A social profile feels like property, but Larry Chiang points out you are only ever renting space on someone else’s platform. His Web12 framework flips that: put the actual page on a website you own, then use the profile to point at it. Web12 stands for Web1 plus Web2, a personal domain running on old logic, wired to modern networks for distribution.
Rent comes due in ways you do not control: a login gets suspended, a feed algorithm changes, a platform simply shuts down. A domain you registered does not answer to any of that; the page stays exactly where you put it. Larry’s line is that a rented profile builds someone else’s company, while an owned page builds your own record.
He treats syndication, email, trackbacks, and posts on X, as the borrowing part, aimed at a page that is already his. That is the same External API instinct from his other plays: use existing distribution, but keep the asset itself outside of it.
Search engines credit the original page over time, which only helps you if the original page is one you control. A profile cannot be indexed the same way a permanent page can, and it cannot collect a list you actually own.
Larry keeps the list next to the page, so a visitor becomes a contact, not just a follower he might lose in an algorithm shift. Renting can still work as a megaphone, but Larry’s rule is to never let the megaphone double as the archive.
Details: See Larry break down own versus rent
#Web12 #OwnVsRent #BuildOnYourDomain