I mean the internet is a new world which is only about 40 years old. It was created by a lot of really smart guys who mostly don't care about the "traditional market rules" and it was created a specific way to follow specific philosophies one of which is when a domain name is no longer being used it should be available for other people to purchase.
It's not exactly counter-culture, but it's completely different. The distributed infastructure, the emphasis on putting equal power in the hands of the smallest operators rather than focusing it on the largest corporations, none of these things mesh with how the offline world has been operating for centuries.
People who were aware of the internet before it was cool remember these details.
I don't know how to make it more clear for you than that.