A $5 million museum is in the works as a counterweight to Bill Clinton's presidential library, but it only takes $30 to affect the Internet debate over the former president's legacy.
The Clinton Presidential Foundation, the nonprofit group in charge of building the official $160 million library and policy center, didn't get to use the obvious Web addresses — ClintonLibrary.org and ClintonLibrary.com — because those addresses were already taken for a $30 registration fee.
ClintonLibrary.com is being held for a $9,500 ransom. And Greg Forsythe, a 28-year-old graduate student from Huntsville, Ala., created ClintonLibrary.org to link to other anti-Clinton sites, including the site of the Counter Clinton Library group that has plans for an anti-Clinton museum.
ClintonPresidentialCenter.org was the best name left for the official library.
Foundation president Skip Rutherford says the Internet site names don't bother him, and insists the more cumbersome name is better anyway for what will be a museum, policy center and graduate school campus, as well as a library.
"You can't spend time worrying about people who hate," Rutherford said. "Clinton will always draw this kind of attention because he's the most intriguing, interesting political figure of our time."
Knowing that the buzz over Clinton's presidential legacy inspires thousands of Web surfers to visit ClintonLibrary.org, Forsythe uses the site to taunt those who want information on the real library. He tells them that their only option is to "go Greyhound ... for an authentic Arkansas experience." Below that is a photograph of Clinton smiling at pop diva Mariah Carey, who's dressed in a skin-tight, low-cut tank top.
"The photo really speaks for itself and it sums up the Clinton years," Forsythe said. "He has this wolfish grin."
Forsythe says he isn't a "hard-core Clinton hater" and is more bemused than angered by the Clinton years, but he also admires the work of the Counter-Clinton Library.
"It looks to be pretty right-wing, but it's interesting stuff," he said
- Recognizing the name grab ahead, a fast-typing P&G employee registered more than 2,000 domain names related to P&G products. Those included product names such as crest.com, pampers.com, tide.com and pringles.com. The employee, whom P&G says it cannot locate, also registered generic domains such as diarrhea.com, headache.com and pimples.com.
Today, headache.com takes you to P&G's "little corner of cyberspace," a page with a list of P&G products -- oddly, none having to do with headache remedies. Typing in pimples.com summons a Web page for Clearasil, P&G's acne-fighting creams.
P&G avoided having to fork over a king's ransom for its domains by registering everything it could think of in 1995, long before most cyber-squatters made their claims. The company pays about $70,000 a year to maintain about 2,000 names it has registered with Network Solutions Inc., the company that keeps the master list of domain monikers. For P&G, which pulls in close to $40 billion in revenue a year, this is small change. But that didn't stop the sharp minds in P&G's global licensing group from reevaluating their strategy on Internet domains.