Pioneer on the Internet – Sean Gursky

What is in a name? When it comes to marketing a brand or an identity the consensus is to come up with something and stick with it. Over the last few months I have been struggling with my online identity, but it has recently come to a head. Ask someone what my Last.fm profile name is, chances are three suggestions will come back. That is not how you stay brand consistent.

In 2005 I registered seagurs.com and used that as my online profile, however the use of the name was very limited. Besides the website it was only used as my Gamertag on Xbox360 and, most recently, on the Playstation PSN network. Could I really be identified as ‘seagurs’ elsewhere? Would it be a more appropriate and identifiable online identity than I realized?

For almost every other site or account I would go with ‘gursky’. It is an obvious nickname, usually unused when I register it on other sites. When Facebook launched vanity URL’s for user profile pages I began to wonder how I should be identified online. Would I go with ‘seagurs’, ‘gursky’ or something else? In the end I decided to go for something generic, but accurate name and claimed ‘seangursky‘.

The purpose of this post, and the reason behind this whole identity crisis, began when I was looking to create my custom URL on Flickr. Instead of being identified by numbers and letters I could use a name. I have been a member of Flickr for as long as I had a domain name but never knew they released custom URL’s. I was late to the gold rush but I had the intentions of registering ‘gursky‘. However, someone with a screen name not of gursky beat me to it.

What was I to do? This is Facebook all over again, do I go with ‘seagurs’ or ‘seangursky’ or something else? Ultimately I went with ‘seangursky‘ and began to wonder if I made the right choice.

I can change my Flickr screen name to reflect my custom URL, but that feels like I am giving up on an identity battle, however it is confusing to have a screen name different from the custom URL. Facebook, Flickr and Last.fm all have usernames that cannot be changed; but only last.fm is without my given name and just stands as ‘gursky’.

Only a few sites will allow me to change my name (like Twitter), but I guess the question is this: If the site allows it, should I move my identity over to ‘seangursky’? Or should there be a conscience split where social networking sites have one name but the rest don’t? Is it easy to define what is a social networking site and what isn’t?

I am at a crossroad. No matter which direction I go there will be old left overs (Xbox 360 and PSN under ‘seagurs’ and Facebook, Flickr and Last.fm under variations of my name) but which path is the right one to take?

I do not have an attachment to ‘seagurs’. It is a convenient combination of my first and last name, but is that enough to making it more prominent? Is the full name necessary? I have come to grips that I will never be the only ‘gursky’ online so perhaps this is how I can separate myself from them?

There is little to report, but like a presentation being better with PowerPoint, I decided to dress up this entry with some images to assist in my story.

Extreme Prize

I completed an online survery for Value Drug Mart and was quite intruiged by the prize they were offering me if my entry was selected.

I guess this could be an interesting prize.

Tube Steak Challenge

Canada Day marked our nations 142nd birthday, but it was the official end to my innagural Tube Steak Challenge. We celebrated this years holiday at work but enjoyed a BBQ for our troubles of working July 1. It was here that hot dog number 54 was consumed.

Of course when the Coney Island hot dog eating contest from July 4th has a record breaking 68 hot dogs eaten in ten minutes it puts my ’1.03846′ hot dogs a week to shame.

Still, I am proud of it all the same.

Months of Waiting

In March I lost everything to 1and1.com. In addition to losing blog posts and photos my domain was held for ransom by 1and1. I had to wait for my registration of the domain to expire, then wait the month for the redemption period to run out. Following that I entered an auction to purchase the domain.

After winning the auction I had to wait 60 days to move the domain over to GoDaddy, and now seagurs.com is rightfully mine.

This could fall under the tag of ‘eye surgery‘ but it was more of a casual joke than anything that turned into a joke on me.

Last week I was speaking with Gord and jested that I would buy CanSeanSeeYet.com and have it similar to IsItChristmas.com or IsMacTFired.com. Gord talked common sense into me, got me off the ledge and basically said that registering a domain for a joke “3 people will get” was a waste. I thought it was a fair argument and that it was impulsive on my part. I gave up my quest for this joke site and did not think about it after that.

Wednesday morning I was renewing another joke domain, IReallyLoveTheMcRib.com. I selected the domain and went through the checkout process for renewal. I must have been too busy making sure no other GoDaddy ‘upgrades’ made their way into my cart to really see what I was buying.

I completed the purchase without error, however when I received an email notice thanking me for purchasing a new domain I realized something was wrong. I went back to my domain manager and saw the horror! I had purchased CanSeanSeeYet.com without realizing it.

CanSeanSeeYet.com was still in my cart from last week and I purchased that instead of renewing my intended domain. I had already paid a years domain registration for it so I might as well make the most of it.

I present to you: CanSeanSeeYet.com, in all of its blurry glory.

I am now one step closer to having seagurs.com back in my possession.

I have debated a lot about what I would do to regain seagurs.com. I contemplated spending the $50USD to 1and1 to retrieve the domain out of the Redemption Period, or just forgetting about it completely. Ultimately I decided to ‘back ordered’ the domain through GoDaddy and see what would happen.

However, when I suspected that GoDaddy wasn’t going to successful secure my domain I found a domain auction and entered a bid into that. I felt kind of odd bidding on a domain I had owned for years, but seeing the advertisement parking on the site made me realize how much I would hate it if someone else had control of my former identity and the least I could do was try to secure it through another method.

