Originally Posted by Fetish Gimp

From a marketing point of view one can argue that is brilliant.

If there's no real demand for a particular TLD, have a sale for the people who develop websites related to the TLD, giving them the added incentive to lock into it for up to ten years, ensuring they'll have to develop and most importantly, promote it to make their money back, which then will hopefully create the demand which does not presently exist.

Or I could be wrong and it's just a simple sale.