[shepherdjerred]

> Is it so hard to imagine a world where .com is no longer the default, and companies/individuals have to pay exorbitant monopoly prices to some gatekeeper?

.com is not a requirement. Companies use non-standard TLDs everywhere. .com is still the default, but you would do just fine with other TLDs, and if some gatekeeper arrived this would only strengthen the argument as businesses would flock to lesser known TLDs.

Of all of the things I worry about regarding computing, the internet, etc., domains does not make the list.