Mediaboss Marketing

March 19, 2012 - 16:02 AMT

PanARMENIAN.Net - A Turkish cybersquatter has registered at least a dozen variants of Pope Benedict's name as .xxx internet domains and is using them to promote Islam, The Register reports.

Cybersquatted sites including PopeBenedict.xxx currently proclaim "Everyone will find Islam" alongside pictures of the Quran and Kaaba.

Unsurprisingly, the sites also state that "This Web Site is For Sale".

PopeBenedict.xxx is registered to one Bulent Ozcan, a resident of Turkey, according to Whois records. Other domains evidently squatted by the same person include: josephaloisiusratzinger.xxx, josephaloisiusratzinger.com, benedictus.xxx, benedictxvi.xxx, ratzinger.xxx, xvibenedictus.xxx, xvibenedictus.com benedictusxvi.xxx pontificio.xxx holyfather.xxx and josephratzinger.xxx.

While the pope is not the first person to be cybersquatted in the new .xxx domain Sir Richard Branson recently recovered richardbranson.xxx from a squatter this does seem to be the most comprehensive effort to trash an individual by linking their name to .xxx porn (and to promote a "competitor").

The Vatican's quickest option for shutting down the domains might be to file a Rapid Evaluation Service complaint with the National Arbitration Forum, the U.S. body hired by .xxx manager ICM Registry to handle this kind of case.

RES complaints cost $1,300 to file, but cybersquatted domains can be permanently suspended in as little as two working days. Because the policy covers personal names, the Pope won't need to show trademark rights in his name.

However, it would probably be cheaper to file a complaint using the Uniform Dispute Resolution Policy, which unlike RES offers bulk discounts, instead.

The Vatican briefly got its cassocks in a twist last December when it mistakenly thought that vatican.xxx had been registered by a cybersquatter.

The rest is here:
Turkish cybersquatter registers Pope Benedict's name as .xxx internet domains

The board of directors of internet overseer ICANN is said to be fuming after its ethics were called into question by the organisation's outgoing president and CEO.

Rod Beckstrom, who is set to the leave the domain name policy group in July, took to the stage at ICANN's public meeting here in San Jose, Costa Rica on Monday to criticise what he called the "tangle of conflicting agendas" on the board.

ICANN must be able to act for the public good while placing commercial and financial interests in the appropriate context, he said. How can it do this if all top leadership is from the very domain name industry it is supposed to coordinate independently?

There is value in having community members with domain name industry experience but it is equally valuable to avoid even the perception of a conflict of interest, he said.

The address came a few weeks after an ICANN board meeting at which seven of its 16 directors, including the chair and vice-chair, acknowledged conflicts of interest relating to ICANN's new generic top-level domains initiative, which promises to create hundreds of new domain suffixes.

Chair Steve Crocker runs the consulting firm Shinkuro, which has a silent investment from domain name registry provider Afilias. Vice-chair Bruce Tonkin, meanwhile, is a senior executive with Melbourne IT, an Australian company that expects to help over 100 clients apply for new gTLDs.

All seven conflicted directors excused themselves from voting on or discussing new gTLDs, in adherence to new ethics rules approved by ICANN in December.

Beckstrom first raised conflicts of interest as a problem facing ICANN at its meeting in Singapore last June, just a few days before the organisation approved the new gTLD programme.

The programme enables any company to apply to run their own right-of-the-dot domain name either generic terms such as .web or .blog, geographic names such as .london, or branded extensions such as .canon and .hitachi.

The then-chair of ICANN, Kiwi trademark lawyer Peter Dengate Thrush, left the organisation shortly after the Singapore meeting to take on the well-paid executive chairman position at Top Level Domain Holdings, a start-up with big plans to apply for dozens of new gTLDs.

Original post:
ICANN prez calls out own board over conflicts of interest

CHICAGO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--

GTCR, a leading Chicago-based private equity firm, announced today it will invest in Zayo Group, LLC ("Zayo") to finance its pending acquisition of AboveNet, Inc. (NYSE: ABVT; "AboveNet") for $84.00 per share of AboveNet common stock and a total transaction value of $2.2 billion. As part of the transaction, GTCR will partner with Chief Executive Officer Dan Caruso and other senior executives from Zayo. Mr. Caruso and his team founded Zayo in 2006 and have built a leading bandwidth infrastructure provider with an excellent value creation track record.

AboveNet is a leading pure-play provider of fiber infrastructure services to enterprise and carrier customers in the United States and Europe. The AboveNet and Zayo business models are closely aligned with a disciplined focus on high bandwidth fiber-based communications services. The combination will create value for customers, employees and investors with a fiber network spanning 60,000 route miles.

