As someone who has worked with many small business and startups, a .com domain name and associated e-mail address makes a big difference in credibility as they start out, helping change the perception of a business from a fly-by-night operation to one that can be trusted and relied upon. Many new small businesses are started by people trying to ramp up a new revenue stream for themselves or their families, and launch with little to no resources precisely because the point of starting the business was to solve that very resource problem. By allowing prices for the .com top-level domain name, which is solidly positioned as the default extension in the public consciousness, to grow significantly in pricing would place that credibility increasingly out of reach for those who need it the most. Maintaining this kind of accessibility is outlined ICANN’s own statement of purpose: “...ICANN is dedicated to preserving the operational stability of the Internet; to promoting competition; to achieving broad representation of global Internet communities; and to developing policy appropriate to its mission…” The promotion of competition amongst users of the Internet and the fostering of a diverse global Internet community sourced from all economic situations is much more in line with ICANN’s broad and inspiring mission than promoting competition amongst those few organizations who hold a stewardship role for this network which has transformed how the global public connect and transact. While price increases at some level are inevitable due to the simple fact of monetary inflation, under what terms and at what rate those increases happen should be much more conservative than the proposal here, especially in the light of falling infrastructural prices and the margin already built into the business of being an operator of this kind. Keep the .com domain pricing accessible for with the least and with the most need by significantly reducing the allowed rate of price increase. Peter Pallock