It's not correct and does sound ridiculous. I highly recommend calling a domain attorney. Most will give you a free consultation. One person who specializes in this type of dispute is John Berryhill: https://johnberryhill.com/
Lots of people have tried to create these "alternative roots" to the traditional DNS. It's a chicken and egg problem. In order for website owners to choose these alt domains, they need every browser, email system and software to support them. In order for the browser makers et al to support them, they need millions of people to be using them.
The average price a domain investor sells a domain for is around $2,000. That's a one time charge, and then after that they pay just about $10 a year to renew.
And people register alternative domains rather than one an investor owns because they don't want to pay that amount.
So I don't agree with your thinking.
And in some countries $1,000 is a lifetime's earnings.