According to Domain Name Wire, the following bidders participated in the auction:

• 1-800-Diapers
• Toys ‘R’ Us via Eagle, LLC
• National A-1
• Schilling Aviation Corp (Frank Schilling)
• Socha APA David William Socha
• Faculty Lounge Partners

KXV.com – $3,000
KFQ.com – $3,000
KQH.com – $3,000
KBQ.com – $3,100
SJQ.com – $3,300
JXV.com – $3,600

SOL.com attracted 13 bids, the highest being 15,500 euros, but the reserve was not met. COP.com attracted 3 bids, the highest being $20,500, but the reserve was not met either.

According to 3character.com, the lowest observed LLL.com sale during January had been for $4,200.

In my opinion it's a big mistake to list valuable domains on Sedo without reserve. The LLL.com domains shown above would have probably sold for 20% to 30% more on domain forums, without having to pay any commission to Sedo.

Also, with Greatdomains auctions there are dozens of domain auctions ending at the very same minute, so it's difficult for those trying to strike a bargain to keep track of last-minute developments.

Moniker.com announced that it will be hosting the first online silent auction of premium gaming and casino industry domain names during the Casino Affiliate Convention 2007 (CAC 2007), in Amsterdam May 3 – 5 at the NH Grand Krasnapolsky Hotel.

All CAC 2007 attendees will be provided with a free, special password granting them access to the online auction and bidding which will be hosted on the Moniker.com Web site. More information on the auction can be found here.

Domains that will be available for purchase during the auction include Poker.com, Winner.com, Slots.com, Jackpots.com, ePoker.com, Craps.mobi, Gambling.org, HoldemGuide.com and CasinoReview.com.

Those who are not attending the CAC 2007 will also be able to participate by purchasing an absentee bidder registration for US $99. Interested individuals should contact sales or call 1-800-688-6311.

"As individuals continue to participate in online gaming and entertainment, the need for a marketable domain name is now more important that ever," said Monte Cahn, co-founder and chief executive officer of Moniker. "Events such as this silent auction at CAC 2007 are critical events for online gamers who are interested in increasing the scope and reach of their online business."

Interestingly, Moniker's announcement cites a November 2005 report Online Gambling: Bet, Call or Fold by Ben Macklin, which says that 20 to 30 million US internet users visited gambling or sweepstakes sites in February 2005, representing about 15 to 18 percent of all US internet users. In Europe, the report found 14 million internet users visited gambling or sweepstake sites, with Germany having the largest number of users.

The gambling industry was hit hard last year with the passage of the USA's Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act of 2006, which aims to stop the flow of funds to offshore casinos. The act's long-term effect is still uncertain, and a permanent ban on gambling seems unlikely.

Moniker.com's domain auction at the T.R.A.F.F.I.C convention in Las Vegas has ended and turned out to be yet another success. 155 out of the 233 domains on offer were sold for a total of $4.26 million. Compared to the previous auction, which took place in October 2006, prices for two letter .com domains continue on the rise while .mobi has apparently reached its peak. As Domo Sapiens succinctly put it, it seems that somebody's frank comments had quite a "schilling" effect on .mobi.

Moniker.com will be hosting another multi-million dollar live auction of premium domain names at T.R.A.F.F.I.C West in Las Vegas on Wednesday, March 7 at 2:30 pm PST at The Venetian Resort, Hotel and Casino.

Conference attendees will have the opportunity to place bids on valuable domains including Privacy.com, Ethanol.com, Reunite.com, Greeting.com, Sopranos.com and Minnesota.org.

dotMobi plans to make 15 domains available on the auction, including Airfare.mobi, Casinos.mobi, Directions.mobi, Eat.mobi, Models.mobi, Pics.mobi, Pizza.mobi, RealEstate.mobi and Singles.mobi. These names join the 400,000 .mobi domains that have been registered since general registration commenced on October 11, 2006.

The T.R.A.F.F.I.C. conference takes place from March 5-8, 2007 and is sold out.

