1. Sex.com – Sold for: $14 million on January 19th, 2006
2. Fund.com – $9,999,950 – Sold in 2008
3. Porn.com – Sold for $9,500,000 sometime in 2007
4. Business.com – Sold for $7,500,000 in 1999
5. Diamonds.com – Sold for $7,500,000
6. Beer.com – Sold for $7,000,000
7. Casino.com – $5,500,000 – Sold to a private company in 2003
8. Toys.com $5.1M sold to Toys R Us
9. AsSeenOnTV.com – Sold for $5,100,000 in January of 2000
10. Korea.com – $5,000,000 – Sold in January of 2000
11. SEO.com – $5,000,000
12. FreePorn.com – $4,000,000 – Sold in February 2008
13. YP.com – $3,850,000 – Sold to YellowPages.com
14. Shop.com – Sold for $3,500,000 in 2001
15. WorldWideWeb.com – $3,500,000 in 1996
16. AltaVista.com – $3,250,000
17. Software.com – $3,200,000
18. Candy.com – $3,000,000 Sold in March 2009.
19. CreditCheck.com – $3,000,000 -Sold in June 2007
20. Loans.com – $3,000,000

Top 20 most expensive domain names is a post from: Top Business Opportunities

Wealthy punters pay £3,500 per day to patrol the most dangerous waters in the world hoping to be attacked by raiders.

“They are worse than the pirates,” said Russian yachtsman Vladimir Mironov. “At least the pirates have the decency to take hostages, these people are just paying to commit murder,” he continued.

When attacked, they retaliate with grenade launchers, machine guns and rocket launchers, reports Austrian business paper Wirtschaftsblatt.

Passengers, who can pay an extra £5 a day for an AK-47 machine gun and £7 for 100 rounds of ammo, are also protected by a squad of ex special forces troops.

ananova.com

Luxury yachts offer pirate hunting cruises is a post from: Top Business Opportunities

Shreelaxmi Suresh received recognition for her work after she developed a website for Kerala Bar Council, located in the country’s south.

The youngster has displayed a keen interest in computers and art since she was in Kindergarten.

With a little assistance from her father, Shreelaxmi managed to find a ‘knack’ for web design.

At the age of eight, Shreelaxmi had already created the official website of her school, a website for deaf people and a news website for children written in Malayalam language.

Her newest creation, The Kerala Bar Council site, aims to update people on legal matters and offer free legal aid through the website.

bigpondnews.com

Nine-year-old starts up web business is a post from: Top Business Opportunities

Pet Living Wills cost $49 per yearly membership for one pet, and $39 for each additional pet. Pet parents can log on and access their Pet Living Wills at any time to reflect changes in their pets medical needs; which also gives partnering vets virtual access to the most up to date information. That way, if someone else has to take your beloved fur baby to the vet due to a medical issue, you’ll only be stuck with a bill that’s in line with treatment that you would have chosen for your dog or cat.

It’s certainly a unique business, but it’s up to you to decide if Pet Living Wills are worthwhile; or if written instructions left with a pet-sitter, boarder or vet would suffice.

inventorspot.com

Niche Business In Living Wills For Your Dog Or Cat is a post from: Top Business Opportunities

This breakthrough technology promises to generate huge savings for the cost of live fish shipment where it will eliminate the use of water which consists of 75% of the weight, improve the survival and appearance of fishes in tanks, save on fresh fish shipment (50% on weight of ice), better fish meat quality in taste and appearance and minimize stress and prevent onset of Rigor Mortis or stiffening of the flesh.

This world-class inventor from Siquijor province even successfully tested the waterless live fish technology on salmon (10 to 12 hours of transport time), abalone (14 to 18 hours) and yellowfin tuna in his research works in Australia.

As president of Buhi Marine Worldwide Suply, Inc., his list of clients in the country includes Saranggani Farms, Vitarich and Century PG. His company provides service for live fish transport without water.

BFAR National Director Malcolm I. Sarmiento, Jr, said that this technology is a major breakthrough for the fisheries sector having witnessed it with his own eyes although he said that continuous tests will be conducted to ensure that no harmful residues are found. The initial laboratory tests of the Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources (BFAR) in validating this technology including necropsy and hispathology showed no traces of toxins or abnormalities on the fishes.

