Mozilla’s popular Firefox web browser has reached one billion downloads today. Currently, the download counter stands at 1,000,066,665. The downloads have been counted since the release of the first official version of Firefox in November 2004.

I was actually a happy user of Microsoft’s Internet Explorer until about one year ago when I finally made the switch. I’ve been using Firefox almost exclusively ever since, being convinced that it is the superior browser. Especially the new version of Firefox is very fast, easy to customize and just fun to use.

Mozilla has registered the domain name OneBillionPlusYou.com, where it is going to launch a website to celebrate this milestone. The site isn’t online yet, but it should be up soon now that the magic number has been crossed.

Last week, it was the first time that I submitted domains to Bido. I can say that the submission process went very smoothly. I think Bido’s auction platform is one of the best I’ve used so far. Not only does the design look nice, but it also follows function.

It was very easy to submit domains for consideration via Bido’s online form. Once the domains were submitted and listed in my account, I still had to verify that I was the owner of the domains. To do this, Bido asks you to add a short code into the domains’ whois info, which is pretty easy to do and quickly done. After I had placed the required codes in the whois, I clicked on the verify link within my Bido account and Bido instantly verified ownership. This all happened within minutes after I had submitted the domain names. If you compare this to other auction sites such as Sedo, where they manually check ownership of domains, and which sometimes takes more than one business day to be completed, the submission and verification process was very fast.

There is something negative about selling domains on Bido, however. They require you to agree to a strict exclusivity agreement with a rather long exclusivity period. I won’t discuss details of the contract, but I just would like to say that I think it is too strict for an online auction site. Especially given the fact that Bido asks you to do most of the marketing for your auctions. On the other hand, Bido only charges a fair 8% commission on domain sales and the signing of the contract can easily be done from within your account. But I still think Bido should relax the exclusivity contract a bit. I mean, I even got a more seller-friendly contract when selling domains on behalf of clients in Moniker’s live domain auctions not too long ago. Most domains that go on auction on Bido do sell, so the exclusivity agreement won’t be an issue in most cases, but I’m the kind of person who prefers peace of mind throughout the entire process. Now back to the actual buying and selling of domains on Bido.com.

It’s no secret that I like Bido’s innovative approach to auctioning off domain names. Bido has been one of the most innovative companies in this industry, in my opinion. The team around Sahar Sarid, Darren Cleveland, Jeff Bhavnanie and Jarred Cohen has done a great job implementing the many ideas of the Bido founders and domainers who let them know what they wanted online domain auctions to be like.

As a buyer of domains, you will also like Bido. I don’t want to talk about its general concept of selling domains, which is to only sell a very limited number of domains in auctions running no longer than one hour, because a lot has been written about this already, but just look at the bidding interface and the Bido home page: The site updates all bids and auction running times in real time without you having to reload the page. It’s even possible to chat with other domainers while watching an auction or placing bids. This makes trading domains more fun and, yes, more social.

As this is the first time that I’ve submitted domains to Bido, I don’t have any results, yet. So I can’t tell you how the transactions are done once a domain has sold. But I’ve only heard good things, and my personal experience so far has been very good. I’m sure I won’t be disappointed when the auctions finally go live next week.

Oh yes, I guess I should do a little promotion and mention the domain auctions here:

WarCrime.info – Monday, August 03, 13:01 pm EDT

EastTexas.us – Tuesday, August 04, 13:01 pm EDT

DegreeCourses.us – Wednesday, August 05, 13:01 pm EDT

SecondLienLoan.com – Thursday, August 06, 13:01 pm EDT

I believe in letting buyers decide on the prices in auctions, so all of these are no-reserve auctions starting at $1. It is possible to place pre-bids before the auctions actually start. Please do place your bids if you’re interested in any of these generic domain names.

In response to TechCrunch and Mike Berkens, I’d like to comment on the .CM landrush. Enom together with NameJet is now offering .CM domains for pre-order and other domainers and auction houses like Rick Latona, for example, are offering .CM domains for sale, too.

While I completely agree with those saying Cameroon has every right in the .CM top-level domain, a ccTLD it was awarded by IANA years ago, I also have to agree with those saying .CM domains are little more than a new way for getting your hands on high-traffic typo domains. Those who have been reading my posts over the years know that I’m a supporter of the domain industry. I try to promote domain names whenever possible, but I’m also an outspoken critic of cybersquatting.

Cybersquatters have been hurting the domain industry for many years, leading to the industry’s negative image of today. Just take a look at all the reader comments left over at TechCrunch. TechCrunch writer Robin Wauters, for instance, says the domain industry is a “nasty cybersquatter rat nest”. TechCrunch writer Robin Wauters, for instance, says:

I distinctly remember reading this Business 2.0 Magazine piece published back in May 2007 about Kevin Ham, ‘the most powerful dotcom mogul you’ve never heard of’. If you’re interested in the domain name business (lovingly called the nasty cybersquatter rat nest by some), I suggest you read it in full.

I can assure you that the domain industry as a whole is far from a cybersquatter rat nest, but that is how others perceive our industry, so we may not look the other way. Cybersquatting and typosquatting are serious threats to every domain investor and trademark-owner alike.

The opening up of the .CM ccTLD also changes some aspects of this controversy. In the beginning, few really owned .CM domains. Cameroon together with Kevin Ham’s Reinvent Technology had a wildcard on unregistered .CM domains very similar to the wildcards of large ISPs and other corporations. This way they were able to cash in on the typos of millions of Internet users. But most of those domains were not really registered and therefore were not legally owned by any person or entity. Although ethically disputable, legally it was a gray area. Now, however, people are rushing to officially register .CM domains, which will make the registrants the legal owners of their .CM domains. I guess this will expose them to tons of legal threats, as many .COM domain owners and trademark owners will surely sue them in order to get their corresponding .CM domains.

All in all, I don’t really see why domain investors are so crazy about .CM. Those domains would be worthless were it not for the traffic some of them will possibly be receiving. Like with all ccTLDs, it only makes sense to register a .CM domain if you’re based in Cameroon or doing business there. Otherwise, why buy such a domain? The answer is that many domainers want to make a quick buck by purchasing traffic domains, even if it’s only typo traffic. This is a very short-sighted strategy, in my opinion, and in some cases it is just plain wrong, too.

If you want the domain industry to evolve, don’t bother with schemes like the .CM TLD, even if they’re being promoted in such a big way. If anything, these promotions will only bring a very short-term boost. More likely, they will either result in bad press or dilute the value of individual existing domain names. It would be more productive to spend your time and energy in the right places. Domain investors should be developing new auction formats, promote accurate pricing of domains, find solutions to put more useful content on parked domains, develop professional tools for domain valuation, portfolio analysis and risk reduction, promote the benefits of domain names to corporate buyers, and so forth. In short, domain investors must be willing to be more professional about their business if they want the industry to mature.