Are Public Companies Wasting Domain Name Assets?

It is less well known than it should be, but many large, public companies are sitting on treasure troves of generic domain names. For example, American Express (AXP) has open.com; and AOL (TWX) has when.com, games.com, and love.com. Are these domain names being used as well as they should be? One wonders. For starters, most of these generic domains -- perfect, in other words, for direct navigation -- don't include any ads. Here is a short list:

American Express - Open.com, AOL - When.com, Games.com, Love.com, Bank Of America (BAC) - Loans.com, Barnes and Noble (BKS) - Books.com, Bayer (BAY) - Aspirin.com, Brown Shoe Company (BWS) - Shoes.com, Burlington Coat Factory - Coat.com, Calvin Klein - Bras.com and Underwear.com, Citibank (C) - Student Loan.com, CNET (CNET) - Kids.com, Help.com, Computers.com, Download.com, Online.com, TV.com, Upload.com, News.com, Search.com, com.com, Builder.com, Gaming.com, Shopper.com, Marketplace.com, Updates.com, Store.com, Buying.com, Chat.com, Welcome.com, Browser.com, Shareware.com, Freeware.com, Auctions.com, Labs.com, Community.com, Silicon.com, Radio.com, CNN - Money.com

Many more here.