Names Ending in Dot-Com Lose Value in New Order.

REMEMBER when every hot new company wanted to have. "dot-com" in its name, because it conferred instant prestige (and the promise of piles of venture capital)?

The worm has turned. Now, it seems companies are trying to distance- themselves as far as possible from the dot-com moniker.

A case in point is the company formerly known as Jfax.com, which was founded four years ago to convert faxed messages into voicemail messages. Come July, the Hollywood based company will be known as J2 Global Communications, which sounds much more like a seasoned company than a young dot-com.

"This company has evolved, and it has evolved past faxing," explained Laura Hinson, spokeswoman for J2.

Indeed, an evolution might be what it will take to get Wall Street back on J2's side. Like many a money-losing Internet company, J2's stock is in the tank. Trading for more than $10 a share a year ago, as of late last week it was hovering around $1.50. So it's no surprise that the company is giving its business plan, as well as its brand name, a major overhaul.

"J2" signifies that the company is entering a second phase, while "Global Communications" indicates that the business has moved beyond faxes into various forms of communication, including e-mail, Hinson said. In conjunction with the name change, the company is changing its Nasdaq ticker symbol from JFAX to JCOM.

Operationally, the company has branched into unified messaging, a service that allows consumers to access all their voice, e-mail, paging and faxed messages in one place, usually with either voicemail or e-mail. The debut of other communication features, like Web-based conference calls, is slated to coincide with the official name change announcement in July.

"You go through growing pains and see that it's necessary to keep reinventing yourself and growing in order to be successful," Hinson said. "In any business, you can't stay the same."

Dropping the "dot-com" doesn't surprise Scott Painter, who founded CarsDirect.com and is currently launching a new company, Direct Ventures, to sell other big-ticket items via the Internet. Painter is shying away from promoting his new companies, including the up-and-running BoatsDirect.com, as "dot-coms."

"I think the dot-com name is certainly relevant for use with consumers, because it tells them where they can find you," Painter said. "From an investor standpoint, a dot-com means you are a virtual company and, at least for today, that you are more of a superficial retailer. We are a real business, selling items, using the Web to get scale."

True online retailers invest in infrastructure, while less substantial dot-coms blow their funding on customer acquisition without a solid business structure to back it up, he said.

BoatsDirect.com and the upcoming MotorcyclesDirect.com act as any brick-and-mortar boat and motorcycle retailers do -- providing financing options, answering customer questions, and giving consumers a wide variety of options and information. They don't, however, have physical stores.

"The dot-com is a side note, it's just the way we choose to communicate and sell our product," Painter explained.

Though it's not a dot-com, another local tech company is significantly changing its moniker to reflect changes in its services. Pasadena-based Cogent Software Inc., which provides industry updates and procurement services to electronics and manufacturing firms, in July will become SupplyEdge.

"The company actually started with a different mission," said Pamela Francel, software manager for Cogent. "Our name needs to change to align with the mission that we have now."

Cogent was founded five years ago by members of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, to develop software for monitoring, the electronics industry and sending out alerts to clients. (including Hewlett Packard and Motorola) when components became obsolete and when new products hit the market.

Along with its name change, the company will emphasize e-procurement for the electronics marketplace, so that those who need to buy electronic parts can easily find sellers. A new site, www.reparts.com, will begin operating by the end of July.

Though the companies are in different situations, J2 Global Communications, Direct Ventures and SupplyEdge are making a statement by avoiding names followed by the ubiquitous "dot-com," which has become distinctly unpopular among investors.

Now, investors are stringently demanding solid business plans and management teams, indicating that it's not what's in a name, it's what's behind a name. Plus, nearly all businesses these days are expected to have online strategies, meaning that simply a being a "dot-com" doesn't make a company-unique. Some think the "dot-com" age might be just a phase that is ending.

"I have a theory: The age of 'dot-com' will be this awkward three- to five-year period that we'll all look back on," Painter said. "You don't see Captain Kirk or Captain Picard saying, 'Get me Robots.com!' They say, 'Computer, get me a car, get me this,' and the computer sorts it all out."

Staff reporter Laura Dunphy can be reached at [e-mail].

L.A. Web Review -- www.entertaindom.com

IT'S been a while since Warner Bros. launched its Entertaindom.com Web site, originally meant to promote the studio's productions. Now, the site functions as a full-blown entertainment portal.

As far as sites offering movie, television and music news, reviews and other entertainment content are concerned, Entertaindom is pretty good. Information is organized well. The site offers some unusual features like horoscopes, a link to auctions on eBay, even a place to learn how to use the Internet (in a tutorial taught by Looney Tunes characters).

Entertaindom also features video programs, including, "Mission: lmp," a spy spoof starring Verne Troyer, who played "Mini Me" in "Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me." But Warner Bros., like many other content providers, has yet to answer a fundamental question: Why would anyone want to download this stuff -- not to mention downloading all the software it takes to play it--when they could lust turn on the TV?

All in all, Entertaindom.com is a fine place to visit occasionally, but not to bookmark.