Dutch Entrepreneur Auctions the World’s Most Expensive E-mail Address

WebKnowHow
Monday, August 14, 2006; 05:36 AM

A 23-year-old Dutch entrepreneur is auctioning off the world’s most expensive e-mail address, in an attempt to set a world-record. The auction, starting at US $100,000, was inspired by the recent auction of the world’s most expensive phone number; 666 6666, which sold for 10m Qatari riyals or 2.7m US dollars.

Ralph van Troost, from Nuth, the Netherlands, thought that if a record-breaking phone number existed, a record-breaking e-mail address should surely exist too. After some reasearch on the internet, he had to conclude that this wasn’t the case: “Noticing the potential of such an e-mail address, made me decide to take the challenge and try to set this particular world-record.” After the registration of two appropriate domain names and the development of a website, the record attempt was ready to go public.

Ralph said that a record-breaking e-mail address has some very interesting advantages: “Compared to a record-breaking phone number, a record-breaking e-mail address has much more to offer to the winning bidder than just a certain amount of prestigious value. It also offers marketing value and all kinds of commercial opportunities to the winning bidder. Therefor the idea will be much more appealing to businesses rather than to private individuals.”

In order to take full advantage of the marketing value, Ralph promises the winning bidder will get to decide what comes in front of the ‘@’-sign: “This could be for example the name of a company or the name of a private individual. Fact is that the winning bidder will buy himself or his business a place in internet history.”

Businesses or private individuals who want to participate in the auction can register for it at www.TheWorldMostExpensiveEmailAddress.com. The bidding begins on Monday, August 14, 2006 at 00:00:00 GMT +02:00 and ends on Monday, August 28, 2006 at 00:00:00 GMT +02:00. The website’s front page and RSS feed will keep everyone informed about the most recent bid and eventually the highest bid.