I agree with the sentiment, but in reality it's unrealistic to expect it to *not* happen.
The problem is domains are rock bottom cheap. It's quite possible to buy a domain for $8 and throw up ads that will either make you break even within the year, or earn you a profit. Although the profit could be small, multiply it by the hundreds and thousands of domains, and these people are millionaires.
At the place I dealt with, they just resell them for $60 to the people who *really* want them. Thats OK... other companies (usually the smaller ones), though, refuse to resell for any less than hundreds of thousands of dollars.
So, there's a couple of solutions. Raise the price of domains. The profit margins on the majority of domains would be entirely eliminated if the start up cost was too high. One thing would be to have a really high starting cost, with the rock bottom low re-registering costs. The price should be at a level thats prohibitive of buying a domain unless you're serious about making a website for it.
One of the problems with the prevalence of cybersquatters is it induces the squatter behavior on a low scale in all other web developers. For example, I have a ton of domain names for websites I *want* to develop, but haven't yet. I buy them because it's cheap and because I don't want someone else to get that domain name. If the cost was too high, there'd be more domains available (because they aren't profitable) and I wouldn't buy them unless I was really serious about starting development.
The next option is to auction domains that have expired - or simply auction all domains. Make tracking domains free (this is possible by the profit margins from auctions and high registration costs), and then have an open auction for, like, a month after a domain has expired. That will inspire it's *true* value, rather than these silly inflated appraised values.
All of this should be managed from the source: ICANN. They are a non-profit, but in being a non-profit, they are instead passing on the riches to others and making this whole situation the way it is. If there is a profit to be made, they should be the ones to get it first.
The problem is domains are rock bottom cheap. It's quite possible to buy a domain for $8 and throw up ads that will either make you break even within the year, or earn you a profit. Although the profit could be small, multiply it by the hundreds and thousands of domains, and these people are millionaires.
At the place I dealt with, they just resell them for $60 to the people who *really* want them. Thats OK... other companies (usually the smaller ones), though, refuse to resell for any less than hundreds of thousands of dollars.
So, there's a couple of solutions. Raise the price of domains. The profit margins on the majority of domains would be entirely eliminated if the start up cost was too high. One thing would be to have a really high starting cost, with the rock bottom low re-registering costs. The price should be at a level thats prohibitive of buying a domain unless you're serious about making a website for it.
One of the problems with the prevalence of cybersquatters is it induces the squatter behavior on a low scale in all other web developers. For example, I have a ton of domain names for websites I *want* to develop, but haven't yet. I buy them because it's cheap and because I don't want someone else to get that domain name. If the cost was too high, there'd be more domains available (because they aren't profitable) and I wouldn't buy them unless I was really serious about starting development.
The next option is to auction domains that have expired - or simply auction all domains. Make tracking domains free (this is possible by the profit margins from auctions and high registration costs), and then have an open auction for, like, a month after a domain has expired. That will inspire it's *true* value, rather than these silly inflated appraised values.
All of this should be managed from the source: ICANN. They are a non-profit, but in being a non-profit, they are instead passing on the riches to others and making this whole situation the way it is. If there is a profit to be made, they should be the ones to get it first.
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