - Unknown Owner
95866		Marchex
96982		Chinese Site
98830		Marchex
99512		Marchex

NNNNN.com Renewals Update

I have done some random sampling of available NNNNN.com's and it looks like my predictions that about 1/2 of NNNNN.com's bought in the buyout last year would be renewed was accurate. After looking at 5 samples of 500 random NNNNN.com's, the result was that 9.6% were unregistered. The margin of error in this sampling is 1.94.

Not surprisingly, NNNNN.com's that start with "0" had the highest percentage unregistered. I did 3 samples of 500 random NNNNN.com's starting with 0, and the result was that 16.5% were unregistered. The margin of error here is 2.33.

As of the end of January 2008, there were 19,346 NNNNN.com's unregistered. Now it appears there are only around 10,000. If anyone is looking for signs of long-term strength in the NNNNN.com market, I think this is a pretty good one. Despite a severe recession and the collapse of the buyout, many people still seem to understand the value in these domains. It is still to early to tell whether registrations of NNNNN.com's are going to continue to move in a positive direction, but this news should be somewhat encouraging to those who are holding for the long-term.

Some recent NNNN.com sales on Sedo

9280.com
$5,000
5/5/09

8220.com
$1,050
5/5/09

8370.com
$510
5/5/09

80 MILLION .com domains!

As of today, there are 80,055,109 .com domains registered!

Source: domaintools

Interesting Numeric Auction Results

On 2/10/09 the following auctions closed at Sedo

22.com $100,000
34000.com 170 EUR (USD $219)
46000.com 110 EUR (USD $142)

I was surprised that 22.com ended so low, that is an awesome domain and I have seen NNN.com's go for $XXX,XXX so it was surprising that nobody with more cash showed up, probably a result of the general economy. If I had $100k to throw around, I would love to have bought that domain. Also, the other sales were surprising for how high they went, both attracted multiple bids. I don't think I have seen NNNNN.com ending in 000 go for so much.

Organic NNNNN.com's?

Apparently, PLU codes can be used to distinguished between organic and genetically modified products (i.e., according to Wikipedia, the code for organic yellow bananas is 94011). According to Vision Magazine:

Conventionally grown produce has a four-digit PLU that begins with three or four. Organically grown produce has a five-digit PLU that begins with nine. Genetically modified produce has a five-digit PLU that begins with eight.

Now, I haven't yet heard of an organic produce company advertising this with a five-digit numeric domain name, but it might be a great idea for one to do so!

Some Interesting Numeric Auctions

Sedo currently has some exciting numerics on auction. 22.com has 5 days left and is currently at $72,000. Also, 34000.com and 46000.com are both up to 70 EUR with 5 days left as well. These auctions will be interesting to watch to see how premium NN.com and NNNNN.com's are faring in a bad domain market. 11.com sold for $188,889 last year in a private sale, but 22.com could surpass that on auction, and perhaps in a significant way. We'll be watching!