The Hot Iron

Thursday, April 10, 2008

freeagentnation.com Points To Nothing

If you are a regular reader of The Hot Iron you may know I am reading through all of the books on my bookshelf, blogging my takeaways from them, and passing the books along to friends and colleagues.  One book I just finished is Free Agent Nation by Daniel Pink, published in 2001.  Look for my takeaways on this great book soon.

At the end of the book it mentions the Web site for the book at freeagentnation.com.  So I entered the address into my browser and it resolves to nothing, no Web site.  Daniel Pink has a Web site for himself and one of his most recent books, Johnny Bunko.  According to the Internet Archive Wayback Machine, the last pages of freeagentnation.com archived were on November, 2005, and it was a link to his personal Web site.

This surprises me, especially as the book is probably still sitting on the bookshelves of many entrepreneurs and in circulation.  I am glad to see at least he still owns the domain name.

Web sites can and do have a shelf life, and taking it down can be the right move.  However people still may be seeking the site or its topic.  Routing Web traffic to another site at a minimum is straightforward and can suit those looking for the Web site, and maintain value for the topic as well as the domain name.

When Virtual LEGO came out in 2003, I never built a site around it and in retrospect, I probably should have.

Grabbing your own domain name and doing something with it is so important, especially with what happened recently to Shel Israel (see http://www.shelisrael.com).

Like you said, at least he has his. I just recently did a WHOIS on a friend’s nickname and when she didn’t own it I made sure she grabbed it. To readers: if you haven’t already, do a quick check on your first/last name and any popular nicknames or brands you use. Snap them up before someone else does!

Hi Tim - Yikes!

Good advice Tim.  I have always advised people to get the domain name for their name - http://www.thehotiron.com/index.php/site/comments/own_the_domain_name_for_your_name/ - as well as friends and family.  That, as well as for any idea they have for a product or service - it is such a small cost to pay that will pay for itself for years!

mp/m

You’re right, Mike.  It’s a long story, though—having to do with changed registrars, servers, webmasters and the like.  We’ll try to get it squared away soon.  Thanks for the prod.

Hi Dan - Thanks for stopping by, and good luck with sorting everything out.  And I know all that’s involved, as I live it everyday as a Web developer!

mp/m

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