Moreover, BFAR Regional Director Dennis del Socorro intends to tie-up with Mr. Comandante’s technological innovations to be tested and introduced in Bicol Region. They made this agreement when they met recently when the latter presented his technology with Bicolano researchers and fisherfolk in Albay and Camarines Sur respectively.

Comandante is an Agricultural Engineer (2nd placer in the Licensure Exam) from University of the Philippines and holds Masters Degree in Economics from Asian Social Institute(ASI) and Costal Resources Management from Siliman University. He is also a candidate for PhD in Marine Biology and currently taking up PhD in Applied Cosmic Anthropology.

Among the awards he reaped for his innovations are: Finalist in the World Bank Development Market Place in Washington D.C., USA (2007); Winner at the Philippine Emerging Start-ups Open Biz Plan Challenge (2007); Winner at the World Bank Development Panibagong Paraan in Manila (2006); Pillar of Agricultural Development Award by the Department of Agriculture (2006); Inventor’s Award by the Galing Pilipino Movement (2006); Best International Business Award by the University of San Francisco USA (2005); Outstanding Creative Research Award by the Department of Science and Technology (2005); and Innovations Award by the Department of Trade and Industry (2005). He was also featured in the Go Negosyo Book of 2007 as one of the 50 Successful Filipino Entrepreneurs with inspiring stories. On June 6-9, 2009 he will participate as contestant on a research paper competition at the International Institute on Food Technologists in Anaheim, California, USA with his research work on Innovations for Philippine Hand Line Tuna Fishermen and the Sashimi Trade.

bfar.da.gov.ph

Filipino invention lets fish live without water is a post from: Top Business Opportunities

(Fortune Small Business) — A year ago Kris Drey couldn’t care less about Twitter. With 13 years of Web site experience, Drey is no technophobe. He serves as vice president of product marketing at Fliqz, an online video-hosting service with 20 employees in Emeryville, Calif. But when he first skimmed Twitter, the popular micromessaging service launched in 2007, Drey saw a lot of mindless chatter and very little that seemed useful to a video business.

Still, with the economy taking a dive, Drey persisted. He was looking for ways to spread the word about Fliqz without spending any more of his maxed-out $15,000 marketing budget. Not only was Twitter the fastest-growing social media service around — its user base grew by a whopping 1,841% in 2008, to 14 million — but it also wouldn’t cost him a dime.

“The only overhead is your time,” says Drey, 40. “You need to pay attention.”

He did just that. Drey started posting three or four updates a day as @Fliqz (all Twitter IDs start with “@”) and subscribed to (or “followed”) the 140-character updates (or “tweets”) of anyone he could find who seemed interested in the online video industry, even if the person was just posting links to stories on blogs. One Saturday afternoon Drey spotted a Twitter post from a Fliqz customer who was having trouble encoding video. After exchanging a couple of tweets with him, Drey called the customer on the phone, figured out that the guy had a corrupted file and fixed the problem. The customer posted a tweet of happy surprise.

Tweeting for profit is a post from: Top Business Opportunities

A new knife, meant to make impulse stabbings of a co-worker or a spouse more difficult, is ready for the market.

Manufactured by Taylor’s Eye Witness (a cutlery company whose amazingly apt name is a total coincidence), the New Point has a dulled leading tip that keeps the knife edge from striking anyone. The actual blade tip is recessed, so that it snaps on clothes before it can do serious damage. Seems like a hoax, right? Maybe not. The designer, John Cornock, says he was inspired to invent the knife because of a BBC report that showed an unusually high number of fatal stabbings in Britain, which called out long kitchen knives as being the weapon of choice. One doctor, responded–with total sincerity–by saying that pointed knives should be banned. Cornock thus responded with his “more considered” solution.

fastcompany.com

An Anti-Stab Knife is a post from: Top Business Opportunities

McDonalds Fries after 10 Weeks is a post from: Top Business Opportunities

So before you go, you can at least arrange for a memorable send off.

One company in England has taken that directive quite literally to heart, creating a bizarre new business that sits on the tentative border between creativity and extreme bad taste.

Vic Fearn and Company is a 160-year-old entity that makes coffins. That doesn’t sound terribly exciting, but recent customers may make you think twice about that impression.

They’ve been coming in asking for exotic caskets to be buried in to reflect their passions in life.

