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Today, Richard Branson announced on his blog that he was holding a contest, where entrepreneurs can submit a 2 minute video pitching their idea, and every month he will select 5 winners who will have their video presented on Virgin Atlantic flights where it can be seen not by Richard, but by all those who fly on the airlines, including many successful businessmen.

Cool idea, only problem is from the domaining side, pitch.tv is a domain reserved by the .TV registry (although its going to a parked page) and pitchtv.com is owned by PitchTv, Inc. located in New York and seems unrelated to Mr. Branson or Virgin.

Of course if the owners of PitchTv.com has a site up, they could get the benefit of the extra traffic this campaign might generate, but the site seems dead.

Here is the official word from his blog:

“””When I was starting out, I wish I could have had the chance to pitch my business ideas directly to people who could help make my ambitions a reality. We can now make that happen for you, on this very blog…!

If you’re a budding entrepreneur, we’re giving you the unique opportunity of getting your ideas heard not only by the online community here but also by top business professionals from around the world watching the in-flight entertainment on board Virgin Atlantic planes.

All you have to do is film yourself delivering the very best pitch possible, but make sure it’s no longer than 2 minutes. Then simply upload your video pitch here.

The community here will then vote for the best ones, and every month the best 5 pitches will make it on to my new PitchTV show which will premiere on board Virgin Atlantic flights.

We’ll also upload each monthly episode of PitchTV here shortly after. Viewers will be able to get in contact with the chosen entrepreneurs and who knows – among the viewers might be someone with the power to bring your idea to life…

Each year, I will also personally select my favourite pitch, and the winner will receive a very special prize which I’ll reveal more details about later on…

In the meantime, get your 2 minute pitches together, film them, upload them and may the best pitches get the exposure they deserve!”””

Rob Monster made quite an impact in the domain industry when he started Monster Venture Partners, a venture capital firm that backed more than 20 early-stage companies – many of which were based on high quality domain names such as Alerts.com, HealthCare.com, and Complaints.com. But now, two years later, MVP’s Bellevue office has shut down and Monster has started a new web 3.0 firm, Epik.

During his two years in the venture game, Monster spent $7 million of his personal funds to help a wide range of startups get going. But in the end, the economic environment caused the investment market to change dramatically and contributed to the fall of MVP.

“MVP’s model was to fund the seed and early stage — what I call ‘North of an angel, South of a VC,’” Monster told TechFlash in an email. “Investor appetite for this asset class largely disappeared during Q4 2008. With capital markets still relatively frozen so far in 2009, the prospects were limited for raising our first outside fund to supplement what to date had been personal capital.”

The firm had planned to raise up to $40 million, which clearly didn’t happen. But thankfully, most of the companies MVP invested in either transitioned to being self-sustainable businesses or raised capital from other sources.

Now, at the age of 40, Monster is ready to move on and is busy creating a new “Web 3.0 media company” called Epik. Through email correspondence with Domain Name News, Monster outlined the purpose of Epik as well as the company’s plans:

“Epik is building out what I describe as a platform for the User-centric Semantic Web. In the first phase, we are combining a solution for portable identity (Identity.net) with a network of descriptive domain names that are intelligently cross-linked using a proprietary content management system that dynamically adjusts the user experience in a way that is user-aware. You might describe this as a Web 3.0 platform.

To better appreciate a Web 3.0 content network, imagine a future state where a site knows a little but more about you and can now dynamically adapt the user experience to your preferences, even if you choose to be anonymous. This is where the web gets personal…Epik, by leveraging the Identity.net back-end, seeks to create a more seamless web which leaves the user control of who knows what about them, while also making it more intuitive to navigate content using direct navigation.

Domains are a key part of the vision of the Web 3.0 network we are pursuing – and as more and more traffic moves from the laptop to personal mobile devices (like the iPhone), there is an opportunity for direct navigation to make a triumphant return.”

Monster’s journey to this point was an interesting one. In 2007 he started out with practically no knowledge of the domain world except from buying company domains for his previous company, Global Market Insite (GMI). In June 2007 he pursued some domain-related ventures including working with Matias de Tezanos on HealthCare.com for 18 months. He then became an investor and partner in Internet Real Estate Group and had the opportunity to work with Andy Miller and Mike Zapolin. These ventures showed Monster that significant value could be created by taking an undeveloped domain and turning it into an operating business.

