Domain Name Buzzkill is what happens when you're in the middle stages of developing some kind of product... it's in pieces and you're barreling 100 miles per hour through it. If you're working on an e-book maybe you have a bunch of disjoint chapters... if it's a script, an unfinished user interface. If it's a video product you have a few video clips but nothing to tie them all together yet. Everything's working great, you've got a kick-ass domain name, and then... you register the domain name. Uh oh.

For some reason, at least with me, registering a domain name for an unfinished product is the easiest way to ensure it never finishes. Any kind of excitement I previously had is gone when that domain name is grabbed because now it's something concrete.

Up until that point I was just working on some project (a project is a temporary task with a definite "beginning" and an "end"). But now that I can see the end it's become some kind of a chore.

What the Domain Name Buzzkill phenomenon has taught me is: wait until the project is just about finished before you register the domain name. This means you shouldn't give out the name for the product OR you should operate under a working title. Moviemakers, book authors, and programmers do this all the time - Microsoft Windows Longhorn, Microsoft Windows Whistler, and so on.

Once everything's all done and you have a final name you can register the domain name and get a temporary page up. Get the copywriter to add a name to the sales letter. Have the graphic designer change the name on the header logo from the working title to the finalized title. And finally get that product launched!