With over 1,200 people online and 300 in the live audience, the sponsor of the Seattle Domain Name Rdountable hosted the most viewers of any domain auction ever on Friday. The sum total of the nearly 7-hour marathon was $3,519,128 in sales.. We learned a lot in our first auction. First off, the auction was too long. It lasted about 6 hours or 7 hours with breaks. I think we will go down in history with the world’s largest live domain auction. I don’t think.
Among the domain names auctioned and the closing bid prices:
Fine Cars.com $30,000
Good Car.com $3,700
Cab.com $110,000Invention.com $500,000
Rebate.com & Rebates.com $1,000,000
Albinos.com $31,500
Make Money Online.com $95,000
Gastronomy.com $15,000
Ahora.com $31,000
Brokerage Accounts.com $5,400
Phone Smart.com $5,200
Copies.com $90,000 [24×7]
AT&T Censorship of Pearl Jam Backfires
Ryan Blethen said it best in the Seattle Time’s editorial pages last week. “Our boys from Seattle have always been a very politically loud and thoughtful band. Their early hits, “Even Flow” and “Jeremy,” were popular but also carried a social message not often found in contemporary music. Lyrics of social issues and politics have continued through Pearl Jam’s latest release.”
AT&T overextended its reach when it deleted lyrics critical of President Bush recorded at a Pearl Jam concert that was shown through the telecom’s Blue Room site.
If Congress finally gets around to passing a net-neutrality law, we can thank, in part, Pearl Jam. Not solely because they were censored, although AT&T’s clumsiness helps, but for their long-standing concern about the consolidation of the media and the misuse of power, as displayed in the song “Grievance”: “Have a drink they’re buying. Bottom of, bottle of denial. Big guy, big eye watching me. Have to wonder what it sees … Progress, laced with ramifications. Freedom’s big plunge.”
These lyrics fit nicely into the narrative of AT&T’s actions. The company released a lame statement claiming it did not mean to censor political statements by Pearl Jam. But, as Blethen pointed out, the remarks were hollow, it has happened before.
The public needs to be worried about media consolidation, the lack of diversity of media ownership, and the assault on Internet radio and low-power FM.
Pearl Jam understands this. A statement on the band’s Web site says, “AT&T’s actions strike at the heart of the public’s concerns over the power that corporations have when it comes to determining what the public sees and hears through communications media.” [24×7]
