They're big, cheap and safe. Have you ever tried to rescue hundreds of domains from a reseller who is gong out of biz or from a company being acquired? I have and it blows. I'll stick with the evil I know and skip the headaches of smaller registrars.
Their DNS/domain service is nothing to complain about, and their support is in fact excellent. I had to call support several times, to revert "accidental" auto-renewals and what not and the support people do their best to compensate for the bad impression created by GoDaddy's sales tactics. Zero hold time, settled all issues just as I asked no questions asked.
That being said I still switched two dozen domains from them to Gandi over a year ago. One can tolerate their obnoxious sales pressure only that much.
I certainly understand your point but the point of the poll is to find out if GoDaddy users are actually taking actions (to find out if there will be a mass exodus).
Domain transfers are a small pain in the ass, and your registrar is generally nothing more than a name and a number on a yearly bill, so past idiocy from GoDaddy doesn't really mean much unless it was offensive enough to motivate you to do some work to switch, and since I've rarely even been to their website since my initial registrations, it just never occurred to me.
I stopped registering new domains with GoDaddy several years ago, but until today, I didn't bother switching my old ones away from them (I had maybe a dozen there, and several dozen elsewhere). Now I have.
I've been with them for 10yrs and they have never wronged me. The only reason I'm considering switching is the moral reasons with SOPA.
When you have 30+ domains on a single registrar it is a little frustrating to go through each one individually and get the authorization code, unlock them, and request the transfer.
Also, for me, I have domains that I did 5-10yr registrations on, so the transfer and getting 1yr free isn't really that helpful.
I haven't got any GoDaddy domains so I haven't done it personally, but I think people on the other top story about how to leave GoDaddy had all that solved.
You could use the tools to export all your domains, get the transfer codes, drop those into NameCheap (with the SOPASUCKS coupon) all at once, then go back to GoDaddy and confirm the transfers to avoid a long wait. And they even let you keep the time you had registered.
Just fyi, you can generate a csv of your domains and authorization codes by doing:
Domain Management > Tools Tab > Exportable List > click Add New Export button > All your domains > and make sure to select "Authorization Code".
As for locking or unlocking, in Domain Management you should be able to just click the select all checkmark, and click the Lock button to set the lock level on all of them.
None of that should be an issue, even when transferring in, a bunch of registrars offer a bulk transfer option. The real pains start to set in if you have gTLDs which have special gotchas when transferring or changing contact information/ownership. I probably wouldn't even have been able to transfer my .it domains out of godaddy if not for the fact I have a dual citizenship which gave me some freedom with the regulations -- though it still took me hours of trial and error.
One slight irritation on GoDaddy -> Namecheap. One of these sites has a bug where it's either incorrectly generating ACs with embedded double quotes, like ABC"345"DE, or it's not storing them correctly. I did the bulk transfer yesterday, and this morning discovered that all such domains failed with a bad AC. I'm working with Namecheap support now to resolve it.
So it's still a constant-time operation, but the value of C is growing for me.
That's why the poll is missing an option. I've never registered a domain using GoDaddy, but, the way the question is phrased, I almost clicked "No", since I indeed "did not transfer my domains from GoDaddy today". Doing so would have skewed the results.
Technically I should answer "no" on the poll, because I did not transfer my domains from GoDaddy today. I never had them registered at GoDaddy. Perhaps a typical HN reader is not as pedantic, but I expect some are, so surely having the "never used godaddy" option would have made the results more accurate.
Honest question: when was that, and what was the criteria for "best"?
I've been purchasing domains since the time when you had to mail in a check for the payment (and the grace period was like 6 months). I don't ever recall GoDaddy being any version of "best".
I remember switching to them from Network Solutions or Register.com, who still charged like $99 or $29 per domain (I forget which). It was amazing that they had $9 domains AND they provided DNS (it used to be you'd be stuck needing an ISP for this)
The first domains I got were from register.com at over $30/year. I assumed I was getting great service or something. When I finally had an issue, I sat on hold for over an hour and then got disconnected. I decided to switch to godaddy, the cheapest well known brand.
Needs at least one more option: switched after past GoDaddy débâcles.
I didn't switch immediately after the elephant controversy, but did a couple months after that when half my domains were up for renewal.
Knowing now that Namecheap and other registrars will actually extend my expiration date no matter when it is, I'll definitely be moving my remaining domains ASAP (some of which I bought for 5-year periods not long ago, hence my prior reticence to switch).
I believe I'm stuck within the 60 day policy due to recent renewals before all of this came to light (will have to double check). Will be switching as soon as possible.
I had been wanting to participate in the Dec-29 mass de-activation protest but it just so happened that a handful of my domains were expiring on this 25th. Something I was very conscious about was the hoops and hassles Godaddy makes you go through for doing a transfer... I was not looking forward to wasting time figuring that mess out, but very thankfully the article from earlier today (http://blog.jeffepstein.me/post/14629857835/a-step-by-step-g... ) made that a hassle-free process.
I will be transferring some 50 or so domains over to Namecheap -- either because I own them, or have sway over friends/family who currently are stuck with them.
Yup. I've been a little bothered by GoDaddy in the past, but they provided good service, so I didn't really stress it too much. Domain transfers are a pain in the ass, so when you have a bunch of domains, there's momentum working against a transfer. But, when they get on board with legislation that's going to destroy my industry, I'm done.