GTCR Principal, Philip Canfield said, "We have followed the progress of Dan and his leadership team at Zayo for some time and, together, we have been looking for opportunities to do acquisitions in the bandwidth infrastructure domain. Dan and his team have a long history of success and value creation and exemplify the traits and characteristics associated with the GTCR Leaders Strategy. We look forward to working with Dan and all of Zayos existing shareholders to build upon their past success in the bandwidth infrastructure domain.

"GTCR's impressive track record of partnering with leaders to build companies through growth and acquisitions combined with their domain expertise in technology makes them a perfect partner for Zayo," commented Dan Caruso. "We are thrilled to have a new equity partner who shares our commitment to growing our business and providing vital bandwidth infrastructure to our customers."

Latham & Watkins LLP served as legal counsel to GTCR. GTCR's proposed equity investment to finance the transaction will be made from GTCR Fund X, a private equity fund raised in 2011 with $3.25 billion of committed capital.

About GTCR

Founded in 1980, GTCR is a leading private equity firm focused on investing in growth companies in the Financial Services & Technology, Healthcare and Information Services & Technology industries. The Chicago-based firm pioneered the Leaders Strategy finding and partnering with management leaders as the critical first step in identifying, acquiring and building market-leading companies through acquisitions and organic growth. Since its inception, GTCR has invested more than $9 billion in over 200 companies. For more information, please visit http://www.gtcr.com.

About Zayo Group

Zayo Group is a national provider of fiber-based bandwidth infrastructure and network-neutral colocation and interconnection services. Zayo serves wireline and wireless carriers, data centers, internet content and services companies, high bandwidth enterprises as well as federal, state and local government agencies. Zayo provides these services over regional, metro, national and fiber-to-the-tower networks. Zayos network assets include over 45,000 route miles, covering 42 states plus Washington D.C. Additionally, Zayo has approximately 5,200 buildings and 2,300 cell towers on-net, and over 94,000 square feet of billable colocation space. For more information, please visit http://www.zayo.com.

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GTCR Announces Investment in Zayo Group to Finance Zayo’s Pending Acquisition of AboveNet

Domain Associates latest investment is as much a bet on Russia as it is on the potential of new medicines.

The Princeton-based venture capital firm is teaming up with the Russian government-backed investment group Rusnano in an ambitious deal to bring new medicines and medical devices to Russias emerging healthcare market.

Its very daunting and its very exciting, said Brian Dovey, a partner at Domain. The Russian government is very committed to establishing a regional pharmaceutical industry.

The agreement calls for Rusnano and Domain to co-invest in as many as 20 U.S. life science companies with products in advanced stages of development. The joint investment will provide up to $660 million over a three-year period to the companies all of which will be selected from Domains existing portfolio.

And theres more to the deal a specialty pharmaceutical company will be created in Russia and through a combination of technology transfer agreements and licensing arrangements, the new company will have rights to manufacture and sell products resulting from the joint venture. In that way, Russia will gain a local pharmaceutical company with a variety of products in a few years far quicker than if the business was started from scratch. Forming the new company will be funded with an additional $190 million, according to the agreement.

Domain, which has $2.4 billion of capital under management, is known throughout the country for its investments in the life science industry. Nearly 25 years ago, it provided early financing to Amgen and helped the company grow into a biotech giant. Its portfolio also includes such names as Align Technology, which makes clear braces and Cardiac Science, a defibrillator maker.

The collaboration with Rusnano represents its first venture in Russia.

Its not such an unusual bet though. With the market for initial public offerings withered by the wobbly world economy and many early-stage companies considered too risky, venture capitalists are putting their money on the promise of emerging markets.

In addition to Russia, venture capitalist firms are pouring money into China and India. For Russia, the partnership provides a leveraging of Domains life sciences expertise and for Domain, the partnership is strengthened by Rusnanos knowledge of Russia and neigboring markets in Ukraine, Belarus and Kazakhstan.

Pavel Rodyukov, Rusnanos senior investment manager, said the group will invest in products that are in the later stages of development, enabling them to go to market within about four years. This will be one of the first big players in a regional pharmaceutical industry, Rodyukov said. It is also the countrys first brush with innovation in the pharmaceutical area.

See the article here:
Princeton venture capital firm and Russians collaborate on life sciences

18-03-2012 16:45 Y Dot @ GRINDE SEASON STUDIOS With (FlightGangMuzik)

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FlightGangMuzik Producing New Single For Y-Dot @ GRINDE SEASON STUDIOS - Video