So...correct me if I'm wrong here...does this mean that the registry services operations and the GTLD maintenance operations for .com/.net will be owned by different companies?
Yep. And it means that Verisign business is no longer based so much on serving customers but more on leveraging various monopoly rights that they have such as ownership of .com and ownership of the main root CAs whose certificates are bundled with Microsoft's OS.
Isn't that what we wanted all along?
This just gets more interesting. If the sale of the NetSol was in the works for some time (and these things usually take a while) it would mean that Verisign was likely counting on the revenue from Sitefinder to offset the loss of revenue from selling NetSol. They cut off an arm and then shot themselves in the foot. Maybe ICANN can put them out of our misery. It would help explain why Verisign continues to press so hard for Sitefinder despite the firestorm over it.... New Coke anyone? Mark