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Comment by thih9 | Hacker News Reader

> [domain parking] is value-destructive as hell

I disagree, they provide value by keeping premium domains available for people with money.

> Thanks to Uber you now can seamlessly hail a ride to wherever you are. Thanks to AirBnB you now have a great alternative to hotels.

Uber started as UberCab.com , AirBnB started as AirBedandBreakfast.com . Premium domain name is not required to start a successful business.

> If it wasn't for domain parkers, you'd still get your domain - just for 10$, rather than 10.000$.

Or not, it could have been claimed (possibly unused) with the owner not checking their email. I think domain parkers solve this very problem.

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> I disagree, they provide value by keeping premium domains available for people with money.

how does keeping domains away from people with little money provide any value?

> Or not, it could have been claimed (e.g. for a hobby project that's permanently work in progress) with the owner not checking their email.

As long as the owner pays the fee who gives a f? What makes a hobby project less worthy then a professional product?

>how does keeping domains away from people with little money provide any value?

The value is that the market becomes more efficient.

More efficient how? Rather than registering the domain name via a registrar there's now another middleman and that's efficient? What are you, a manager?

By Allocative efficiency.(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allocative_efficiency)

> how does keeping domains away from people with little money provide any value?

True, it doesn't. Then again, how is it different from property prices? A business that wants to open a shop in a premium location has to pay a higher price. I may be not seeing something, but to me this looks similar.

> As long as the owner pays the fee who gives a f?

I think other market users would become annoyed. Businesses would still have trouble coming up with names, but now they would have no way to solve that with money. And users would have to deal with more "creative" names.

Concert ticket scalpers also provide the same value, keeping culture available for people with more money. I just don't get this mentality - it's a negative for the world.

True, ticket scalpers also work in a niche where the actual price and the market price are different. Ticket companies solve scalping by lotteries; or they bring the ticket price closer to market value with price increases or auctions. Offering domains always for $10 seems similar to lotteries. Lotteries make money irrelevant; to me it makes sense for a concert but not for things that can enhance your business. I'd prefer domain parkers over $10 domain lotteries.

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