Moniker.com will also be hosting a silent online auction which will run March 6 through March 14, 2007. The silent auction provides additional opportunities for individuals to purchase domain names that will support their overall portfolio. Details will become available on March 6 at http://silentauction.moniker.com/

Additionally, many Sedo auctions seem to close at fair market price. This allows sellers to get more money for their domains while attentive buyers can occasionally grab a bargain.

One Sedo auction to watch today was for the domain name FN.org, which attracted 65 bids, probably a new record on Sedo, and ended with a winning bid of $10,932.

Other notable auctions ending in the next few days include cobertura.com (Spanish for "coverage"; 7 bids, $1,100), sat.net (14 bids, $5,100), drink.org (8 bids, €650), wrr.eu (12 bids, €361), complain.net (2 bids, $80), zpq.com (9 bids, $3,001), tle.net (4 bids, $950), and last not least several .mobi domains including investor.mobi (1 bid, £9,999).

Sedo has now changed how they present IDN auctions in two essential ways:

1. In the auction listing overview, a big IDN tag is now visible right next to the domain:
2. And in the auction listing itself, they added a non-ambiguous text mentioning the actual punycode domain:

Thanks for listening, Sedo.

Check out all current Sedo auctions here.

The domain auction for xn--fx-kja.com attracted 102 bids from 26 bidders – and closed with a final bid of $46,001!

These domain investors must know something that we don't:

• Is xn--fx-kja a high-traffic typo of the latest Web 2.0 company to be snapped up by Yahoo?
• Has Bubble 2.0 reached its peak, with domain names back at their 1999 valuations?
• Is this a misconceived publicity stunt to promote an otherwise shunned URL?

Actually, it's none of the above.

xn--fx-kja.com is simply the ASCII representation (punycode) for fìx.com, which looks deceptively similar to fix.com.

fìx.com and fix.com?

In case you didn't notice any difference, we didn't either, and neither did several commentators over at Com. Take another look:

fìx.com – fix.com

Of course, fìx.com (the first one) is pretty much worthless and nobody in their right mind would pay $46,001 for such an ugly domain. But when it looks like the highly valuable fix.com (the second one), it's understandable that potential buyers get excited and smell a bargain. But this time, it wasn't meant to be and the winning bidder will probably refuse to pay when he realizes his mistake.

Meanwhile, at the time of writing, the auction for wìne.com (xn--wne-nma.com) is still in progress. It has attracted 9 bidders, with the top bid currently at €510. How many of them believe they are competing for wine.com? [Note: The auction ended with a winning bid of €31,001.]

Sedo, the company that manages these auctions, does indicate in the fine print that these domain are IDNs, which are, essentially, domains that allow the use of special characters such as á, ï, è etc. However, many domain newbies will not realize what they are getting themselves into.

Therefore, Sedo should either announce these junk domains as follows:

xn--fx-kja.com (fìx.com)
xn--wne-nma.com (wìne.com)

… or ban them entirely. Their domain auction service had started out as a pleasant alternative to eBay's scrap heap but it has degenerated rapidly in recent weeks.

Incidentally, yet another imitator is up for auction on eBay. This time it's fıx.com. No, not fix.com, but fıx.com, which is actually xn--fx-hpa.com. Buyer beware!

While legitimate IDN domains do serve a limited purpose, these bogus domains are worthless and even dangerous. Fortunately, due to spoofing concerns most browsers convert these domains to their ASCII representations: if you copy fìx.com into your address bar and hit enter (or click here), the URL will actually be displayed as http://xn--fx-kja.com. Using your browser as assistant in this way may be the only sure-fire way to guarantee that a domain you're interested in isn't just a cheap pretender.

Note: Sedo has since made important changes to the way they list IDN auctions.

The Domain Name Wire commented, "Moniker has proven it can take the domain sales process to the end-user. Hopefully other end user markets will be approached in the future." The Daily Domainer agrees. An end user is someone who buys a domain to actually develop it, instead of putting up a PPC (pay-per-click) site and hoping that someone else will come along in the future and buy the domain for a higher price. Approaching other industries that "get it" to the world of domains is the logical next step. Any ideas on where to start?