It started with an odd request from a woman who was a big fan of the Royal Air Force’s acrobatic team the Red Arrows. She wanted to be interred forever in a model of one of their fighters.
“So we constructed this plane with folding wings like they have on aircraft carriers,” recalls company director David Crampton. “The cockpit of a plane is more or less coffin-shaped so that made life easier.”

Once word spread about the custom casket, more people decided to plan for their own demise and do it Frank Sinatra-style – my way.

What other requests have they been asked to fill?

One man wanted to be laid to rest in a canal long boat. “That caused friction with his wife so we had to build one for her as well,” Crampton reveals.

Then there’s the hospice nurse who’s having a pink ballet shoe made for her final exit.

A town crier will be buried in a coffin shaped like a bell. “He wants to go out with a bong,” Crampton jokes, a punchline in an industry not known for its humour.

Another client is having a scaled down model of a 1913 Rolls-Royce Silver Ghost built. It comes with wheels so pall bearers can simply push it along.

Then there’s the one in the shape of a giant electric guitar – with strings attached.

Another resembles a large sports bag (top left), a demand from a cricket fan. (It includes its own wickets.)

There’s a box-kite shaped coffin that puts the dearly departed in the middle.

A skateboard container, complete with a skeleton-like rider on its surface, appeals to the crowd who may be too young to die.

The “egg” is self explanatory, although it might be hard to carry.

One that Canadians will no doubt appreciate is a giant beer can with a corkscrew on one end.

A sledge coffin comes with fake feet sticking out of the end of it.

And in the height of questionable appropriateness, there’s even a coffin shaped like an industrial garbage container.

You’ll pay a lot extra for these final resting places, of course, but they’ve become something of a sensation in Europe. So much so that many have been put on display in touring shows at art galleries.

And they’ve brought light to an industry normally filled with solemn gloom.

“Making an unusual crazy coffin is great for the staff,” agrees Crampton. “It gives them a chance to test their skills and joinery expertise. It can create some fun in the shop.”

Which just proves nothing is sacred any more – even in the coffin making business.

“We are less lugubrious nowadays,” the director admits. “It is a changing profession and I like to believe we are fashion-driven.”

To see some of the ‘crazy coffins’ for yourself, click here and here.

citynews.com

“Crazy Coffins” A New Booming Business In England is a post from: Top Business Opportunities

ast month Telus, Canada’s second-largest wireless operator, quietly tried to do something that no other North American rival has done: sell pornography. But when The New York Times detailed the new service Monday, the backlash from religious groups and Telus subscribers was swift.

By Wednesday, Telus (Charts) pulled the plug on its incipient porn play. In press reports, company executives seemed nonplussed by the public outrage, noting that the company’s television unit carries adult channels with no fuss.

“There was certainly a fairly significant amount of surprise and a lack of awareness that the Internet had arrived on cellphones,” spokesman Jim Johannsson told the Edmonton Sun.

For Telus, its venture into adult content came to an end almost as quickly as it began. Notably, though, company officials left open the possibility that the carrier would sell smut in the future.

Read the entire article here.

Selling sex on cells is a post from: Top Business Opportunities

1. Jeff Bezos, Amazon.com
   because “optimism is essential”
2. Betsey Johnson, Betsey Johnson
   for her stylish life
3. Russell Simmons, Rush Communications
   for his powerful example
4. Scott Cook, Intuit
   because he learns, and teaches
5. Sergey Brin & Larry Page, Google
   for their integrity. And, well, for Google
6. David Neeleman, JetBlue
   for creating an airline fit for humans
7. Tom Stemberg, Staples
   for doing it exactly right
8. Jack Stack, SRC Holdings
   for going naked
9. Judy Wicks, White Dog Enterprises
   because she’s put in place more progressive business practices per square foot than any other entrepreneur
10. Davin Wedel, Global Protection
    because he’s a lifesaver
11. Pat McGovern, International Data Group
    for knowing the power of respect
12. Steve Jobs, Apple Computer, Pixar
    because we like to be seduced
13. Lance Morgan, Ho-Chunk
    because a man must make his own arrows–Winnebago proverb
14. James Goodnight, SAS
    for saying no to Wall Street (repeatedly) and yes to the people who really matter
15. Stella Ogiale, Chesterfield Health Services
    for doing good while doing well
16. Rhonda Kallman, New Century Brewing
    for seizing opportunity– again and again
17. Laima Tazmin, LAVT
    because she’s a lot like other kids–and then again…
18. Laura & Pete Wakeman, Great Harvest Bread
    for living a little –no, a lot
19. Andra Rush, Rush Trucking
    for rolling up her sleeves
20. Kathleen Wehner, Cirrus Aviation
    for refusing to quit
21. Frank Venegas, Ideal Group
    because he parlayed a little bit of luck into a lot of good fortune for others
22. Dan Wieden, Wieden + Kennedy
    because he’s a true independent
23. John Sperling, Apollo Group
    because he stirs the pot, and apparently always will
24. John Stollenwerk, Allen-Edmonds
    for his commitment to U.S. workers. We also love the shoes
25. Mel Zuckerman, Canyon Ranch
    for showing the way

