I've been seeing a lot of recommendations for NameCheap, but there is one thing that makes me hesitate: I get a staggering amount of spam from domains registered by NameCheap with the Whois info shielded by WhoisGuard. Yes, I've used their reporting tool to report spammers, but it still comes.
Is this about scammers flocking to NameCheap because it's, well, cheap? Or is NameCheap somehow marketing to spammers while trying to maintain plausible deniability? I'd be happy to consider moving my sites over to NameCheap, but I don't want to move from one evil registrar to another registrar.
I have all my domains at NameCheap and have never gotten any spam (or maybe google blocks it all?).
Either way, I'm happy. I haven't tried http://en.gandi.net/ but they are bit more expensive.
I've been using Gandi for 11 years. They've generally been great. Initially I was drawn to them because they were one of the first registrars to make it clear you owned the domain name and they were an agent.
I've kept with them largely because of the generally convenient and low-upsell nature of the website on top of this.
One caveat for U.S. customers: on the very rare (once or twice a decade) occasions when I've had to contact customer service, the time separation and some rough English skills have led to a slightly bumpy communication experience while resolving issues, but even with those obstacles, they're better at it than GoDaddy (and their English is a heck of a lot better than my French :).
~$15usd/yr rather than $7ish a year isn't a big deal for domains I care about.
I like Gandi's motto ("no bullshit"), but their support is - for lack of a better word - exactly that. It's now hovering at 36 hours without a response after repeated emails to them. No excuse. I'd rather pay the $10 extra and get real phone or live chat support from anyone else. Avoid.
Is this about scammers flocking to NameCheap because it's, well, cheap? Or is NameCheap somehow marketing to spammers while trying to maintain plausible deniability? I'd be happy to consider moving my sites over to NameCheap, but I don't want to move from one evil registrar to another registrar.