My initial excuse was "well, I just renewed them all, and I don't want to burn that much cash". But then I saw that Namecheap appends your transfer renewal year to your existing expiry, so my domains that renewed last month now renew in November 2013. So, I'm just shifting money I'd be paying anyhow upfront, rather than wasting registry time (as GoDaddy often tries to get you to do).
I decided to switch today, before I grew complacent. Almost 60 domains, but the last step of the transfer is now pending, and it feels great.
Usually when you transfer a domain you buy an extra year on top of whatever time you have left... but you'll have to check with the company you are transferring to.
If you're being sincere, I would love to know why. Is it because you don't support SOPA, couldn't care less about SOPA and love GoDaddy, have too many hurdles to jump over, or some other reason? Just curious.
I'm in the same boat. I only have three domains on GoDaddy, but it doesn't feel like it's worth the hassle. I haven't had a bad experience with GoDaddy, maybe because I don't use them for hosting.
My own reason is that I hate internet-protests like this. Someone on Reddit gets some half facts, mixes in with some misquotations, then tries to whip together the internet mob to do their business.
A few geeks moving a few domains away from godaddy will have absolutely no impact on anything, and all it will do is waste the geeks own time.
I'll be switching the first thing tomorrow morning.. all 100 or so of my domains. Will be spreading the word to all my internet marketing friends as well.
I'm tempted to write a scraper script that finds sites registered with Godaddy (using public registration info/searching for "registered with Godaddy"), harvest emails, and tell them all about switching.
I could help with this, if you know of a site where it has lists of domains registered with godaddy let me know and consider it done, I already have an email harvester script I've been working on and can easily tweak it to do this, its multi-threaded so it can go to a lot of sites, crawl them and pull the emails in fast.
You could just get the .com zone file and scan them with a load of proxies for godaddy dns servers etc. Or write some Seti alike tool so more people can participate. [Place here spam warning]
I transferred everything to NameCheap today, but I should say, I've been wanting to transfer away from them for a while now for a variety of reasons, and this is what finally convinced me to do it.
Agreed; when a company spends enormous amounts of money to brand themselves as childish and unprofessional, I'm going to take them at their word and steer clear.
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[ 0.18 ms ] story [ 220 ms ] threadThat being said I still switched two dozen domains from them to Gandi over a year ago. One can tolerate their obnoxious sales pressure only that much.
There has been so much past idiocy from GoDaddy, that I'm surprised there are all that many HN readers left with them now anyway.
I stopped registering new domains with GoDaddy several years ago, but until today, I didn't bother switching my old ones away from them (I had maybe a dozen there, and several dozen elsewhere). Now I have.
When you have 30+ domains on a single registrar it is a little frustrating to go through each one individually and get the authorization code, unlock them, and request the transfer.
Also, for me, I have domains that I did 5-10yr registrations on, so the transfer and getting 1yr free isn't really that helpful.
You could use the tools to export all your domains, get the transfer codes, drop those into NameCheap (with the SOPASUCKS coupon) all at once, then go back to GoDaddy and confirm the transfers to avoid a long wait. And they even let you keep the time you had registered.
Domain Management > Tools Tab > Exportable List > click Add New Export button > All your domains > and make sure to select "Authorization Code".
As for locking or unlocking, in Domain Management you should be able to just click the select all checkmark, and click the Lock button to set the lock level on all of them.
None of that should be an issue, even when transferring in, a bunch of registrars offer a bulk transfer option. The real pains start to set in if you have gTLDs which have special gotchas when transferring or changing contact information/ownership. I probably wouldn't even have been able to transfer my .it domains out of godaddy if not for the fact I have a dual citizenship which gave me some freedom with the regulations -- though it still took me hours of trial and error.
So it's still a constant-time operation, but the value of C is growing for me.
I've been purchasing domains since the time when you had to mail in a check for the payment (and the grace period was like 6 months). I don't ever recall GoDaddy being any version of "best".
I didn't switch immediately after the elephant controversy, but did a couple months after that when half my domains were up for renewal.
Knowing now that Namecheap and other registrars will actually extend my expiration date no matter when it is, I'll definitely be moving my remaining domains ASAP (some of which I bought for 5-year periods not long ago, hence my prior reticence to switch).
I had been wanting to participate in the Dec-29 mass de-activation protest but it just so happened that a handful of my domains were expiring on this 25th. Something I was very conscious about was the hoops and hassles Godaddy makes you go through for doing a transfer... I was not looking forward to wasting time figuring that mess out, but very thankfully the article from earlier today (http://blog.jeffepstein.me/post/14629857835/a-step-by-step-g... ) made that a hassle-free process.
I will be transferring some 50 or so domains over to Namecheap -- either because I own them, or have sway over friends/family who currently are stuck with them.
My initial excuse was "well, I just renewed them all, and I don't want to burn that much cash". But then I saw that Namecheap appends your transfer renewal year to your existing expiry, so my domains that renewed last month now renew in November 2013. So, I'm just shifting money I'd be paying anyhow upfront, rather than wasting registry time (as GoDaddy often tries to get you to do).
I decided to switch today, before I grew complacent. Almost 60 domains, but the last step of the transfer is now pending, and it feels great.
A few geeks moving a few domains away from godaddy will have absolutely no impact on anything, and all it will do is waste the geeks own time.
I'm tempted to write a scraper script that finds sites registered with Godaddy (using public registration info/searching for "registered with Godaddy"), harvest emails, and tell them all about switching.
Previously, I got sick of the hidden charges they had ("Business registration fee", added with each domain) that you may not notice.