Every once in a long while, the planets align just right or something, and luck falls remarkably in my favor. One example happened in late December 1999.
Ever since I became aware of the Internet, I had coveted the domain name byGosh.com. I had been using the byGosh moniker for various things since way before the Internet and just liked the name. But it was registered very early on. I was somewhat comforted that it was used for a real web site, not just parked or used for spam advertising. I checked every year or two in case it was dropped.
I happened to check a couple of days before Christmas 1999 – byGosh.com was available! It had been dropped and no one had picked it up yet. The timing was amazing. Network Solutions held a monopoly on domain name registration. Registering a domain name was a significant expense – over $200. The monopoly would end in a few days, on January 1, 2000, and upfront expense would drop substantially – to about $35 if memory serves. I could pounce on my dream domain name in spite of the expense, or I could wait a few days and save quite a few dollars at the risk of someone beating me to it. I pounced.
Immediately upon the new millennium, byGosh.net was registered. I am convinced that I got exceptionally lucky. For some reason, the owner of byGosh.com let the domain name drop. By sheer coincidence the cost of domain registration was about to decrease substantially – otherwise someone surely would have picked up the name. Had I waited for the price drop, I am convinced I had little chance of grabbing the name – someone would have beaten me to it.
I entered the new millennium a couple hundred bucks light in the wallet but with a web presence using the domain name I had always wanted. Yea me!
The original byGosh, before it was dropped and I grabbed it, was a Christian site focused on the peaceful and inspiring Sermon on the Mount, with an odd sidebar advocating the slaughter of one’s religious enemies. At least that’s how I remember it – it has been awhile, and it was not well written – difficult for me to follow in places. Still, I found the advocacy of both peaceful tolerance and genocide to be ironic and intriguing. It’s record was once preserved in the Wayback Machine, but disappeared roughly 15 years ago
