Let's define swampland domains and oceanfront domains since so many domain investors focus on worthless swampland. Imagine it’s 1826 instead of 2026.
You plant a street sign way out west where there’s no town, no road, no business, & no customers.
You call it “Dot Whatever Way.”
Congratulations. You’ve got a street sign.
Maybe 100 years later, a city grows around it. But until people arrive & commerce follows, that sign isn’t doing a damn thing for you.
You can be right about the location & still be 100 years too early.
Timing is everything. I say it all the time.
How old are you? Can you wait 100 years?
That’s the difference between planting a sign & recognizing an opportunity whose TIME has arrived.
When a gold rush arrives, RECOGNIZE IT. GREET IT. & GRAB WHAT YOU CAN!
But make sure the gold rush happens in YOUR lifetime and it is actually gold, not something painted yellow. That’s the key difference.
We’ve witnessed a .COM gold rush. It’s still going.
We’ve witnessed an .AI gold rush. It’s still in progress.
Now we’re witnessing what I see as an .SI gold rush unfolding before our eyes.
Whether that rush turns into lasting adoption is still an open question.
But there’s a difference between waiting 100 years for people to show up & seeing them arrive TODAY.
That’s why I sat on the sidelines for the other extensions. I didn’t see the fruit ripening in my lifetime.
With .AI & .SI, I see something worth planting for NOW.
For 13 years, I’ve endured pressure, criticism, name-calling & domain stalking from domainers with a vested interest in getting me to buy into THEIR extension.
I resisted. I was one of the few voices pushing back. They didn’t like it, & they didn’t make it easy.
Their blah, blah, blah wasn’t going to sway me. Neither was telling me I was stupid, a dinosaur, or missing the next big thing.
The only thing that sways me is NEW FACTS ON THE GROUND.
NEW FACTS! NOT LOUDER MOUTHS!
Something changed. I recognized it, reevaluated my position, & made a decision.
SIMPLE!
That's called business!
In business, you either act. You don't act. Or you're paralyzed by indecision.
The pressure didn’t change my mind. The facts did. ONLY FACTS!
Then I simply marry those facts with a lifetime of experience and follow my instincts and gut.
And over the last few weeks, I've articulated and shared my thought process. If none of that makes sense to you, then maybe you need to get some common sense before you buy your next domain name.
I am now closing in on 500 .SI domains.
First, I went after the strongest names. I expected their prices to spike first & hardest, making them the hardest to get.
Then I went into the mines. Few people, but there sure was a lot of gold & diamonds lying around.
I don’t usually dig deep into veins, but I found a few worth exploring & mining.
Approaching this extension through superintelligence, I focus on the intent of people who might use it. What is their purpose? What are they trying to achieve? Can a builder see a business he can bring to life?
I have a blueprint from the .COM era, but I have to put on a specialized thinking cap. This opportunity has a narrower focus.
We don’t know whether adoption will happen. That’s business. You take a calculated risk based on what history taught you & what you see ahead.
You place your bet.
At $11.54 a registration, I can explore many possibilities without risking a fortune on each one. One builder with a vision or one meaningful sale can tote the note.
Sometimes you overpay to protect your position. Sometimes to fill in the blanks. Sometimes because you’re late to the game.
You balance that with bargains on other names serving the same purpose.
I can afford to take a risk. What I can’t afford is to sit on the sidelines while something big might be happening.
Whichever way this goes, it will unfold before our eyes. Nobody needs to stand on a mountaintop like Moses proclaiming what WILL or WON’T happen. None of us know.
What I saw was a shift in attention. It sucked the oxygen out of the room overnight. What remains unknown is the sustainability. The viability. The adoption.
Do you think I knew any of that shit in 1995 or 1996?
I didn’t know 1/100th of what I know now. I was blind in a dark mine, learning as I went.
Today, I’m in a different mine. But I’ve brought 30 years of experience, & the damn place is lit up like the sunniest day on earth.
All I ever try to do is get a seat at the table.
The domain name is my passport to that seat.
Nobody invited me to the porno table, the candy table or the property table. I elbowed my way in, whether they liked it or not.
It’s hard to ignore the fat guy with a bunch of chips & sometimes one on his shoulder to match!
Entering an established industry, you have to get noticed. You have to make a splash.
After all these years, in my opinion, a GREAT domain name is still one of the best ways to get a seat at the table.
I’m a .COM guy. I’m ALWAYS going to be a .COM guy. I don’t see anything challenging .COM’s position in the lifetime of anyone reading this.
But I sat on the sidelines through 100s of other extensions. Nearly 2,000 of them.
When .AI & .SI emerged, I saw a place for them in the ecosystem. A purpose I could understand. A business case I hadn’t seen for the others.
Outside .COM, .AI & .SI are the only extensions where I own even 25 names.
I was late to .AI, but I assembled a foundation. I wasn’t as late to .SI. I found a foundation, some gems, & some veins worth mining.
Ask yourself 1 question:
Why would a guy who sat on the sidelines for 30 years watching this domain stampede suddenly jump into .SI with both feet?
@andrewrosener and @amiller325gd have articulated the pitfalls in very well-written pieces. I don’t discount any of it. But I don't agree with all of it.
Their valid concerns don’t erase what I see & they see both the opportunity & the risk.
There’s a big difference between blindly gambling & taking a calculated business risk. I know what I’m risking & why.
If I wanted to be a flipper, I could sell what I’ve bought & make money quickly. But that’s not my game.
I look through the eyes of the BUILDER. The AUDIENCE. The FUTURE. The PROFITABILITY.
People thought I was insane in 1996, buying domains when nobody knew what the hell I was doing.
Maybe I’m as insane in 2026.
But insanity has served me well!
At the end of the day, it comes to gut instinct & I always follow my gut! It has served me well.
Here’s the Bentley’s mileage as of RIGHT NOW. 3521. Garage kept every night of its life since 2010. I think it's only been in the rain twice.
I’m having second thoughts about giving it away. The damn thing is still BRAND NEW and GORGEOUS!
What the hell was I thinking?! I think I had a moment of insanity. 🤣
Oh well, a promise is a promise.
Somebody’s going home with MY Bentley! 🔑
Bingo, Bongo, Beanstalk! 🌱




