Well, it started Sunday when Jay Westerdal wrote a piece about Rick Schwartz, Moniker, and the TRAFFIC conference falsely accusing them of fraud (learn more here). Later when facts came out Jay retracted and publicly apologized.
This morning Rick Schwartz wrote more about these events, trying to recap all these events. Now comes Stephen Douglas, ex employee of Name Intelligence (Jay’s company), and writes this on his new blog:
I feel a great need to clear the air about some lingering misconceptions about my involvement with Jay Westerdal and Name Intelligence, the creators of the currently controversial Domaintools.com.
Jay LOVES to talk about “transparency”? in this business. At the moment, as he tries to brush off the criticism he’s getting for the “negative”? comments he’s made about Marchex, Enom, Snapnames, Moniker, TRAFFIC, Rick Schwartz, and others on his blog, he’s failing to pay me my fair commission as accorded me by my five year contract with Name Intelligence as the executive producer and joint venture partner of the Domain Roundtable Conference.
I want to make it clear to everyone who knows me, or who has met me, either through business or the Domain Roundtable Conference: I NO LONGER WORK FOR JAY WESTERDAL AND NAME INTELLIGENCE. I currently have a lawsuit filed against him for breach of contract and gross underpayment for my commission as accorded me by my contract. I do NOT SUPPORT JAY WESTERDAL or endorse ANY of his posts regarding his judgements of other companies in this industry, many of who he looks at as competitors.
That said, let’s hope my contractual issues with him work out quickly and favorably. I can’t say much more at this point other than Jay and I have severed all ties and I have no negative perceptions of Marchex, Enom, Snapnames, Oversee, Moniker, TRAFFIC nor Rick Schwartz in their concerns and do NOT support Jay in his blog comments or other actions he has taken against any domain industry company or individual. More to come as the situation warrants. Stay tuned.
In Jay’s defense I would say this isn’t the first I heard of an employee in the domain business who breaks up terms with an employer on a bad note, not in the domain business and not in other industries. Matter of fact, it is quite common.
I hope this is all enough Drama for the week but I suspect more will come. This is no fun though and I’d like to move to more productive stories then this. If it continues I may just discontinue reporting these kind of stories altogether and leave it to be covered by other bloggers or industry forums.
I’m two years too late to comment, but I’d still love to do so. I worked for NI a little less than a year before your post. My FIRST impression was that the company was a little slippery. I left on bad terms KNOWING that Westerdal was a class A asshole, Jothan Frakes was a clueless idiot, and that Ray King was also clueless, but a nice enough guy. I’ve read comments here and there King and Westerdal’s companies have little to do with each other; odd since King used to walk into the office in Newcastle (the main office is right on Lake Washington, not that front in Bellvue, yes, I know what I’m talking about)
Westerdal has a dull, sheepish look but know that when he’s looking at you he holds you in contempt, even if your rich and can some how make him money. He feels he’s above everyone else, EVERYONE. Just a genuine ass. Oh, the clowns running Go Daddy are pretty low-rent as well. I got the feeling they were criminals who had some how gotten into the high-tech biz. Don’t do business with any of these people!