Marc Ostrofsky is an American entrepreneur,

venture capitalist Venture capital (often abbreviated as VC) is a form of private equity financing that is provided by venture capital firms or funds to start-up company, startups, early-stage, and emerging companies that have been deemed to have high growth poten ...

, New York Times Best Selling Author and public speaker. He is the author of the books ''Get Rich Click!: The Ultimate Guide to Making Money Online'', and ''Word of Mouse: 101+ trends using technology on How we Buy, Sell, Live, Learn, Work and Play!''. ''Get Rich Click'' was in the top ten of the lists of bestselling books compiled by

USA Today ''USA Today'' (stylized in all uppercase) is an American daily middle-market newspaper and news broadcasting company. Founded by Al Neuharth on September 15, 1982, the newspaper operates from Gannett's corporate headquarters in Tysons, Virg ...

, ''

The Wall Street Journal ''The Wall Street Journal'' is an American business-focused, international daily newspaper based in New York City, with international editions also available in Chinese and Japanese. The ''Journal'', along with its Asian editions, is published ...

'' and ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

''.

Career

His career began developing companies for

voice mail A voicemail system (also known as voice message or voice bank) is a computer-based system that allows users and subscribers to exchange personal voice messages; to select and deliver voice information; and to process transactions relating to ind ...

and

voice processing Speech processing is the study of speech signals and the processing methods of signals. The signals are usually processed in a digital representation, so speech processing can be regarded as a special case of digital signal processing, applied to ...

, private

pay phone A payphone (alternative spelling: pay phone) is typically a coin-operated public telephone, often located in a telephone booth or in high-traffic outdoor areas, with prepayment by inserting money (usually coins) or by billing a credit or debit ...

s, operator services,

telecom reseller Telecom may refer to: * Telecommunications ** A telephone company (or ''telecommunications service provider'') ** The telecommunications industry * Telecom Animation Film, a Japanese studio See also * Telcom (disambiguation) * Telekom (disambigu ...

and

VOIP Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP), also called IP telephony, is a method and group of technologies for the delivery of voice communications and multimedia sessions over Internet Protocol (IP) networks, such as the Internet. The terms Interne ...

, and prepaid

telephone card A telephone card, calling card or phonecard for short, is a credit card-size plastic or paper card, used to pay for telephone services (often international or long-distance calling). It is not necessary to have the physical card except with a ...

s in the United States. Before writing his first book, Ostrofsky was a

domain name A domain name is a string that identifies a realm of administrative autonomy, authority or control within the Internet. Domain names are often used to identify services provided through the Internet, such as websites, email services and more. ...

investor. His

venture capital Venture capital (often abbreviated as VC) is a form of private equity financing that is provided by venture capital firms or funds to start-up company, startups, early-stage, and emerging companies that have been deemed to have high growth poten ...

firm has created a number of

telecommunication Telecommunication is the transmission of information by various types of technologies over wire, radio, optical, or other electromagnetic systems. It has its origin in the desire of humans for communication over a distance greater than tha ...

, publishing and

internet The Internet (or internet) is the global system of interconnected computer networks that uses the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) to communicate between networks and devices. It is a ''internetworking, network of networks'' that consists ...

based companies, and he is the co-founder of hundreds of web properties. He was a co-founder of Internet REIT (iREIT) (also known as www.iREIT.com), which acquires, develops and sells internet traffic

wholesale Wholesaling or distributing is the sale of goods or merchandise to retailers; to industrial, commercial, institutional or other professional business users; or to other wholesalers (wholesale businesses) and related subordinated services. I ...

Google Google LLC () is an American Multinational corporation, multinational technology company focusing on Search Engine, search engine technology, online advertising, cloud computing, software, computer software, quantum computing, e-commerce, ar ...

for them to resell to others on a

pay per click Pay-per-click (PPC) is an internet advertising model used to drive traffic to websites, in which an advertiser pays a publisher (typically a search engine, website owner, or a network of websites) when the ad is clicked. Pay-per-click is usually ...

basis with partners

Ross Perot Henry Ross Perot (; June 27, 1930 – July 9, 2019) was an American business magnate, billionaire, politician and philanthropist. He was the founder and chief executive officer of Electronic Data Systems and Perot Systems. He ran an inde ...

and

Howard Schultz Howard D. Schultz (born July 19, 1953) is an American businessman and author who served as both chairman and CEO of Starbucks from 1986 to 2000, from 2008 to 2017, and as interim CEO since 2022. Schultz also owned the Seattle SuperSonics basket ...