25 Most Fascinating Entrepreneurs is a post from: Top Business Opportunities

Second Life is a place where anyone can have just that. It is a richly detailed virtual world where anything a computer programmer can imagine can exist: There are minutely detailed replicas of Rockefeller Center and human-size raccoons; sex and sadism and spiritual retreats; conference calls and a currency exchange. Almost all of it is created by the people who pay to dwell in it. Linden Lab, the San Francisco company that created and owns Second Life, acts as a sort of laissez-faire government. It makes money primarily by selling property, of which it can conjure an infinite amount.

What’s real is that Second Life is a haven for entrepreneurs, with thousands of businesses selling things ranging from clothes to office buildings to body parts. Business is conducted in Linden dollars, but those can be cashed for cold, hard credit card credits. The in-world economy is now clipping along at $10 million–those are U.S. dollars–a month. Big companies are popping up, too, experimenting with what might be a look at tomorrow’s three-dimensional Web.

inc.com

Second Life, Haven for Entrepreneurs is a post from: Top Business Opportunities

Eternal Reefs is the only company in the world that mixes the ashes of cremated people into cement to form “reef balls,” which they then lower into the ocean to help create habitats for marine life. While it certainly sounds strange, it helps if you think of it as a way of creating something that does something good for the environment–offering marine life a home that replaces the dying coral reefs.

Long-time good friends Frankel and Bawley often went diving together in the Florida Keys. They quickly noticed how the area’s reefs were deteriorating and began organizing volunteers to create reef balls–structures made of natural resources that provide homes for coral and microorganisms. Then, in 1998, Brawley’s father-in-law got sick. “He knew his time was limited,” says Frankel, “and he really wanted his cremated remains to be in a reef.” After a funeral director gave Brawley the ashes, he remembered his father-in-law’s request, and from his death, a new company was born.

“We definitely get one of two responses,” reports Frankel. “Either their eyes light up and they get it right away. Or they don’t think we’re serious.” Generally, Frankel says, if somebody isn’t excited about the idea, they often say, “That’s not really for me, but I know someone it would be perfect for.”

entrepreneur.com

From Ashes to Fishes is a post from: Top Business Opportunities

Rebecca Rescate found her niche the way so many entrepreneurs do: She had a need and nobody was filling it. Rescate and her husband, Christian, had moved from Pennsylvania to New York City with their cat, Samantha, into a very small apartment. They really didn’t have space for a cat litter box—or the odor it generated. Rescate had heard about the concept of training a cat to use a toilet, and there were two products on the market to help felines do just that, but they weren’t what she wanted. So Rescate developed a gadget that actually teaches a cat to do his business on the toilet. After a few weeks, the gadget can be thrown away, and pet kitties can relieve themselves on the regular toilet.

“I got a lot of people who rolled their eyes,” Rescate admits. “They’d just look and me and say, ‘Whatever you want to do.’” But once friends and family who had cats heard about it, they all wanted one. So Rescate launched her business part time and kept her day job–until Good Morning America featured her on the show and pet blogs began talking about her. “It was something that became an immediate success, so I handed in my resignation,” says Rescate, who had been working at a tech company.

Educating the public. “Very few people know about this,” says Rescate. “And the people who do know about it often think it’s a joke, that nobody can really toilet train their cat. It’s really hard to get people to understand that you can.”

entrepreneur.com

Cats Toilet-Training Business is a post from: Top Business Opportunities

Henderson-Townsend’s company rents and sells mannequin body parts.

