You're never going to win our hearts or minds here. MT is dead to me now.

There is no one web technology professionals hate more in the world than GoDaddy. I can't think of a vendor I despise more.

Also I'm an MT customer of 8 years and probably referred tens of thousands of business to MT over the last decade. Dead to me. Thats how much I hate GoDaddy.

"There is no one web technology professionals hate more in the world than GoDaddy."

By the way back in the day, before there was a godaddy and during godaddy's rise to "power" that crown (as a despired domain registrar) went to Network Solutions.

I wonder how many HN'ers are aware of that?

What was weird about Network Solutions was that they were much more expensive than their competitors, yet much worse than their competitors. I didn't know anyone who used them, and I'm surprised to learn that they still exist.

Seriously? Network Solutions was the original domain registrar.

Original and only prior to ICANN.

Original price of a domain: free

Next price point a bit later $100: 2 years min ($50 per year)

Next a bit later $70: 2 years min ($35 per year)

Then came competition and prices dropped.

Little known fact: The first registrars that were accredited had to certify that they had no criminal record (any of the officers) and had to be a corporation and post $100,000 bond as well as other hurdles which were all put in place by Network Solutions to limit competition.

Out of NSI came Verisign which had to erect a "chinese wall" (iirc) in order to separate the "registry" from the "registrar". Verisign of course ended up selling off NS.

I remember calling up Network Solutions on the phone to pay for a domain, because they had no e-commerce functionality! This was around 1997ish. I had several "free" domains from the 1993-94 era.

Yep and they sent out these paper invoices and gave people credit when they registered. So much profit they could afford to not get paid in many cases once they started to charge for the domains. I also remember (as I'm sure you) some billings going out with ads for branded tshirts with their name on it and some other swag.

I still don't like Network Solutions but it's so rare that I run into anyone using their services it has become a non issue.

Sure, as someone above mentioned though, unfortunately GoDaddy is a toxic brand. I do NOT want to be associated with a brand that doesn't support net neutrality and was in favor of SOPA and PIPA. I'm sure you guys will do fine anyway, but I'm pretty sad I'm going to probably have to abandon MediaTemple in the long run....

I think you'll find the negative response from developers to be way larger than you anticipated. (Otherwise, you probably wouldn't have gone through with this.)

I still respected MT for their independence, even if the service was unbearable for a few years there. You were just starting to earn a good reputation again, now you're right back in the dark days.