2) No merged mining. This is important because, according to Dustcoin, Namecoin currently adds 6.42% (BTC60.6 or $7410.17 a day) to 21TH of mining.
That's not chump change; perhaps Friedcat can buy merged mining software from Dr. Haribo or doublec.
True. OTOH I don't think this income would have been sustainable in the long run. NMC is deemed to stay a niche for alt-coiners until real applications start making use of it (i.e. the idea behind .bit at the time)