Several weeks ago, Rick Schwartz shared that he would be a guest on an upcoming Planet Money podcast on NPR, where he chatted about domain names. The podcast was released yesterday, and it was one of the best podcasts I’ve heard that explains the value of domain names and the role domain investors play in the marketplace.

In addition to having Rick Schwartz as a guest, Snagged Founder Rob Schutz was also a guest. On a related note, I think Rob is able to offer some really good insights about domain name since he has considerable experience in the startup world, and works with numerous founders at various stages of corporate life. Rob was able to offer his insights as a domain broker while sharing some thoughts about the value domain names being to various startups.

Have you ever stopped what you were doing to take a picture of a domain name? Maybe you passed a billboard while driving on the highway and went completely out of your way to pass it again and take a picture. Perhaps you were taking a walk in the city and you saw a domain name that made you stop and whip out your phone.

I probably have dozens of photos of random signs, billboards, and other advertising materials with interesting domain names. Most of these are exceptional domain names that caught my attention, but there are plenty of images of cringy domain names that I don’t understand how any business with common sense would consider using. Sometimes I write about these domain names – like Direct.com – and sometimes I share elsewhere.

Spaceship launched its Seller Hub earlier this year, and the company has been quickly implementing changes based on user feedback. The platform offers sales landing pages, and domain names listed on its platform are integrated within the search stream at Spaceship and sister company, Namecheap.

One of the advantages to listing domain names for sale on the Spaceship Seller Hub is the lower commission as compared to Afternic, Sedo, and other platforms. These two external platforms have had domain name listings syndicated across Namecheap, and Namecheap / Spaceship CEO Richard Kirkendall has been touting the savings of listing directly via the Spaceship Seller Hub:

It is helpful to see what domain names are being used by companies that are growing and receiving funding. One way to do this is to read articles about fundraising on publications like TechCrunch and The Verge. There are many fundraising rounds that are shared in press releases and redistributed in industry-specific publications and not on the mainstream tech news websites I follow regularly.

To bridge this very large gap, I have found it helpful to follow two accounts on X that do a great job of uncovering funding rounds and sharing the domain names associated with these companies.