I like the idea, but how do we keep an IP going from provider to provider? IPs are even more fragile than domains and changing that fact seems near impossible.

Instead, couldn’t a trusted nonprofit (say @eff or ISRG) buy a gTLD from ICANN, become a registrar and rent out domains at (very close to) self-cost with no insane price hikes? Picture what ISRG did with @letsencrypt, but for domains.

Running costs for this would currently be a fixed fee of US$6,250 per calendar quarter and a transaction fee of US$0.25[1]. These costs could be split on all registrants.

Some would probably say that .org is the answer, but the PIR drama in 2020[2] shows how fragile this system is. We need a TLD that doesn’t need to be saved by the @eff from hostile takeovers.

Imagine: more registrants would mean lower prices. That’s far from how gTLDs function now. A sudden spike in interest could introduce a sudden price increase.

[1] https://newgtlds.icann.org/en/applicants/global-support/faqs/faqs-en

[2] https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2020/12/how-we-saved-org-2020-review

This was an idea of mine from 2023: https://merveilles.town/@mikael/110856360216330528

@aral

@aral I like the idea of simply saving IP addresses to my address book, though changing number seems like a hassle (about as bad as changing phone numbers, only I expect it to happen more often).

And I guess you still need a domain name to run Catalyst for multiple users? (Needing to get it on the PSL already seems like a problem anyway)