Someone registered dougfordformayor.ca, a domain that directly mirrors the wording of Rob Ford's campaign website, in May of this year.
The registration garnered attention Friday afternoon after Rob Ford dropped out of the Toronto mayoral race and his brother Doug Ford stepped in to take his place.
UPDATE: As of Friday evening, the website looked like this:
The domain name was registered anonymously on May 6, 2014 through the website tucows.com. All .ca domain registrations by individuals are anonymous by default.
It was registered during Rob Ford's stay in rehab, when rumours about his location were rampant and he was a regular subject of jokes on late-night TV. Many postulated then that Doug Ford might take a run at the mayoralty.
In fact, May 6 is the exact day that Doug Ford sat in Rob's seat at City Council and posed for this now-infamous photograph.
As of Friday afternoon, the website was blank save for the word "home." However, posting the link to Facebook did yield a photo of Doug Ford looking less than pleased.
The website follows the same syntax as Rob Ford's official campaign website robfordformayor.ca. That website registration was renewed in March of this year by the Rob Ford campaign via the website Go Daddy.
At least one reader reported on Twitter that up until Friday, dougfordformayor.ca displayed the slogan "vote for John Tory." HuffPost was unable to confirm this and there is no cache of the website previous to Friday.
The domain dougfordformayor.com was also registered earlier this year and is currently "under development." A Stephen Smith of of Vancouver registered the domain on March 5 with webnames.ca. A Stephen Smith is listed as one of the founders of webnames.
Web domains are often bought these days for the purpose of parody. But more common is the practice of buying a domain with the intention of selling it for a profit down the road. And whoever bought dougfordformayor.ca may now be in a position to do just that.
That logic, however, isn't stopping many online from postulating the Ford camp bought the domain months ago as part of a long-simmering plot to make Doug Ford mayor.
What seems more likely is that someone who saw the photo of Doug in the mayor's chair captured on May 6 got an idea for a joke.
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