2010 joke: Foursquare forgot domain renewal

Hundreds of Twitter users have been reporting that trying to access the Foursquare website just redirects them to a holding page from domain registrars GoDaddy. That means, Popular location based social networking company forgets to renew its domain name.

And the company admitted the error on their Twitter account, saying:

‘Whoops on our part if you’re seeing that GoDaddy page… billing glitch on our end (and should be fixed in the next hour). Stay tuned!’

Not everybody is directed to the GoDaddy page – with the domain having only just lapsed, what you see will depend on how quickly different Domain Name System (DNS) servers update.

The company is unlikely to be in danger of losing their domain name, however – most domain registrars offer a period of grace after a domain lapses in which the original registrant can claim it back.

Based on the language of the tweet, it appears that Foursquare may have had an old credit card on file with domain name registrar GoDaddy. Or perhaps its email address in whois at master@foursquare.com no longer worked.

Whatever the reason for Foursquare letting its domain name expire, it won’t have the same problem for at least another 10 years. It renewed the domain name until March 25, 2020.