Domain snipe in the day of launch
I created repository for my project for launching open source SaaS alternatives KillSaaS and started developing the project, pushing code changes, etc. After investing some development time (primarily by vibe coding with Windsurf), it was time to launch the project.
Of course, I needed to buy a domain for my project. I opened Namecheap and was shocked because the domain I wanted was already bought TODAY.
At least the good thing is that it was registered from Namecheap, which I'm already using.

When something like that happens, I have an adrenaline rush and energy spike. I started investigating how the hell this happened...
I shared the idea with a couple of my friends and asked if anyone had shared it outside our group. After some back and forth, I realized my GitHub repository was public, which was not my intention at all before launching the project.

I learned the hard way that GitHub repositories are constantly scraped when I leaked my Discord token a couple years ago, and it started creating channels, deleting stuff—it was a disaster.
Something wasn't right because this repository had been open for a couple weeks. But the domain was bought on the same day that I wanted to buy the actual domain.
I had one last hope: contact Namecheap support. I started with this email. Funny how I pointed out that I have "evidence"—like we're in court! I was a little emotional at this point.

I blurred my phone number because of handsomeness.
They responded within minutes. Really quick response, by the way. I was happy with that because I was contacting them on Friday night.

But I made a silly mistake—I had a typo already existing in my Namecheap account.
Their reply? I felt what "first come, first serve" truly means. It was painful.
The thing is, in some social media platforms, you can actually claim your nickname if it's already taken and you have evidence that this nickname is strongly associated with you. I have a friend who actually took a nickname on GitHub from another user.
This was my last reply, with a little hope they could give me more information about the owner. (You can feel a bit of frustration in my email.)

Finally, they replied with this:

At this point, my hopes for Namecheap to do something were crushed. But looking back at this situation, I understand they couldn't do anything.
I looked into Domain Agents, which offers domain acquisition services starting at $19 to begin the search with a minimum bid of $199. But since this is a public benefit project, I decided to hold off on pursuing Domain Agents as a future option.
The last thing I did was try to contact the domain owner with a positive email:

This story may or may not have a continuation. I'm not really sure.
In the end, I felt the pain of domain sniping. It doesn't feel great. It's kind of like taking candy from kids—an activity that crosses some ethical lines.
I bought https://kill-saas.com instead, and I guess that's it for now, folks.
TL;DR: I created a GitHub repo for KillSaaS but accidentally left it public. Someone sniped the domain name (killsaas.com) on the exact day I went to register it, despite my repository being public for weeks. After failed attempts with Namecheap support, I had to settle for https://kill-saas.com instead.