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= Top page
= Businesses that claim not to have a Web site
= Self-referential, bogus URLs in advertising
=>Bogus URLs used in media humor
=Other self-referential, bogus URLs
- JanetRenoShowerCam.com
- GetItRightTheFirstTime.com
- www.runningoutofnames.com
- www.FumblingWithACondom.com
- www.spear-a-boar.com
- SHHHH!!! dot com
- www.WhyIsTheShowSoLong.com
- www.fresh-air-and-sunshine.com
- www.SetFireToPilesofMoney.com
- www.ParanoidPsychoticDelusions.com
- www.aintnowebsite.com
- http colon slash slash stab ooh, that really hurts
- www.Send$500You'reSaved.com
[2000-09-08]
Bennett Haselton <bennett at peacefire dot org>
Jay Leno said last night: "Do you know what the most valuable domain name of all time is? Business.com, sold for $7.5 million. Do you know what the least valuable domain name is? JanetRenoShowerCam.com."
Still unregistered at this writing.
[2000-06-05]
Carl Steadman, (Industry Standard columnist) 
In a column titled YourNameHere.com, Steadman offers a tongue-far-in-cheek guide to naming your new dot-com. D'oh! Both of these names have been claimed. YourNameHere.com sells cute email addresses; GetItRightTheFirstTime.com is currently parked.
[2000-05-01]
Joe Williams, (St. Louis [MO] Post-Dispatch columnist)
In a column titled www.runningoutofnames.com, Williams tells of his chagrin as first joewilliams.com, then joewilliams.net, and finally joewilliams.org were claimed while he stood idly by. At this writing the domain name is available.
[2000-04-17]
Bennett Haselton <bennett at peacefire dot org>
When it was announced that two teenagers were going to lose their virginity on OurFirstTime.com (and before people found out it was a scam), David Letterman said on his show:
In a few days, two teenagers are planning to become the first couple to lose their virginity in a live broadcast over the Internet. I believe you'll find them at www.FumblingWithACondom.com.
The domain name is available as of 2000-05-01.
[2000-04-17]
Bennett Haselton <bennett at peacefire dot org>
In one of his columns Dave Barry wrote:
In the old days, when the Mud People needed food, they had to manually throw spears at wild boars; whereas today they simply get on the Internet, go to www.spear-a-boar.com and click their mouse a few times (the Mud People use actual mice).
10 months after the column was published, Spear-A-Boar.com registered to Shaun Ivory, and now redirects traffic to ivory.org. This is (at least) the third time a Dave Barry column's bogus name has been pressed into service to direct traffic to someone's site. The first such was the hijacking of aintnowebsite.com by none other than our informant Bennett Haselton, who redirected its traffic to his Peacefire site. (Either Barry never learns or he doesn't mind.) As of last September, Hasleton switched the redirect to an automated Dave Barry column generator.
[2000-04-17]
Bennett Haselton <bennett at peacefire dot org>
In "Austin Powers 2: The Spy Who Shagged Me," Dr. Evil tells his son to shut up in several creative ways, one of which is "dubya-dubya-dubya dot SHHHH!!! dot com!!" (Shh.com, shhh.com, shhhh.com and shhhhh.com are all registered to different people; the first one available now is shhhhhh.com.)
[2000-03-24]
Bennett Haselton <bennett at peacefire dot org>
Bennett runs the censorware watchdog site Peacefire. He is no stranger to bogus and self-referential URLs, having scooped up one documented here -- www.aintnowebsite.com -- to redirect visitors to Peacefire. WhyIsTheShowSoLong.com was registered as a place where people could submit jokes for Billy Crystal to use at the 1998 Oscars. Crystal said that out of 40,000 submitted, he ended up using 3.
[1999-08-20]
Trevor Green <tgreen at colognere dot com>
Mr. Green sent a Randy Glasbergen cartoon in which a concerned supervisor urges an overworked employee to unwind by visiting www.fresh-air-and-sunshine.com.
[1999-08-15]
Ann Wendell <annw at oz dot net>
Another Dave Barry column, Be an Internet millionaire and we may like you, explains how "everybody" is getting rich off the Internet. (Barry notes that by "everybody" he means "not you.")
If you started a company called Set Fire To Piles of Money.com, they'd be beating down your door.
(Linda Kerr <lkerr at efn dot org> writes to note that www.SetFireToPilesofMoney.com has already been pressed into service, by a Web designer in Illinois named Glenn Powers.)
This Dave Barry column also provides one of the better strategic-overview definitions of the Internet:
What, exactly, is the Internet? Basically it is a global network exchanging digitized data in such a way that any computer, anywhere, that is equipped with a device called a modem can make a noise like a duck choking on a kazoo. This is called logging on and once you are logged on you can move the pointer of your mouse to a hyperlink and simply by clicking on it, change your pointer to an hourglass. Then you can go to lunch and when you come back, there, on your computer screen, as if by magic, will be at least 14 advertisements related to Beanie Babies (which currently are the foundation of the entire world economy). This entire process takes place in less time than it takes for a sperm whale to give birth to twins.
[1999-08-02]
Herbert Hille <hhil at loc dot gov>
This is the whimsical title that Randy Cassingham gave to an item in his engaging periodical This Is True, recounting medical research claiming that the Internet is beginning to figure in the fantasies of delusional patients.
A very mainstream sighting for this meme appeared in the Sunday Boston Globe for July 4, 1999. The nationally syndicated humor columnnist Dave Barry closes this week's column, "Moot Points," with: "Got a question for Mister Language Person? Visit his Web site at www.aintnowebsite.com." Mr. Barry probably wrote this column several weeks ago, and may have checked at the time whether such a site existed. It didn't until 28 June, when the name was registered to Bennett Hazelton, whose Peacefire site was one of the first to expose the excesses of "censorware" filtering programs. Visitors to www.aintnowebsite.com are redirected to Peacefire.
[1999-04-24]
Simon Whitaker <simon at netcetera dot org>
I was listening to a comedian on the radio recently and he was talking about the Internet. He suggested that if the Kray twins (notoriously brutal 1960s London gangsters) had a website it would be at http colon slash slash stab ooh, that really hurts.
[1998-12-09]
Alex Beam in the Boston Globe
Beam parodies a bragging holiday letter in his 9dec98 column. Of course you can't get a domain name that contains dollar signs and apostrophies, but Beam may not know this and anyway it would diminish his column's punch.
My new business? Pure gravy! Not too many people noticed the Pope's recent announcement that the Catholic Church will be granting indulgences again, to celebrate the Year 2000 Jubilee. Guess what? I've landed the New England franchise! When my Web site www.Send$500You'reSaved.com goes up, we'll be millionaires!
