1.	I misunderstood, as I think a lot of people have, that this situation could improve because NSI is now getting competition.
2.	Anyone who is seriously maintaining a .Com domain name will just deal with NSI. The other companies, unless they *pay us* to register with them (it's thinkable in this crazy world), will achieve an installed base of zero.
3.	So to answer the question posed by this piece, Network Solutions owns .Com, for the forseeable future. That should clarify the situation, a simple statement. If you're proud of your domain name, as many of us are, know that you share ownership of that name with a company that's become famous for super-bad customer service, who also controls every other domain name from aol.com to yahoo.com to joesDiner.com.
4.	Esther poses the possibility that we could have another Internet, one that wouldn't be based on .Com names. At first I thought this was unthinkable, now I want to give it some thought. What if we could start over? Let's see how this shapes up.
5.	Thanks Charlie and Esther for adding to the discussion.