www.MarineVinylFabric.com

Marine Vinyl Fabric may not be the sexiest of products but when you think about where it's used – "I'm on a boat!" – its sex appeal goes up exponentially.

The same goes for URL selection and display. You may not win any graphic design awards for a logo that just simply shows the URL with dubs (aka www) and Leading Caps (aka Title Case) but top SEO results and zero ambiguity on what the website offers will surely draw some wandering eyes.

WWW.NAPLETOWN.COM

OK, so the name of the dealership is Napleton's but the URL is Napletown? Sorry, but it's brown frown for Napletown. :(

www.callAPlusRestoration.com

Hmm, how exactly do I call this domain name?!? F-minus for this URL.

WWW.crossroadspublichouse.com

I've been on a bit of a hiatus from URL-spotting but this one caught my eye as a misuse of CAPS I don't think I've seen before. For some reason, the dubs here are capitalized and the rest of the URL is in alllowercase. Talk about putting the em-phah-sis on the wrong sy-lah-bles!

HTTP://WWW.KNOPE2012.COM/IMAGESCMYK/CAMPAIGN/1239U/09230023/POSTER/.JPEG

Just say Knope to Bad URLs! Bet poor Leslie wished this domain got parked rather than (w)rec(k)ed.

EMAIL www.amvetspickup.com

And just how would one do that?

www.agremodeling.com

Maybe it's because I had my eyes on the dash trying to figure out the name of the tune I was jamming to or maybe it's because I'm an URL-aholic but I read the back of this truck bottom up. So my first encounter was with the URL. "Hmmm... AgreModeling.com... sweet!" I thought as I turned my gaze up expecting to find a bunch of hot models sitting in the back of the truck. "DOH!"

www.funerals.pro

Sorry I've been slacking my fellow URLaholics. Please know that I am not yet cured, just busy with other obsessions. You know you're out of the loop when you see a TLD that you didn't know existing. Now I realize I'm no domaining .pro but who knew!?!

www.chick-fil-aleadercast.com/atlanta

Here's another SkewURL (for the uninitiated, those are URLs spotted by URL-aholic Peter Askew of Search Bound) from Chick-Fil-A . Peter seems to eat there a lot!

This one is a mess of mashed up alllowercase and an ill-advised /slash. As Peter points, out it should've been Chick-Fil-A.com/LeadercastAtlanta or dropped Atlanta altogether and had a drop-down on the landing page.

As it stands, this URL is not chic. It's not ful-fil-ling. And it grades an F not an A.

www.EMBA.utk.edu

The URL-alert Alichia Keller spotted this one and offered up some pun gems like "Education needs an education" and "This school needs to be schooled." Indeed the mix of CAPS and lowercase is befuddling. And the dubs aren't necessary in an online ad. Methinks this URL does not make the grade.

www.exercisetv.tv./fitness360

What is it with Ex-er-cise-tv-dot-tv? Not only is it a Bad URL but it has no concept of how to display itself. Not what you'd expect from a franchise devoted to improving one's appearance. Here, they not only present a mess of alllowercase preceded by Dubs and followed by a slash but theres an extra dot thrown in for good measure that makes this not even a functioning URL. Dot's not very nice.

www.mayo-clinic-jobs.com

Alichia Keller was on-the-spot with this bad banner ad. 3 dashes does not exactly make this URL dashing.

www.FreshSeafood.com

Peter Askew sent this one in from Seattle. Love how they use "Smoke" like it's a verb rather than an adjective. At least the URL is sea-worthy, as in worthy of being seen.

www.carpetcleaning.cc

I don't hate the alternate domain (non-dot-com) because it bares the initials of the key words. It sucks that the decal has the first "c" caught in the crevice though. Dot-cc is already a not easily recognized TLD, much less when half of one of the letters is cut off. This URL's gonna make ya sweat til ya bleed. Finally, it's happened to me.

www.YourDreamIzHere.com

Mr. David J. Barnes spotted this search ad with the ebonics spelling of "is." I can haz lots of fun with this one!

www.PerfectlyGoodAirplane.com, perfectlygoodairplane.com

Saw this rotating ad on a truck parked at the Hard Rock Chicago. Not sure why they had to go and ruin a perfectly good URL with dubs and alllowercase.

www.nuoviuffizi.com

I just returned from holiday in Italy. I was out there for a good friend’s wedding and my wife and I tacked on a few extra days for sight-seeing. I had fully intended on taking a break from URL-spotting and swapping URL-aholism for one of my other aholism vices (after all, we were in the land of vino) but I just couldn’t escape it.

Here we were in the political square of Florence admiring the original home of Michaelangelo’s David sculpture and out pops a digital billboard promoting the new Uffizi. It was like we’d been transported from ancient Italy to Times Square. And, as if intrusive advertising in a historically significant location weren’t enough, they topped it off with a bad URL!

I’ve softened my stance on using www (aka Dubs) so I won’t penalize them for that nor will I dispute the use of dot-com in the land of dot-IT because they are targeting tourists but I do take issue with the use of alllowercase. I would also like to penalize them for imposing their modern will against an medieval backdrop. There should be a penal code against posting digitalia within 100 yards of David’s genatalia!

www.misteroptik.it

Here’s another bad Florentine URL. This one uses the native TLD (.it) but fails to use Leading Caps to distinguish the words. With a name like Optik, that has the inverse of the TLD buried in it, the result is an optical illusion in which the “ti” and the “it” can easily become inverted. This Mister could stand a little fiber-optics in his diet.

www.ivri.it

I saw quite a few URLs on Vehicles in the bigger cities in Italy. This one was promoting the Instituti Di Vigilanza Reuniti D’Ital. Can’t fault the URL selection here but I don’t love the alllowercase display. I much prefer ALLCAPS when it comes to Abbreviations as that makes the series of letters much more recognizable as an abbreviation and not some weird word. If only ivri-one understood this.

ti.atocos.www

This URL adorned the roof of a taxi cab in Florence. Not sure who they hope to reach with this one but it sure ain’t the passengers inside. And it’s not like Florence is Manhattan, replete with big buildings lining the streets, so there’s not people looking down on cars very often. Alas, I’m left looking down on this URL but not in the manner intended.