The DOMAINfest Global conference closed its three-day run at the Renaissance Hotel in Hollywood, California last night (Wed. Jan. 23). Final day highlights included a second

SnapNames Live domain auction that yielded over $2.3 million in sales. Coupled with more than $817,000 in sales in the first auction Tuesday, the live twinbill produced over $3.1 million in sales. The auction caught the attention of the Los Angeles Times who published a very positive article (free subscription sign-up required to read) about the event and the industry morning. The story's headline was not so positive, but keep in mind that newspaper headlines are written by an editor with the intent to grab attention. The writer rarely even knows what the headline will be. In this case author Joseph Menn wrote an unbiased and informative piece that will be syndicated around the world today - a very positive development for our industry in my view. The top sellers Wednesday were Porn.net ($400,000), Bookmarks.com ($300,000), Photograph.com ($195,000) and Yemen.com ($100,000). 

Auctioneer Mark Buleziuk called the action 
in two SnapNames Live domain auctions 
that produced over $3.1 million in sales 
at the DOMAINfest Global conference in Hollywood, California this week. 

Other highlights Wednesday included a very interesting keynote speech from Wired Magazine co-founder and best-selling author John Battelle, a closing round of well-crafted seminars and panel discussions and the grand finale, an evening dinner at which the first annual Domainers Choice Awards were handed out. I have to run for the airport in a few minutes to catch a flight from LA back to our Florida base, so I will have to save details of Batelle's thought-provoking talk and the Wednesday panel sessions (the last of which I had the pleasure of moderating) for our comprehensive show wrap-up article that will be out next week. 

Of course, I can't go before revealing the winners of the Domainers Choice Awards! They were selected in balloting conducted over several weeks on the DCA website. All visitors to the site were able to nominate and vote for their favorites, making these honors analogous to the entertainment industry's People's Choice Awards.  Without further ado, the envelopes please:

Best Domain Auctions: (co-winners) Moniker.com and SnapNames.com

Best Domain Financial Services: Escrow.com

Best Domain Marketplace: Sedo.com

Best Domain Publication: DNJournal.com

Best Domainer Tools: DomainTools.com

Best Domainers Blog: Elliot Silver for ElliotsBlog.com

Best Hosting Company: GoDaddy.com

Best Industry Spokesperson: Frank Schilling

Best Registrar: Moniker.com

Domainers Rising Star: The Castello Brothers (Michael and David)

Industry Achievement Award: Kevin Ham

Industry Customer Service Rep: Eben Smith of Sedo.com

Industry Trade Association: The Internet Commerce Association (ICA) 

Best Parking Company: TrafficZ

Domain Ambassador Award: The Castello Brothers (Michael and David)

Congratulations to all of the winners and a big thank you to CEO Lawrence Ng and everyone at Oversee.net for staging a superb conference and serving as such gracious hosts to your more than 600 guests this week. Again, our daily Lowdown posts from the show this week are just appetizers. Our definitive wall to wall coverage of DOMAINfest Global will be published by the end of next week (look for the intro on our home page). We have reams of notes and hundreds of photos to sift through so that we can produce the comprehensive conference review you expect from us. Now let's see if I can make that flight!

CEO Monte Cahn of double award winner Moniker.com with DCA organizers Sally Letzer (left) and Donna Mahony (right). 

David Castello (left) and Michael Castello won twice so each will have an award to display on their trophy shelf.

Sedo.com CSO Matt Bentley with Sally and Donna after collecting one of two awards claimed by the company (Sedo's Eben Smith also won but was unable to attend). 

(Posted Jan. 24, 2008)