During 2008, Monster became more aware of search engine optimization strategies and applied this knowledge to Patents.com and Complaints.com, using Google to establish significant organic traffic. He also invested in EVOLanding and SharedReviews.com, watching both mature into popular sites and credible businesses. All of this knowledge has influenced the vision for Epik, and Monster’s plans to establish partnerships and use technologies to take the Web to the next level.

“The opportunity for domainers is to align their best domains with this emerging user-centric semantic web in a way that delivers aligned incentives, whether through shared ownership or shared revenue,” Monster said in an email to DNN. “Epik will also work very hard to prevent redundant domains from being included in the network [such as Hobbies.com and Hobby.com]. So in effect, domains will occupy de facto exclusive status within the Epik network. Domains in the network can be either ‘hub’ domains such as WiFi.com or “spoke” domains such as BostonWifi.com. There is value in both domains – the construct of a hierarchical semantic map of domains is a significant part of the content management system we are building in order to power a scalable content network that injects new relevance for domains, and offers a new economic model for the people who own them.”

Although it’s unfortunate to see Monster Venture Partners come to a close, the future of Epik.com certainly holds a lot of promise within the domain industry. The company controls some very impressive domain names and is leaps ahead of others in empowering the use of direct navigation.

[via TechFlash]

(c) 2009 DomainNameNews.com

Upcoming Domain Industry Events, Conferences & Auctions

Google announced today on it’s company blog that is was launching a $100 Million venture capital fund, “to support innovation and encourage promising new technology companies.”

The fund will be run by managing partners William Maris, a former entrepreneur, and Rich Miner, a former executive in its mobile unit.

The partners said there would be very few companies within the fund’s core sectors that would be off limits for consideration. Miner said the partners have been given a green light to invest in technology that is competitive and potentially disruptive to Google’s core search advertising business.

Maris said the fund would be governed by Google’s “Don’t be evil” motto. The partners will also limit their investments to U.S.-based start-ups to make sure they were close at hand to help build the companies.

“We have huge number of people, many of whom have PhDs, who can help evaluate companies and perform due diligence,” said Miner. “That’s a key asset we have.”

But he stressed there would be a “one-way mirror” between the fund and Google, which would allow start-ups to benefit from Google’s expertise without concern about the security of their intellectual property.

The fund has already invested in two start-ups, including Silver Spring Networks, a company that uses technology to improve the efficiency of power grids, and has also offered a term sheet to a third.

Here is the announcement:

“”””Today we’re excited to announce Google Ventures, Google’s new venture capital fund. This is Google’s effort to take advantage of our resources to support innovation and encourage promising new technology companies. By borrowing the best practices of top-tier, financially focused venture capital firms and bringing to bear Google’s unique technical expertise and brand, we think we can find young companies with truly awesome potential and encourage their development into successful businesses.

At its core, Google Ventures is charged with finding and helping to develop exceptional start-ups. We’ll be focusing on early stage investments across a diverse range of industries, including consumer Internet, software, clean-tech, bio-tech, health care and, no doubt, other areas we haven’t thought of yet. Central to our effort will be our fellow Googlers, whom we view as a critically important resource to help educate us about potential investments areas and evaluate specific companies.

Economically, times are tough, but great ideas come when they will. If anything, we think the current downturn is an ideal time to invest in nascent companies that have the chance to be the “next big thing,” and we’ll be working hard to find them. If you think you have the next big idea, or if you just want to to learn more, please see our website at www.google.com/ventures””””

I watched the whole auction that took place via Aftermarket.com / DomainTools.com for the Domain Madness auction presented by DomainConsultant.com and was pretty impressed!
I am glad DC added in the video feed / Chat as I think it really added to the auction. Now was it perfect? No. Miguel had a cold and was sniffling [...]

There has been some decent discussion about the value of Mini-Sites on a recent post at Domain Name Wire however I really want to challenge all the mini-site providers to step up to the game.

First, I want to say I commend all those who are providing mini-sites to people.

