My habit peaked in 2000 and it has never really abated.
My habit has cost me 100s of 1000s of dollars.
To feed my habit I've sometimes acted as a dealer. I made some 5 figure deals. This only reinforced the habit.
I have a lifetime supply, 1000s still. Am I rich or am I poor? I don't know. My perception is altered. Sometimes I wish I had a beer habit. Beer: You drink it, you feel good. You also feel good when you pee away your investment in beer, it's a relief. I don't get the same feeling when my domains are expiring.
I once was paying my pusher$70 for a domain fix. Now I pay $8.00 for a fix. I could even pay less. I don't know why I don't. I believe that my latest domain pusher likes me and is there to protect me...so I pay a little more.
I keep looking to see if I might score again. I buy Snaps. I pay to enter the Pool. I bid to be a Winner.
I've got a double addiction now: A domain addiction and an auction addiction. I keep telling myself "not today, no more". I haven't had a dry day in awhile.
I worry that I might accidently drop a score, so I keep "patting my pockets" to see if a score is about to fall out onto the pavement.
It's been painful at times to say "Wow, I scored some bad s#%% man. Let it go." I do. Feelings are mixed. Relief from release. Pain from admitting a failure. Dumbfounded when fools line up to devour the crumbs from my table. The circle is unbroken.
I'm ready to kick the habit but I hear there's some good money to be made, that the market is heating up. Then I score a big sale. Then another. Someone says "hey, you got some really good s### there". My mind gets foggy. Now .... I'm the pusher again and the money burns in my account. Do I score again?
I am a domain junkie and today is the first day of the rest of my life. Today I will not buy a domain.
Sounds like you got it really bad! As you are well aware, the game has changed.
I'd say get out of the game OR "find a better way to play"!
Drop it and don't look back!
Paranoia .....another side effect of abuse....;-)
That'll start a cheaper, and more fulfilling addiction. You can also write a book on this bad habit of yours :)
Are you feeling sick? I can make you feel better.
i do still get the ocassional urge....
you can do it, you know you can
Shak
Arrrggghhh. Scored a good fix the other day. Really. Rationale minds might differ...but I know better...or do I? Actually scored several. I'd tell ya what they were but then I'd have to....edit them out .;-)
But, there's hope...I bailed on a $$$$ buying negotiation when 1 of the 3 domains wasn't actually in play. Fool actually had a pending agreement through a different broker. Thank-you. Amen.
But, I digress. I want to stop buying and focus all energy on developing. Buying is a distraction. I would like a fix of revenue, not a domain score fix. Maybe get hooked on AdSense and search engine feed partnerships? Would like to try that...Would also would like to go fishing. Haven't done much of that lately either.
Okay. Here's the deal with myself: Close on pending deals and don't buy any domain for next 7 days. Don't even look. Rationale to self: Develop sites, show they make $$$, enjoy the $$$ and enjoy the rush of "realizing the dream".
This may be an avoidance syndrome. Keep buying and avoid ever "running the experiment" - building the sites and networks. I have studied my brain foggy and soggy on all the different options, approaches, to what I am doing. Everything keeps evolving. Seems no matter what entry point I choose change will be inevitable and there will be a need to go back revamp, redesign, revise the model.
Ready, fire, aim? Might apply here. Take focus as a flow, not a prerequisite.
Okay. Close the deals and then, for one week: 1) No searching for domains to buy; 2) No filing Snaps; 3) No searching drop dates. Nothing. Nothing at all about buying domains, except polite responses to anyone who contacts me about past emails.
These are the confessions of a domain name junkie.
P.S. Thanks guys.
After attempting to explain domain name specualtion, she stole my credit card.
YOU HAVE THE RIGHT TO REMAIN SILENT...
ANYTHING YOU SAY CAN AND WILL BE USED AGINST YOU IN A COURT OF LAW...
YOU HAVE THE RIGHT TO AN ATTORNEY...UH...OH, I SEE YOU ARE AN ATTORNEY....
I'm not a junkie, really I'm not, I have PLANS for all my domains ... really I do ...
I like it... I like it...
