This whole saga unfolding makes me think of a smaller scale drama thing that illustrates some of what feels so surreal about it to me.<p>Recently, the subreddit r/pokemonswordandshield had a meltdown where, allegedly, the “owner” of the sub and related discord server was seeking to sell them in secret. I don’t know all the ins and outs of how or why that would work, but the idea failed in any case because the mods rebelled and took the community with them.<p>I can’t help but wonder though - if the sale actually did go through, isn’t it now worthless? And isn’t the .org situation very similar in that the only value it ever had was the community believing in the integrity of the product? Like in the small case, if the sale itself alienates the community enough it makes the thing sold toxic. Browser companies could, for example, choose to replace ICANN’s role as authority for .org domains and make that $1.1B purchase worthless. In light of that risk, is $1.1B a sane price now after the uproar?