Basically, kudos for doing something while others do nothing however is the product actually worth the money?  Some people agree with me, others don’t and some never say a word. Let’s get this straight – for the record I do not really care what anybody thinks personally about my opinions but I do care about the industry and how we look to end users, new investors and main street.

In 1999 I purchased some html software (hotdog) and started learning FrontPage and basically learned within a couple weeks all the code one would ever need to make what people are calling mini-sites today.  It’s not hard and no one is reinventing the wheel with these products. Granted, my knowledge of programming, online marketing and development is probably far greater then many however it doesn’t mean we will not take advantage of new offerings in this industry even in the most basic formats such as mini-sites, if they are worthwhile.

There are many sides to the Mini-Site product.

Some say there are useless, others say they generate millions from having 1,000’s of these sites while others claim it’s a worthy investment for newbies.

Where am I?

First and foremost I believe they are sort of useless in their current formats but instead of ranting about why lets use facts

Most mini-sites look the same – AEIOU’s designs (are they not all the same … why not just copy the source code and insert your own images)

Original content – if produced in mass volumes how original can all the content be coming from the same writers?  Believe me when I say Google penalizes for duplicate content across sites and although I’m certainly not claiming that anyone is not providing original content I do know the same 5 or 10 people who write content will eventually have things overlap. Domain owners need to write their own content – by doing so, you learn more about the industry and in turn, empower yourself as a domain owner even more.

Gateway to Laziness – I’ve said this a few times about mini-sites.  Domain owners many times look at now what’s become a semi-pretty site and move on to the next since why would Google not want to rank your site high – After all, it looks so good.  Have 500 domains … time to get moving and that mini-site that was put up yesterday will more often than not stay that way.

Enough points about what’s wrong.  Just as people continue to pay $35 at network solutions for a domain people will still buy these mini-sites day after day so again, kudos to those who have the patience and dedication to provide such a product (and deal with customer service for margins so low – percentage wise they may be high but believe me how many designers will tell you working with clients that want to pay $200 is far worse than dealing with someone who pays you $5,000)

Now, For the challenge to mini-site providers

Do not take these words as offensive as the point is far greater than a simple criticism of your efforts to provide a product to domain owners but a challenge, an opportunity and an experienced opnion on how you can become better than all the rest overnight.

Why not step up to the plate and provide template(s) that empower the domain owners to build out networks for their industry targeted domains, provide widget power to help owners add functionality as they go or even forgo the html templates so commonly associated with mini-sites for custom wordpress themes where the owner has the power.

You see – a business plan for all the mini-site providers is the same across the board from what I see.  Sell as many as you can for the one time fee and maybe hook a few clients for SEO marketing upon completion.

Hold up …. SEO tools are 10 times better with templates that offer plug-in compatibility and are poised to grow with the web so isn’t your business model failing even the simple fact of giving your clients a better product to prove your own SEO skills with.

It’s almost like the gold was seen by calculating the number of sites one could do in a week multiplied by how many clients and that’s it – that’s the plan.

SO much opportunity exists in the mini-site arena but the products need to exist.  In a world of widgets, plug-ins and templates there should be an incredible product for domain owners born within a week of someone taking this article seriously and not focus on defending the mini-site industry in its current form.

Again, I’m for people doing well but also want product offerings to become representative of today’s tools – not new ones that are simply duplicates of work provided by others.  In fact, why would you as a company owner want that?  You can do more and you know it.

The best wordpress themes cost $300 max.

Custom designs range from $1,500 to $5,000 or more but these are end-user costs.  Providers can build this for free and shit, built the greatest templates for SEO and mini-site building and charge the same mini-site fee ($2 or $300) – your money will still be tenfold of that one time customer who buys a custom theme.

Staying power is for those companies that build for the future not build for a few dollars today.

So, its not criticism here but a challenge – a challenge to providers to build products of value which use the tools of today and represent the power to expand tomorrow.

It would be great to hear from domain owners and mini-site providers about this since I truly want our generation of domainers to look less like spam and empower domain owners everywhere to have the tools to build businesses, not just a website.

Thoughts, criticism and even the odd curse is always welcome

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