Automation is wonderful right up until a dependency you do not control has a bad day. When someone buys a site with a brand-new domain, we register that domain through a third party — and third parties occasionally say no at the worst possible moment.
So we designed for that day first. If a domain registration fails after you have paid, you are not left staring at an error. Within a few minutes the Machine moves your brand-new site onto a temporary address so you can start building immediately, sends you an honest note explaining exactly what happened and when it will be fixed, and credits a free month for the trouble. The instant the domain clears, everything you built moves over automatically and your old temporary address forwards to the new one.
Why write this down publicly
Because the measure of a one-person operation is not whether things ever go wrong — they will — but whether the person on the other end is protected when they do. Worst case, from card to a place you can build, is about four minutes. We tested the whole failure path before launch, on purpose, using a domain we knew could not be registered. It is better to meet your safety net in a drill than in a fall.