I won the domain auction without hassle, and to my surprise ‘back order’ from GoDaddy did not help in the process. I paid my $9.00 for the domain bid and now with the WhoIs updated to show that I control seagurs.com I can rest a little easier. Unfortunately I am still not out of the woods yet.

Now I began the steps of transferring the domain over to GoDaddy and then maintaining it from there. Until I can complete the domain transfer, which may require me to wait 60 days because I just bought the domain, the advertisements on the site will stay. Even doing a domain redirect with my temporary registrar would set me back $25USD which is too much for that 60 day period.

It has been a long road back to recovery but I can see that the end is in sight.

Time for an update on a few things occupying my time.

The seagurs domain is still in ‘redemption period’. A few weeks ago I began the process of trying to reclaim it, but the account information did not match the domain registration so I had to provide government issued identification for Dad and myself. Since I had been waiting over a week for a response from 1and1, and the ‘redemption period’ was about to expire I decided I had enough with 1and1 and would just forget it and wait it out.

1and1 canceled my previous hosting on March 16, so I am nearing the time where I can buy the domain back. I have read that the ‘redemption period’ time varies so I have been checking GoDaddy for the purchase of my domain several times a day to no avail.

The Las Vegas U2 tickets have been purchased, and my excitement level about the show has increased dramatically. I have seen plenty of photos from Sam Boyd Stadium and it looks like such a cozy and tight arena that no seat will be a bad spot. However, my mission to get a lower level seat close to the stage was successful but there were many who were not so fortunate.

There was plenty of ticket drama surrounding this event as Ticketmaster wasn’t responsible for the fan presale. A smaller site for the venue handled everything and things like presale codes being counted as used when they weren’t, the site buckling under the pressure of presale purchases and a confusing delivery method of the tickets lead to a lot of confusion and grief.

The ticket cost was a bit much for my taste but U2 in Las Vegas sounds like a once in a lifetime experience and after seeing the sights in and around Vegas seeing U2 will be a perfect ending to a trip in Nevada. I am in the process of comparing flights and hotels. I am searching Hotwire, Travelocity, Expedia, WestJet, Air Canada, Yapta and Farecast for the best deals, trends and will hopefully have the flight booked first and then I can focus on hotels and all of the fun stuff to do while in Sin City.

It’s playoff time for the Canucks, and without getting ahead of myself, I am hoping the team can escape the first round and make a solid effort in the second. I am sure their highs and lows will be documented thoroughly here. With that said, I have decided to grow a ‘beard’ in honor of this playoff run.

I use the term ‘beard’ loosely as I have the patchiest, sorriest excuse for a beard that people may confuse me as a double in the “Don’t Be a Tosser” commercials.

The last 24 hours have been pretty busy around these parts as I put together the pieces. I have taken this ‘fresh start’ opportunity to separate the blog and gallery onto their own sub domains, something I have thought about doing for a while.

Keith started a mission to retrieve my previously lost blog posts from the depths of Google, and more successfully, Yahoo’s web cache so it is likely that seagurs could regain its former glory. What he has done is fairly impressive and I will post his method here so that someone else may use it if they find themselves in the same position I was in.

However the name seagurs is so close to being mine but it is so far away. When 1and1 canceled the web hosting and domain information the domain did not come back on the market for purchase. When looking at the WhoIs information for it I see that I won’t have to wait much longer.

domain: seagurs.com
created: 20-Mar-2005
last-changed: 16-Mar-2009
registration-expiration: 20-Mar-2009

Almost four years to the date my seagurs domain would have expired, I find something very odd about the timing of that and everything going belly up.

If Gord doesn’t buy the domain out from under me I will go ahead and buy the domain name back because it is easy to type (all but one letter can be typed with the left hand) and everyone that visited the site knew the address.

Soon things should return to their former self around here, however the gallery will take a little longer to rebuild. I have found many gaps in my Project 365 archives so none of the albums will be complete. If this whole adventure has taught me anything it is to always have a backup and that I can access it at any time.

I was going to write one of two posts. This is the one I didn’t plan out, nor ever want to write.

Three and a half years of seagurs blogs, photo gallery updates, hosted audio files have all been deleted. Everything that the Internet knew of me was erased.

I have no one to blame but myself. All of this started when Dad canceled 1and1 payments for the domain and hosting for his business. Unbeknownst to him he took out everything I had because I was piggybacking on his account. I should have done regular backups, I should have been on my own hosting plan, I should have been more proactive…I should have done a lot of things.

When seagurs was inaccessible I was torn. Was this my chance to start fresh or walk away from it all together? I have recently wondered what it would be like to shut down the blog, but in that story I could always return to it with my files intact. However, not having it accessible was forcing my decision to face a cold truth: it could all be lost.

I realize that what I lost wasn’t important. I lost 1′s and 0′s, non-physical things. Still, I lost years of memories. I have spent countless hours going through old blog posts, reading about the experiences I have had, the highs and lows of my life as it was an in depth journal into my life.

Since I started seagurs I changed jobs, moved into a condo, got engaged, got married, been to Cuba and Mexico, traveled from BC to Saskatchewan for concerts and many other memories and allowed me to grow as a person.

Can seagurs be the same or is the archive what defined the site?