Seriously, Eurocrats??
"an important and valuable building block for the European online identity"
You could just take the humane, neighborly view that there are a few hundred thousand UK residents who have .eu domains because they are currently citizens of the EU, and then grandfather those people. Even if you block future .eu applicants with your residency confirmation. I can assure the members of the Eurocracy that, Brexit or not, the British Isles are not going to break loose from their place on the European tectonic plate and somehow wander off into the ocean somewhere. You guys in Brussels will actually remain neighbors with the Brits one way or the other.
But no, someone in Brussels has got it into their head that people are just lining up in the streets to have a .eu domain, and that these people A) can be petifogged and hassled and they will keep coming back for more, and B) must be some kind of rabble-in-the-making that needs the firm, but wise, guiding hand of the European Commission before they go off and do crazy and socially depraved stuff like posting cat videos and Walking Dead episode reactions.
And presumably these busybodies then go on to wonder why something like Brexit could have ever happened.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
