Bidder Qualification Deadline Approaches for Coveted i.CO Domain Name Auction

Qualification concludes January 21; Auction opens in early February  

LOS ANGELES and MIAMI, Jan. 12, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- SnapNames® and Moniker®, both Oversee.net companies, and .CO Internet S.A.S., the official registry operator for the .CO top-level domain, confirmed today that interested bidders may qualify to participate in the upcoming auction for the valuable i.CO domain name until January 21, 2011 at 11:59 p.m. U.S. Eastern time.

Only qualified bidders can participate in the private online auction, which will open Thursday, February 3, 2011 and conclude at 3:15 p.m. U.S. Eastern time on Thursday, February 10.  The i.CO name will not be part of the lot at the live public auction at DOMAINfest® Global in Santa Monica, Calif.  

The i.CO auction is one of the first in a series of exclusive single-letter auctions sponsored by the .CO Registry, and follows a very successful launch, where more than 600,000 .CO domain names were registered by registrants in 200 countries in less than six months.

"I.CO is one of the shortest and most memorable URLs in existence," said Juan Diego Calle, CEO and founder of .CO Internet S.A.S.  "This is an exceptionally valuable piece of Internet real estate, and the teams at SnapNames and Moniker have set up an outstanding auction process to alert and engage the right buyers."

The .CO Registry has allocated only a few single-letter domain names to date, several of which have enjoyed high-profile success, including Twitter's t.CO and GoDaddy's x.CO, both used as branded URL shorteners, and Overstock's o.CO, which is replacing Overstock.com as the company's primary brand for all of its international websites.

".CO domain names are meaningful to end-users worldwide, and i.CO will be an extraordinary asset for any forward-thinking company or investor," said Craig Snyder, General Manager of SnapNames and Moniker.  "Juan and his team have built a world-class top-level domain."

Interested bidders can get qualified to bid at www.i.CO, or by contacting [email protected] or (800) 688-6311 for more information.  Due to the private nature of the auction, bidder identities will remain confidential.

To further interest potential buyers, SnapNames and Moniker are conducting an online sweepstakes for their Facebook fans and Twitter followers, in which five randomly selected winners will each receive a 16GB iPad.  The sweepstakes started at 12:00 a.m. U.S. Eastern time on Wednesday, January 12, and will conclude at 11:59 p.m. U.S. Eastern time on Thursday, February 3.  For more information about the sweepstakes, including a link to the official rules, and to find out how to enter, please visit us at either www.facebook.com/MonikerSnap or www.twitter.com/monikersnap.

About Oversee.net's Aftermarket and Registrar Division
Comprised of  Moniker® and SnapNames®, Oversee's Aftermarket and Registrar Division offers businesses and individual investors an array of services for domain name registration, acquisition, management, appraisal, brokerage and sales. As a top ten registrar, Moniker introduced the live domain name auction concept. SnapNames operates the largest auction of expired and deleting domain names and gives its customers exclusive first access to the world's most valuable names every day. For more information, visit www.moniker.com and www.snapnames.com.

About Oversee.net

Oversee.net® is the leader in Internet real estate, specializing in monetizing, registering, selling and developing domain names. The company provides an array of managed services to domain investors, corporations, and individuals across more than ten million web sites. Oversee owns one of the largest portfolios of domain names in the world—more than 1 million names. The company's unique optimized technology connects consumers and advertisers with highly relevant advertisements. Headquartered in Los Angeles with offices in Portland, Oregon, Pompano Beach, Florida and Frankfurt, Germany, the company's core brands include DomainSponsor®, SnapNames®, Moniker®, DOMAINfest®, LowFares™ and AboutAirportParking.com®. To learn more, please visit www.oversee.net.

About .CO Internet S.A.S.

.CO Internet S.A.S is the Registry Operator for the .CO top-level domain.  The .CO domain offers individuals and businesses a truly global, recognizable and credible option in branding their online presence.  Thanks to leading-edge technology, enhanced security and unprecedented rights protections for brand owners, the .CO domain is poised to become the world's next premier web address.  Increasingly, entrepreneurs, agencies, venture capitalists and big brands are turning to .CO to brand their companies, products and services online.  For additional information about the .CO Registry, please visit www.COinternet.co and www.Opportunity.co and follow us on Twitter at @dotCO.

SOURCE Oversee.net

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