Open Letter to Ray Fassett of Employ Media Regarding Revenue Share for Dot Jobs Domains

Dear Mr. Fassett,

Thank you again for your “courtesy call” yesterday in which you asked me to retract the portion of my comment at the Wall Street Journal web site and CollegeRecruiter.com Blog in which I wrote, “Ray Fassett of Employ Media has been asking job boards for revenue shares for the domains.”

Although it was difficult for me to understand what the courtesy call was regarding as you seemed reluctant to directly state your concern and instead seemed to want me to identify for you what was of concern to you, I ended up understanding that you wanted me to retract that statement and if I didn’t that Employ Media would take legal action against either CollegeRecruiter.com, me, or both. After ending our call, I considered the issue and essentially reminded myself that my primary concern wasn’t about the revenue share and that I didn’t want that to distract Employ Media, CollegeRecruiter.com, or any other entity from the crux of the matter. In addition, I had no written documentation to substantiate the revenue share statement. As a result of both factors, I retracted the statement both on the Wall Street Journal site as well as on CollegeRecruiter.com.

Two job boards later posted comments to CollegeRecruiter.com Blog indicating that they did have a revenue sharing discussion with you. One of the two comments unequivocally indicates that you raised the revenue share option. The other comment generally supports the first but does not directly indicate whether the option of a revenue share was raised first by you or the representative of the second job board.

I’m hoping that you will choose to participate in an open, honest, and transparent manner by posting a comment on CollegeRecruiter.com Blog regarding Employ Media’s requests for a share of the revenue from job boards or other organizations who seek to own a dot jobs domain. I suspect that you’ve made no such requests of direct employers as that wouldn’t be consistent with their model — they don’t make money by hiring people. But given the statements of the two job board owners, I think that seeing your response would be helpful to the job board, staffing, association, newspaper, recruiter, and members of other communities who object to Employ Media’s plans for dot jobs.

Clearly the two job board owners on one side of the discussion and you on the other can’t all be correct regarding the issue of whether you requested a share of revenues from them should they wish to obtain a .jobs domain. You ended up being pretty clear with me yesterday in our call that no one from Employ Media, including you, had ever requested a revenue share from anyone in return for a .jobs domain. I’m hoping that you can explain your perspective on this issue to my readers and me.

Sincerely,

Steven Rothberg
President and Founder
CollegeRecruiter.com