, the founder of

Starbucks Starbucks Corporation is an American multinational chain of coffeehouses and roastery reserves headquartered in Seattle, Washington. It is the world's largest coffeehouse chain. As of November 2021, the company had 33,833 stores in 80 ...

. In 1999 he sold the DNS domain

Business.com Business.com is a digital media company and B2B web destination which offers various performance marketing advertising, including lead generation products on a pay per lead and pay per click basis, directory listings, and display advertising ...

$7.5 million to eCompanies, which was listed in the

Guinness Book of World Records ''Guinness World Records'', known from its inception in 1955 until 1999 as ''The Guinness Book of Records'' and in previous United States editions as ''The Guinness Book of World Records'', is a reference book published annually, listing world ...

for what was, at the time, the most expensive domain name ever sold in the world, Ostrofsky owned a stake in Business.com which was sold in 2008 for $345 million. He coined the phrase "Domain names and web sites are the real estate of the Internet" when he bought Business.com for $150,000 in the mid 1990s, which had been the most money ever paid for a

at that time. Ostrofsky founded five high tech Internet and telecommunications magazines and a dozen technology trade shows, which were later sold to Advanstar Publishing for $8,000,000. He later created and sold Multimedia Publishing Corporation (another firm holding magazines, trade shows and web sites) to

Primedia Primedia is a South African media group, headquartered in Sandton, Johannesburg. History Primedia was established in 1994 and its listing on the JSE Securities Exchange was completed in April 1995. Primedia remained listed on the JSE until 1 ...

for $35,000,000. Ostrofsky was the first outside investor in Blinds.com and a member of its board of directors. In 2014, Blinds.com was sold for over $200 Million+ to

Home Depot The Home Depot, Inc., is an American multinational corporation, multinational home improvement retail corporation that sells tools, construction products, appliances, and services, including fuel and transportation rentals. Home Depot is the l ...

, He currently owns the web sites Photographer.com, TechToys.com, APPortunity.com, MARCeting.com, LabGrownDiamonds.com, HeartDisease.com, BeautyProducts.com, Potshops.com and 200+ others. He also founded www.idNames.com, an international

domain name registry A domain name registry is a database of all domain names and the associated registrant information in the top level domains of the Domain Name System (DNS) of the Internet that enables third party entities to request administrative control of a do ...

service that was sold to

Network Solutions Network Solutions, LLC is an American-based technology company and a subsidiary of Web.com, the 4th largest .com domain name registrar with over 6.7 million registrations as of August 2018. In addition to being a domain name registrar, Network S ...

, and is now a division of

VeriSign Verisign Inc. is an American company based in Reston, Virginia, United States that operates a diverse array of network infrastructure, including two of the Internet's thirteen root nameservers, the authoritative registry for the , , and gene ...

. In 2001 Ostrofsky donated a sculpture to the City of Houston, Texas that now resides at the

George Bush Intercontinental Airport George Bush Intercontinental Airport is an international airport in Houston, Texas, United States, serving the Greater Houston metropolitan area. Located about north of Downtown Houston between Interstate 45 and Interstate 69/ U.S. Highwa ...

in Terminal B, Houston, Texas. Ostrofsky is a professional public speaker domestically and internationally on business, how to make money and entrepreneurship in the age of the internet. He was a member of the

National Speakers Association The National Speakers Association (NSA) is a US based association that supports motivational and other public speakers. It is the oldest and largest of 13 international associations comprising the Global Speakers Federation. History NSA was f ...

(NSA) and was the original founder of the Internet Commerce Association (ICA).DN Journal Newsletter
January, 2007

References

External links

by Robert A Mamis, ''Inc.'' Magazine, May 15, 2000
''Teen Business Forum'' interview
{{DEFAULTSORT:Ostrofsky, Marc American computer businesspeople University of Texas at Austin alumni Living people 1961 births