To your second point, I submit, and have said so here, on the DNSO GA list, and elsewhere for more than a year now that the pyramid would be, and for some time now has been, collapsing. One need look no further than the tepid response to ICANN's last rollout of TLDs (at the sLD level), or the renewal numbers for existing domains, if one wishes proof of an implosion.

Finally, you are responding to my, until then, only post regarding Pyramids on this thread, I am not (normailly) Anonymous, so if this is tedious (and I don't find it so), I can only cop to a minority of the tedium. -g

At every step down this pyramid the price goes up, not normally because there is any value added but simply because the seller has control of what has at least the perception of being a scarce resource. In addition at most levels in this chain there are claims made by the sellers about the supposed scarcity, and supposed value, that are at odds with reality (compare this, for example, with pyramid schemes selling snake oil purported to be the cure for cancer or other illnesses). False claims, false scarcity, upping the price at each level without actually adding value, this all smells, or rather stinks, of a pyramid scheme for all practical purposes.