Imagine if registration had stayed free, there'd be no domain squatters, and that cool idea you had that only works if the domain is available would be possible!
IMO the .com domain name fees are… acceptable. It’s similar to how we deal with scarce resources in almost every other domain. The only real improvement I can think of would be some sort of LVT-like-system where high-value domains (dictionary words, short domains) would cost more than low-value ones (robertospizzaottawa.com) to discourage camping.