When she first started, Henderson-Townsend mostly kept her company a secret. “I didn’t tell my parents at first because I knew they wouldn’t get it,” she says. She even named her business Mannequin Madness because she knew she was “either mad for doing this–or I’d found a really crazy niche in a unique market.” Now that she’s been in business awhile, she says, “People look at you differently. Before, it was ‘What are you doing?’ Now they look at you like, ‘Wow, why didn’t I think of that?’ ”

Henderson-Townsend’s clients run the gamut, from lawyers who buy mannequins from her so they can demonstrate to juries how a victim was shot or stabbed to movie companies and museums that need them for display purposes. One customer won an Elton John jacket at an auction and wanted the upper torso of a mannequin so he could display the jacket in his dining room. She’s also sold them to clothing entrepreneurs who sell their products on eBay and want to display the clothes for photographs.

entrepreneur.com

Mannequin Madness is a post from: Top Business Opportunities

Grinnell’s shop, Mischief, is in Second Life, a virtual world whose users are responsible for creating all content. Grinnell’s digital clothing and “skins” allow users to change the appearance of their avatars — their online representations — beyond their wildest Barbie dress-up dreams.

Within a month, Grinnell was making more in Second Life than in her real-world job as a dispatcher. And after three months she realized she could quit her day job altogether.

Now Second Life is her primary source of income, and Grinnell, whose avatar answers to the name Janie Marlowe, claims she earns more than four times her previous salary.

Grinnell isn’t alone. Artists and designers, landowners and currency speculators, are turning the virtual environment of Second Life into a real-world profit center.

wired.com

Making a Living in Second Life is a post from: Top Business Opportunities

They run a pooper scooper business. Let’s be real clear about this: Their company sends employees out into yards across communities to pick up dog poop.

“When we first started, ‘disbelief’ would be the way to put it,” says Jacob, “disbelief bordering on pity.” When he told his employer he was quitting his job to run his pooper scooper business full time, she told him, “If you need to come back, just let me know.” Susan’s mother was at first in denial that her daughter was planning on marrying a man whose future lay in dog poop.

The D’Aniellos have been so successful, they now have seven employees and five franchises. Their franchise fee is $20,000, and in case you’re wondering what you get for that, DoodyCalls provides computer software and call-center services as well as marketing and PR help, and everything else you’d expect to get with a franchise. Besides actually finding five people to sign on as franchisees, what’s odder still is, they aren’t alone. Poop scooping is a growing business trend, from Pet Butler and its 42 U.S. franchises to a teenager in the Seattle area who runs a part-time service called TurdsbytheYard.com.

Nature Calls–And They Clean It Up is a post from: Top Business Opportunities

The simple fact is, Jerry Turner’s company is a cleaning company. The twist is what they clean up. Cleaning up after murders and suicides is one of their specialties, but they also handle meth labs and fecal matter and urine, something you might find in the house or apartment of a former tenant who had a few too many pets.

How Turner got started: As a serial entrepreneur-this is his eighth business-Turner’s always on the lookout for a great opportunity. His first company, which he started when he was 18, was a landscaping firm. His last business before this was as an independent insurance agent. A few years ago, Turner read an article about crime scene cleanup and decided to start his own company because of “the money aspect, to be truthful,” he says. “I don’t like to work–or I don’t want to work my whole life.

Turner never really knows how much an assignment will cost until he or his crew of 13 employees finishes a job. “Let’s say this guy’s been killed in the kitchen,” says Turner, very matter-of-factly. “There’s blood on the baseboard–or has it actually seeped under the baseboard? And maybe it’s gotten under the vinyl floor covering. And if it has, maybe the fluid has mitigated into the sub floor, and so let’s say you cut that apart–maybe it’s reached the second sub floor. It may have migrated to the ceiling below. It’s impossible to know, until you know what you’re dealing with.”

A list of Advanced Bio Treatment‘s services:

1. Crime Scene Clean Up
2. Meth Lab Clean Up
3. Unattended Death Scenes
4. Animal – Filth Clean-Ups
5. Other Bio-Hazardous Materials
6. Human Decomposition
7. Disposal of Bio-Waste
8. Insurance Claims Accepted

entrepreneur.com

Murder Scene Mop-Up is a post from: Top Business Opportunities