Someone asked a bunch of us on Twitter what the difference between Priv8Jet.com and PrivateJet.com is…

My answer was simple – one is a super valuable asset, the other is not.

As you might have guessed, this tweet came from the owner of Priv8Jet.com who is asking $3M for the domain name. Yes, you read that right, he wants $3M, a tenth of the price that PrivateJet.com sold for…

Now before I go any further I want to take a step back. As many of you know I don’t typically write slam pieces on my blog, it’s really not what I’m about. I believe that most people are good and I like to give people the benefit of the doubt.

It’s likely that the owner of Priv8Jet.com is going to read this and think, “that Morgan guy is a jerk” and well, I guess I am being a bit of a jerk here but in my defense, you kinda asked for it. Also, don’t take any of this personally, I’m really just responding to what honestly is one of the most ridiculous claims I’ve ever heard about the value of a domain name…and you asked my opinion (and a bunch of other people’s) so you’re getting it!

Not surprisingly, other domainers chimed in, I was actually late to the party and both Konstantinos from OnlineDomain.com and  Joshua Schoen had already shared their two cents, both of whom I agree with 100%.

I couldn’t help myself so I decided to hop over to DomainTools.com to see when the name was registered…a month ago. So yes, this guy went and hand-registered a domain name that all of us know is garbage (hence why nobody since the inception of the Internet ever registered it) and slapped a $3M price tag on it.

Wouldn’t it be great if we could all just register random domains that don’t make sense and then sell them for $3M? Like Joshua said, this one isn’t worth the renewal fee to keep it around, and if I owned it…because, uh, maybe let’s say I lost a bet or something, I would force drop it at the registrar level.

The reality is that there are literally millions of domain names you could throw a number in and “claim” they’re similar to a domain that sold for big bucks. The problem is, that one number stuffed in the domain strips it of all its value.

My guess is that this person isn’t going to learn his lesson though. He asked for advice but didn’t really want it. Instead he’ll waste his time tweeting on his brand new Twitter account and keep renewing this junk year after year. On the plus side at least he got a bit of press and made himself a glowing example of what not to do when it comes to investing in domain names.

What do you think, am I being too harsh? I want to hear from you – what do you think of Priv8Jet.com? Comment and let your voice be heard!

Morgan Linton

Morgan Linton