9 replies to this topic

[Force7]

Hi,

 

I am purchasing a domain and am trying to check the history. It looks like it was registered in 2001 and used through 2005.

 

There was a 302 redirect on the site that just went to a page that stated "TOP Searches" Then had a list of categories, Gambling, Shopping, Computers, Finance, under those obvious keyword liks, casinos, blackjack, gamblin.

 

So we know this site had a shady past but here is the question.

 

I used WayBack Machine.

 

Even with a shady past, since it shows 2001-2005, would this have been dropped so far back that it was considered safe now?

 

Or

 Since the last date on WayBack shows 2005, could it have had a robots.txt file that would not let it be indexed by them.  I guess my question is, if they did that, would that cause it to show no activity since 2005, yet maybe it had in reality been active even up until recently?

 

 

Here is the WHOIS History:

We have 42 historical records for xxxxx. The oldest record dates back more than 7 years. There are at least 15 significant changes. All of the records publish domain name ownership data.

 

Any advice based on the history?  I cannot make a mistake, if there is a chance this domain is tainted, I need to move on.

 

Thanks!

Force7

Edited by Force7, 22 January 2013 - 06:53 PM.

[chrishirst]

Why do you want to buy it?

[Force7]

Going to build a brand new website. This domain is perfect because it has a good keyword with pros on the end, example WidgetPros.com  so it should be easy for people to quickly understand what the site is about.  The site will sell a manufacturer's product so we are not looking to build a brand name.

[piskie]

You can check out what the domain has been used for by visiting the WayBack Machine.

http://archive.org/

Then judge for yourself, has it been put to a "Bad Use" or not.

Edited by piskie, 22 January 2013 - 08:20 PM.

[Force7]

That's the point, I would say this one had a shady past. It looks like in 2005 they were probably hit by Google's Big Daddy update where they addressed 302 redirects. Google's Jagger was also released back in 2005 that stopped link farms and paid links which I would guess this website was engaging in.

 

Since it was 6 years I was wondering if anyone thinks it would still carry that shady past or does Google purge the penalty after so many years of a domain being dormant.

 

The second part of the question is, How reliable is the WayBack snapshots, could this domain actually have been live until recently and just a robots.txt file requesting Wayback machine not to index it make it look like the domain was offline?

[harpsound]

Have you searched Google etc for the use of the domain name in text etc?

A 6 year blank would give you a hint of its use/non-use more recently.

[harpsound]

After being threatened by corporate lawyers using Wayback I automatically stop Wayback from functioning on any of our domains.

 

5x images were found by a corporate spider in my website folders that were not in current use either publicly or privately.

They were hosted as part of a short Christmas joke email then forgotten years prior.

Wayback was then used corroborate.

Then threats started rolling in.

 

Glitch on my part.

No more wayback.

Edited by harpsound, 23 January 2013 - 10:13 AM.

[Force7]

After being threatened by corporate lawyers using Wayback I automatically stop Wayback from functioning on any of our domains.

 

5x images were found by a corporate spider in my website folders that were not in current use either publicly or privately.

They were hosted as part of a short Christmas joke email then forgotten years prior.

Wayback was then used corroborate.

Then threats started rolling in.

 

Glitch on my part.

No more wayback.

 

On your domain, when you look it up on "wayback machine", does it show no activity after you blocked it with robots.txt?

 

I am basically trying to see if wayback is even reliable when assuming a domain was not in use.

 

Thanks for the idea of checking for the domain name in text, I did that and it shows no results.

Edited by Force7, 23 January 2013 - 02:12 PM.

[harpsound]

 

You put the code in as per their website instructions and everything about the domain including all previous history disappears - the domain no longer exists in the WB databanks.

 

So if the early history is still there then the code would not have been used latterly.

Please double check this as I am operating on 7 year old memory.

 

 

 

I decided to double check myself.

Almost 4 similar robot.txt files on 4 domains.

Three sites erased but crawls still there without actual on page data.

3-4 year gap in crawls.

One site fully existant even with disallow.

 

S

Edited by harpsound, 24 January 2013 - 04:13 AM.

[Force7]

Thanks so much for checking harpsound!  That definitely helps me with my decision.