Dear ICANN, I'm dismayed to hear that ICANN has proposed allowing substantial fee increases for maintaining .COM TLDs. Over the past decade, I've watched the internet grow more and more homogenous as a small handful of corporate platforms gradually wall off users in tightly regulated platforms. The expression and creativity of the early internet was largely fueled by how easy it was for individual end users to plant a flag and manage their own sites, at their own domain. Raising the barriers to running individual sites hurts everyone on the internet, especially people who create content, products, or services, that compete with big platforms or run afoul of their murky censorship guidelines. As far as I'm aware, the administrative overhead for maintaining the domain registry has remained mostly stable. Keeping domain costs stable for end users will encourage the participation of good internet citizens and make the internet a more diverse, creative, and democratic space. Thank you for your consideration. James -- *James White | The Baffler* @jamesfacts <http://twitter.com/jamesfacts> | 646.397.9250