Comments on: New Atheist Domains

By: Jeff

Jeff — Tue, 03 Jun 2008 00:00:31 +0000

Perhaps I should check out the pro-Christian websites and try to guess which bloggers might make something of themselves and write a popular book and buy the domain name matching their name before they think to

By: Xeonicus

Xeonicus — Mon, 02 Jun 2008 22:12:13 +0000

Awww snap… those IDiots are parading around just like web spammers and other undesirables. Setting up a pro-ID site at http://www.richarddawkins.org? Feh… How desperate.

By: Adrian Hayter

Adrian Hayter — Mon, 02 Jun 2008 18:25:49 +0000

The http://www.christopherhitchens.com isn’t a case of a critic getting hold of it, it’s a company that buys popular domains, places automated adverts on it, and then try to sell them for high prices.

Since a load of searches for hitchens’ name will turn up results relating to christians and islam, that explains all the weird links. I wouldn’t call it “bad”, it’s only a robot making the best out of the information it’s given

The other “bad” Richard Dawkins site seems to be down at the moment so I’m not sure about that one.

Also, it seems some company called “crescent media” have purchased hemantmehta.com

By: Vincent

Vincent — Mon, 02 Jun 2008 14:19:00 +0000

miller has it almost right.
I forget which registrar it is, but one of them works this way:
You want to register a name so you go to the name registry website and you check to see if the domain name is available. The registry site does a search, and if the name is not registered IT REGISTERS THE DOMAIN NAME!
It then throws up a place holder site (with ads).
Their stated reasoning is that you have expressed interest in the name so they are holding it for you (domain names can be held without fee for a few days) so nobody else registers it while you’re considering it. Of course the unstated reasoning is that now you HAVE to register it with them instead of someone cheaper like godaddy (if you now search for availability at another site it will show as unavailable) – unless you wait out the few days til their temporary registration expires. But as most don’t know that, they think they are stuck.

So Miller just had it backwards. It’s not that the name has gone dormant, but that nobody has registered it except someone searched it through that particular registry.

By: hoverFrog

hoverFrog — Mon, 02 Jun 2008 09:28:11 +0000

Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens are English. What about .co.uk domains?

By: miller

miller — Mon, 02 Jun 2008 05:16:07 +0000

richarddawkins.info appears to be positive or neutral (and Russian). Google translations are your friend.

I’m not sure what goes on in the inner workings of the internet, but I suspect that when a domain is deleted, the powers that be often replace it with a bunch of automatically generated advertisements. This is what appears to be going on for several of the listed domains, including christopherhitchens.com, which you labeled as bad. The fact that christian bookstores are included in the advertisements looks like a coincidence to me.

By: Hemant Mehta

Hemant Mehta — Mon, 02 Jun 2008 03:33:30 +0000

I didn’t think to extend it all the way out, thanks for finishing the thought. That’s a great chart, but there’s a small error: richarddawkins.com should be Unknown Unknown, not Unknown Good (starting to sound like Rumsfeld).

Actually, even though it’s not a Dawkins-approved site (I don’t think), it does speak favorably of him. By that measure, I’m calling it “good.”

By: Len

Len — Mon, 02 Jun 2008 03:30:38 +0000

I didn’t think to extend it all the way out, thanks for finishing the thought. That’s a great chart, but there’s a small error: richarddawkins.com should be Unknown Unknown, not Unknown Good (starting to sound like Rumsfeld).

By: Arthwollipot

Arthwollipot — Mon, 02 Jun 2008 02:07:51 +0000

Sure, cause everybody has a website these days, don’t they?

By: postdiluvian

postdiluvian — Mon, 02 Jun 2008 01:55:44 +0000

Hitchens has a site at http://buildupthatwall.com/