GoDaddy Doesn’t Care About You
If you've ever owned a domain before you've gotten the email. The company you registered your domain with sends out an annual ICANN notice making sure your contact information is up to date. And chances are, if you own a domain name, you probably used the largest registrar in the world: GoDaddy.
Here are the first two instructions given in the email:
- Go to http://www.godaddy.com/default.aspx?isc=ICANN99ad
- Click on the "ICANN Domain Confirmation" icon at the top of the page.
Fine, GoDaddy, let's do that. Step 1 we see…
...HOLY FUCK, be calm, be calm, step 2. Wait where is step 2 in all this madness? Ok, the email says top of the page.
Oh there it is. Of course! This proves a point which hardly needs proving. I'm really not saying anything that hasn't already been said, but here goes:
GoDaddy sucks at design
Shocking, I know, but what's more important is why GoDaddy sucks at design. And I don't mean "why" as in: because they have no whitespace, they try to cram a million text links in a small space, or the color scheme is awful. We all know that. I mean the "why" that becomes evident when you reread those first two steps.
GoDaddy sucks at design on purpose
Step 1, click a link. Step 2, click a link on the page from Step 1. Why doesn't GoDaddy just give you the confirmation link in Step 1 instead of giving you written instructions to click something? If you try you might be able to come up with some theoretical technical reasons for this, but when you look at the reality of the page the answer is clearly: "There's no fucking reason."
Well, there is a reason. GoDaddy is trying to make money. They want you to go to their homepage, see it, and click on something. They do not care if you actually check your contact information. Legally, all they need to do is provide a means to update, and beyond that the ball is in your court. So GoDaddy has decided to use a mandatory legal notice as a way to market to you. And market to you sleazily.
So now you can probably see why their design has to suck on purpose. If it was good their technique wouldn't work. If the ICANN confirmation link were made obvious I wouldn't have taken 2 minutes to read every damn bit of text on the page, skimming over tens or hundreds of products, offers, specials, deals, and banned TV commercials, just to find the link I needed.
Good for them. I hope this kind of shit makes GoDaddy a fuckload of money. But it's filth like this that will always keep GoDaddy relegated, for me, to a cheap place to buy domains from time to time.
Comments
You wont need to drop GoDaddy as your host, just probably stop using their web builder thingy. For the flash page you'll need a few things setup and a tiny bit if training, I'm guessing. You could always hire your son, but I hear he's expensive ;)
Yeah I could hire my son....I think I could afford him but even if I could I hear he is pretty busy...pretty booked...!
LOL This writing of yours couldn't have come at a better time becaue I am frustrated with website tonight ( my web builder through godaddy - though I DID get my domain name cheap through them). I want to buy a flash template (since I don't have the flash program or know how to make one) get what photos and info what I want on the flash template then upload it to my webpage WHICH I know I am going to need something called a FTP (yes I know- file transfer protocol) and this means canning godadd and getting a different host... any suggestions? Oh yeah and I haven't clue the process for all this flash website/ftp stuff!