Watching the big social media companies joust over micro-blogging users is a bit sad for me. Self-publishing for everyone seems to be one the things we’ve lost over the past decade. Instead of empowering users, people have become captive to platforms. Even the new platforms like Substack and Medium leave open the question about what level of control people have over their own content. I strongly believe one of the most important things people can pay for on the internet is a domain name. Once you control your own domain name and DNS records you have far more control over your internet presence. Communication platforms become more fungible and are just a CNAME record away from switching when a platform becomes user hostile.