ICANN: "I'm happy to report that the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) has set the expected evaluation fee for the next round of new generic top-level domain (gTLD) applications. The expected fee will be USD $227,000."
@feld Their PR: https://www.icann.org/en/blogs/details/icann-sets-expected-evaluation-fee-for-new-gtld-applications-in-the-next-round-25-09-2024-en#main ; Fee is said to be "just" to cover the cost to be revenue-neutral (seems in domain names there are no economy at scale… as more gTLDs are expected at this round than previous). As for previous money (gTLDs auctions, etc.) not used a decade after, there is a grant program to see how to dispose of $217 millions :-) https://domainincite.com/29692-icann-opens-217-million-grant-program
@feld ICANN has lots of constituencies/stakeholders (registries, registrars, LEA, IP, etc.) but barely registrants and even less software developers or open source ones. Aka: that specific funding will never happen.