 Wayne Rooney may be hitting the back of the net on the field in Euro 2004, but he is alsohammering it homewhen it comes todomain nameregistrations.
The young England star ison the verge of stealingMichael Owen's second place on the domain name chart, says web registration firm NetNames. England's hero already has 10 domains in his name, one behind Michael Owen. Even Sven Goran Eriksson has four. David Beckham still heads the field though, with 111 registered domains.
It is not just because they are good footballers either, it is becausecelebritiesand sports stars are increasingly becominglucrative"brands" in their own right, according to NetNames' Jonathan Robinson. Sites like Rooney Lookalike, which has been registered since January 2004, is just a taster of what is being created off the back of the striker's success. "What's fascinating to me is that the minute a brand or football star attracts attention, domain names just start 'happening'," Mr Robinson told reporters. "The key thing is that the domain name registration immediately picks up when the brand is news." People tend to associate fame with money, which drives many speculative web entrepreneurs to the net. NetNames has ways of tracking the volume of domain names registered on the net, using their own auditing software. Although this phenomenon is not new, Mr Robinson warns that celebrities and their crews of agents have to become more websavvywhen it comes to claiming a bit of the net for themselves quickly. "It has been something that has been prevalent for a while, but increasingly there is this concept of URLs and domain names being used for specific product launches," he said. The youth market in particular is very often the first to look to the web to find information on a product or celebrities. If they do not move quickly, they may have their name hijacked by someone else who could cash in on the name. "Many rising football stars have the potential to become huge brands in their own right, so they need to start protecting their online identitiesearly onin their careers," he said. (Agencies)
| 韋恩·魯尼不僅在2004年歐錦賽賽場上屢次洞破對方的球門，他的名字更成為人們爭相注冊的網(wǎng)絡(luò)域名。 網(wǎng)絡(luò)注冊公司NetNames稱，在域名表上這位年輕的英格蘭明星差點(diǎn)就超過目前排在第二位的邁克爾·歐文。 已經(jīng)有10個域名用了這位英格蘭英雄的名字，比邁克爾·歐文只少一個。即使是斯文·戈倫·愛瑞克森也只有四個域名。大衛(wèi)·貝克漢姆仍然高居榜首，擁有111個注冊域名。 據(jù)NetNames公司的喬納森·羅賓森說，這不僅因?yàn)樗麄兪莾?yōu)秀的足球運(yùn)動員，而且名人和體育明星憑借自身的實(shí)力越來越成為有利可圖的“品牌”。 一些站點(diǎn)只是回顧這個球場前鋒成功背后的故事，比如注冊于2004年1月的Rooney Lookalike網(wǎng)站。 羅賓森告訴記者說：“令我著迷的是某品牌或足球明星開始吸引眾人目光的時候，域名就開始出現(xiàn)了。關(guān)鍵是當(dāng)這個品牌成為新聞時，其域名注冊跟著就多起來。” 人們往往將名譽(yù)和財(cái)富聯(lián)系在一起，這使得很多網(wǎng)絡(luò)投機(jī)商涌向這個領(lǐng)域。 NetNames公司使用自己的審查軟件，有辦法跟蹤網(wǎng)上注冊域名的數(shù)量。盡管這種現(xiàn)象已不再新鮮，羅賓森先生還是提醒說當(dāng)名人和他們的代理公司想要很快為他們自己注冊網(wǎng)站域名時，他們不得不對網(wǎng)絡(luò)有更多的了解。 羅賓森先生說：“域名注冊如今已經(jīng)很流行了，但是將URL和域名用于特殊產(chǎn)品發(fā)布這種概念逐漸出現(xiàn)。” 對青年市場來說尤為如此，年輕人通常是最早上網(wǎng)尋找某種產(chǎn)品或某個明星信息的群體。 如果名人不趕快注冊，他們的名字就會被別人搶先注冊，然后再利用注冊的名字來賺錢。 羅賓森先生說：“很多有前途的足球明星憑借自身的實(shí)力有潛力成為知名品牌，所以他們應(yīng)當(dāng)在職業(yè)生涯中盡早保護(hù)他們網(wǎng)上的身份。” hammer something home:進(jìn)一步強(qiáng)調(diào)
domain name:域名
on the verge of :接近于，瀕臨
steal:偷偷地奪取，巧取；獲得，贏得
celebrity:名人
lucrative:有利可圖的
savvy:有見識的
early on:在早期 （中國日報(bào)網(wǎng)站譯）
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Updated: 2004-06-25 01:00
