Domain Registrar Registerfly in Trouble, Go Daddy Comes to the Rescue

Posted: March 11th, 2007 | By: Steve Mullen | Filed under: PR Opinion | No Comments

This may be slightly off topic, but where you host your site can have a big impact on a lot of things. I read today on Go Daddy CEO and Founder Bob Parsons’ blog that domain registrar Registerfly is in trouble. Here’s an excerpt of what he (or whoever writes the blog for him) posted:

Kevin Medina was removed from the CEO post of Registerfly for some pretty seedy allegations. The remaining shareholder of Registerfly, John Naruszewicz, alleged that Mr. Medina had been “stealing money from the company since the middle of last year to pay for two Cadillac Escalades, a penthouse apartment in Miami’s South Beach, an escort service, and liposuction. In a phone interview, Naruszewicz said Medina used company funds to pay for loads of private expenses. Also, he said Medina was taking customers’ money in online transactions and then failing to register the domain names they had paid for. Medina denied misusing company funds and accused Naruszewicz of using fraud to take control of the company.”

(SNIP)

According to Business Week, about 75,000 Registerfly customers have lost access to their Web sites. This seems to confirm rumors that a significant amount of customer data kept on Registerfly servers has been corrupted and lost leaving Registerfly management scrambling to find a way to get it back.

While I don’t normally like seeing a company go downhill, I have to say that I will shed no tears for Registerfly. At one time I registered several domains through them and their customer service is somewhere south of pathetic. I recall having to fight to get them to renew a domain that I’d already paid to renew, and they make it rather difficult to transfer domains to another registrar. Amazingly, according to this story, things have gotten worse.

These days I’m a very happy Go Daddy customer. I’ve purchased a handful of domains through them and have two websites and two blogs hosted there. By the way, if you’re a Registerfly customer, you may currently be having problems accessing your account information. Bob Parsons has a special offer to help you transfer to Go Daddy. It’s a good business move for him, since he’s looking to pick up more customers at the expense of a dying company. However, I recommend you take him up on it.

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