Other recent ccTLD sales include Südtirol.eu for $14,355 and Möbel.eu for $13,195. The names mean “Tyrol” and “furniture” in German respectively. Tyrol is a state in Austria.

Introducing IDNs was a great move for the .eu registry. A lot of the top sales on that extension as of late have been IDNs. Expect to see many more domain sales as other extensions adopt the new system.

The city has an urban area of 11.6 million people, more than many countries with their own ccTLDs. According to the campaign:

The Paris metropolitan area could substantially benefit from the availability of domain names under a dedicated .paris TLD. For instance, .paris domain names could demonstrate a sense of belonging to the metropolis. They could also contribute to the localization of services. And they may additionaly increase the profile of companies or brands associating their name to that of Paris.

Paris will likely be able to submit its application for the extension late next year.

Source | Domain News
Photo | leilahh

A pair of French insurance domains, Assurancevie.com and Assurance-vie.com, also sold together for £53,024 ($87,000 USD). “Assurancevie” means “life insurance,” which makes sense considering they sold for an amount that could be a life savings for some.

Engagement-rings.co.uk sold for £7,000 ($11,486 USD). No doubt this was in part influenced by the recent sale of DiamondRings.com for £141,589.

Source: Domain Name Wire

The action came as a shock because private websites are not usually targeted by authorities. SnowTigers had more than 250,000 members, many of whom supported the site financially. The BitTorrent portal mostly offered music and movies.

BitTorrent is a popular method of content distribution. Sites like SnowTigers don’t actually host pirated material, but host what’s called a torrent file. Just a few kilobytes in the size, the file connects the downloader to other BitTorrent users with the same piece of content. Opening up the file in a BitTorrent client links them to these file sharers.

Multiple downloaders are needed, and at least one of them, known as a seeder, must have the entire file downloaded. The group will them anonymously exchange bits and pieces of the content. The downloader’s client will automatically assemble these pieces into the finished product. Popular torrents will often have thousands of downloaders and hundreds of seeders.

This method allows you to essentially download the beginning, middle, and end of a file all at the same time rather than be limited to starting from the beginning and slowly working your way to the end.

BitTorrent’s speed and anonymous nature have made it the most popular file transfer protocol for pirates, but in recent years governments have severely cracked down on torrent portals.

In April, the owners of the world’s largest torrent site, The Pirate Bay, were sentenced to one year in prison for facilitating copyright infringement. They also collectively received a £80,000 fine. The site is still up and running, however.

Source: ZeroPaid
Photo: Flickr