Disney forgets to renew children's gaming site Club Penguin

Club Penguin

(CBS) - Break out the Advil, parents! The popular children's gaming site Club Penguin was offline and re-directing to a parked domain site all morning.

We're guessing the masterminds at Disney haven't learned from the Dallas Cowboy's URL debacle last year. ClubPenguin.com expired last week and was in URL limbo this morning. Whois.domaintools.com said their status as "Pending Renewal or Deletion."

Blog ClubPenguinInsider.com reported that Club Penguin denied rumors that the site had been shut down and said that it would go back online within a few hours.

The site, which launched in 2005 and bought by the Walt Disney Company in 2007 for $350 million, is an online world with mini games and chat rooms. The massively multi-player online role-playing domain claims to have 12 million members and is basically a World of Warcraft for tots - without the creepy ghosts and guilds. 

Although the site went back up around noon, users can't seem to log in to play. People are taking to Twitter and reporting...

"Club Penguin is DOWN?!: When I tried to log onto Club Penguin today, this is what appeared!Club Penguin is down!..." -Papichulo366

"ClubPenguin.com, sold for $350 million dollars to Disney, appear to have let their domain expire..." -EwanToo

"Club Penguin Site Down Update. clubpenguin.com is now online but it you are unable to play the game still as..." -MrSnowman3

[DustyBunnies]

Anyone getting both a golfer and a clown screen? Well, they say if this doesn't get fixed then club penguin will be closed down forever. This is so sad. I love Club Penguin so much and I want on it, badly.

[AlexSchwartz]

CP is working for me now!!!! Yay!!!

[guest173]

it is still not working for my son who has a membership there (he's a kid). They should reimburse us for the membership time lost.

[Iloveclubpenguin]

I'm real depressed. I wanted to go to the club before watching the bachelorette to kill time. Now I am sitting here writing this instead. Fml.

[mask2697]

the moral of this story, get some RL friends

[gage4488]

at 6:55pm my son tried to log on to club penguin to play and he got the clown site also so he called me over to see and when we clicked on the play now icon we were redirceted to a porn site i dont know whats going on but parents beware and dinsey should hurry up and get this fixed we are paying customers

[bamboo21398]

i loved club penguin.
i only just got club penguin membership YESTERDAY!!!!!!!!!!!! :(
WHY DID YOU DO THIS DISNEY?!?!?!?!?!?!?!???????????!!??!?!!?!??!

[Bonbona2]

All morning i've been trying to log on, but it wouldn't let me! I started to think that i got a virus or something on my computer. Imagine all the 12 million Cp users trying to log in today! Club penguin should AT LEAST give free coins or something, or they should give free items, or something

[ashlowes]

my membership expires today and i need to get on to renew it!!! and i get the clown-screen too. i'm so upset and mad i could scream!!! aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!! club penguin is so awesome but now i'm just so mad i don't want to see it

[ponymomma]

It is 1115 PST and my kids still can't log into Club Penguin! They get a Clown screen- no explanation. It wuold have been nice to get an email explaining at least something had gone "wrong". My kids love Club Penguin and were pretty upset- I had to explain to them that everyone needs to pay their bills! I expect thay should give us a "free" day credited to our accounts.
(wishful thinking?)

[ashlowes]

ya that would be nice by the way i get the clown screen too. :(

[ashlowes]

ya that would be nice by the way i get the clown screen too. :(