How many of you just collect - or do you actually go in and nix out the wheat from the chaff? A former boss of mine had a similar addiction, but oh man some of the gold he picked up on a whim!
"Come forward, my child, confession is good for the soul."
P.S. Set up extra chairs poolside. This may involve a larger turnout than expected.
And Bucky! You! I never would have thought! Why, I have a whole new respect.....err, I mean sympathy for you poor child...
Psssst.... Did you see the new ones? Oh, they are sooooo....hot? Sex & The City Hotttt..... Okay, so they're dot orgs. Buy, ya never know....
Now, whether or not any website's functionality, popularity, brandability, memorability, or credibility is destined to underperfrom much because the website name is followed by a little dot org versus a dot com I really can't say for certain. But....that's quite alright with me. What I mean is, if people insist that I should pay for my delusion/addiction at 1/100th or 1/1000th the rate of what I would otherwise pay if they slapped a dot com on "the word" before selling it to me, well,... I'll just suffer my way through it...;-)
Frankly, certain basic, industry grade words annexed to a website - say, tourism, trade, investing, commerce, export, environmental, wedding, designer, clothing, vacations, holidays, rentals, etc. - look just about as nice to me followed by dot org as they do when followed by dot com, ... al other things being equal.
But, then again, that's my delusion. Expensive as it may be it has been far less expensive than if I was married to the delusion that the MIGHTY dot com was the only arbiter of all those issues - functionality, popularity, brandability, memorability, or credibility
So, that in a nutshell is how I've justified much of my addiction.....and, I still gotta stop....just after the next/last round of transfers arrive....
and, oh, they are soooooo hot...
Scary ;-)
See ya all at PubConf.
I still have about 10-12 domains that I would like to get rid of at some point, because I have NO plans to do anything with them (aside from trying to profit). And that actually makes me feel guilty. (The part about never doing anything with them, not the part about profiting.)
I basically try to ignore the domains I own because I remember how addicting it was even at the little baby-level I was at when buying domains. 25 domains ... rookie!
The main trouble with domain names is that if chosen carefully they're DEFINITELY worth more to much more than reg fee, but unless A) they're super-duper-top-notch names and/or B) you price them "unrealistically cheaply" compared to the market, you can't be sure of monetizing any particular domain or group of domains within a specified period of time.
and then I would only consider it a small problem really.. nothing I can't quit ... at least until tomorrow's drop
Very glad to see that I'm not alone - and that I might be able to nip this before it becomes a huge problem.
I think there might be a patch for this at DOM-ANON.COM. Or was that DOM-ANON.ORG? wait - I'll be right back...
rcjordan you got me thinking about comparisons with daytrading...
The domain market & the stock market pay you for one thing and one thing only...for being diciplined. If you need an addiction, get addicted to dicipline. Don't buy and sell based on your emotions...do it based on the reality taking place in front of you.
But, the majority of people who have ever made contact with "offers" to buy a domain have just been looking to get them Very cheap ...No profit in that.
It's difficult to let some of them expire. But, it's expensive to keep a large stable of them if too many are not developed and producing income.
I am still hoping .us "comes into it's own" someday.
I have a couple of older .us domains which get a bit of traffic and decent ranking for the one word keywords they represent.
A month ago I picked up two .us domains for a seasonal activity which is going to become popular soon and they are beginning to get some good activity. They show up way down in the 40's on google.com but Yahoo lists them first for the most common search term.
an interesting read...Come on - people are here to dry out. We don't need any enablers!
Lost a domain in my first NameWinner experience yesterday. I purposely didn't ask for a higher limit (default is $100) on my account because deep down, I knew that I didn't want to pay any more than that. Then, in the auction's final minutes of course, someone bid $110. I was maddly scrambling to find a phone number to NameWinner so I could increase my limit. I never found one and watched in horror as the auction ended and my prized domain slipped away.
So that helped.
>rcjordan you got me thinking about comparisons with daytrading
Anyone will tell you that discipline is not my long suit.
>enabler
How's this; I'm currently working on a high-6 sale having flatly refused lower-mid-6. Keep buying, guys, there's still gold out there.
