I hate those domains you accidentally click over to and they’re just filler. They have a tonne of ads and maybe allow you to “search”, the result of which is further pages full of ads.
But, as someone who sold a valuable domain many years ago, I know the other side of the story too. I have never sold a domain for profit since then (although I certainly have tried). The last domain I “sold” was archrival.net, I think, to the apparently respectable guys over at archrival.com. They look a lot different now than they used to look. I sold it for 10 bucks. I lost money.
But I’ve never been convinced by the many people who think purchasing a domain, without the intent to put content on it, is wrong. I’ve never been entirely convinced.
Domains are a “space”. They have value. I think it’s quite close to real estate. I know there are people who talk about meat-space vs virtual-space, or whatever, but the argument isn’t convincing.
I don’t like domain squatting for the sake of permanent retention of the domain just for useless filler content.
But I can’t argue against speculation. That is, looking for a hopefully valuable domain, purchasing it, and waiting to see if anybody wants it.
I won’t argue that there aren’t potentially more or less negatives to domains vs land. But I think in an average day, we can all agree it’s about as much of a problem as real estate speculation.
It’s just business.