The Other Gadgetopia

I own the “big six” Gadgetopia domains – com, net, org, info, biz, and us. Beyond that, I never bothered to get all the country domains, because how could you, really? There are so many of them.

So, I guess it was just a matter of time before I stumbled across something like this: gadgetopia.co.uk. It appears to be a very cool little gadget store and spy shop in the U.K. I like the little “good vs. evil” theme they have going there.

I had an email exchange with the owner of the domain this week. Seems like a nice guy, and we both celebrated our extraordinary taste in domain names.

In a larger sense, I looked into trademarking the name “Gadgetopia” once. I was told by an IP attorney that trademarks are industry-specific, so the best I could probably do is trademark Gadgetopia in the context of “a Web site about computer topics.” I didn’t think there was much danger of someone infringing on me in that regard, so I didn’t bother.

The fact remains that the odds of someone using the name “Gadgetopia” for something is very much lessened by the fact that there’s no good, universal domain for them to use since I (and this other guy) own them all.

I was offered $15,000 for this domain once by a guy who wanted to set up cell phone kiosks in malls. I declined, and he told me that he was going to change the planned name of his company because I wouldn’t give up the domain.