If you're better at coming up with different names, as PG apparently is (he mentions in the article), then yeah, this would be a net win to just change your name.
For most of us who are pretty awful at naming, it may not be a great idea to focus on the name when there are other TLDs out there like .io, .co, or most recently, .tech. And there's also the highly acceptable alternative of using a derivative of your name, such as (name)app.com, get(name).com, and that sort of thing.
It's also notable that a startup registering its domain name is probably early stages and their name may change anyway, because their idea may change. You don't want to spend hundreds or more on lavalamps.com and then later decide you're actually going to sell those puzzle/IQ lights. Doing that might even make you hesitate to change your idea.* But if you spend $12 on lavalamps.net, the cost of heading for greener pastures is epsilon.
If you've got another name stashed on a scrap of paper in a drawer, dig it up and check whether its .com is available. But if figuring out a new name is going to take you a week, just take what you can get for now.
Probably you don't want to use (name).ru, though. ;)
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*Although if you were that foolish and then that inflexible, you probably weren't going to get anywhere anyway.
For most of us who are pretty awful at naming, it may not be a great idea to focus on the name when there are other TLDs out there like .io, .co, or most recently, .tech. And there's also the highly acceptable alternative of using a derivative of your name, such as (name)app.com, get(name).com, and that sort of thing.
It's also notable that a startup registering its domain name is probably early stages and their name may change anyway, because their idea may change. You don't want to spend hundreds or more on lavalamps.com and then later decide you're actually going to sell those puzzle/IQ lights. Doing that might even make you hesitate to change your idea.* But if you spend $12 on lavalamps.net, the cost of heading for greener pastures is epsilon.
If you've got another name stashed on a scrap of paper in a drawer, dig it up and check whether its .com is available. But if figuring out a new name is going to take you a week, just take what you can get for now.
Probably you don't want to use (name).ru, though. ;)
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*Although if you were that foolish and then that inflexible, you probably weren't going to get anywhere anyway.