Whilst enjoying a stir fried chicken rice over here in Beijing I began one of my usual random tours of the web. During these tours I type in the first thing that comes to mind in my internet browser and add a dot com to the end.
Fish balls
On this particular occasion I typed: www.fishballs.com and rather than taking me to a site dedicated to fish balls it directed me to a bespoke seller of curtains and blinds.
At first I wondered if this is because I’m in China and the Great Firewall is playing some kind of practical joke, but then after turning on my VPN software and testing it from an IP address in the States, I discovered it wasn’t.
So why the bleeding heck would a bespoke curtain and blinds seller go through the process of buying a domain called fishballs.com and redirecting it to their website?
See for yourself
If you’ve done the same thing as me by now and typed fishballs.com into your browser then you should have ended up with this site: www.osdin.co.uk.
They are based in Glasgow in the UK and they sell curtains and blinds. Actually some of their products don’t look too bad…oh gosh, am I their target market?
I checked on Whois.net to confirm that Osdin do indeed own the domain name fishballs.com. So now I’m going to try and figure out why they’ve done this by bullet pointing possible reasons.
Five most likely reasons
- People who want fish balls want curtains
- Because so many people type fishballs.com directly into the browser it’d be stupid not to tap into the mad traffic
- They didn’t want to waste the domain name they bought for their abandoned fish ball business so redirected it
- They are in the process of setting up a fish balls business and are simply redirecting the domain name in the meantime as they build their website
- “Fish balls” translates to “curtains and blinds” in another language
Conclusion
I think I’m going to settle for number one. They must have done some customer survey at some point and had an epiphany that people who buy curtains love fish balls. This guy is on it.
Why do you think Osdin redirect fishballs.com to their curtains and blinds website?
Having read your reasoning for why they would do such a fine thing, I can only draw the same conclusions as you. If it helps your investigation, I have not once overheard a conversation in a curtain shop when a customer has not casually enquired if they also stock a range of fishballs.
Thank you for your fine contribution to this important investigation.
I feel foolish for not realising these truths and will endeavour to enquire about the range of fish balls the next time I go curtain shopping.
I reckon an email needs to be sent to these jokers at Osdin to see what they have to say for themselves…
It would indeed be intriguing to learn their reasons.