I am dumb and stupid and I do not know all the technical aspects of SSL and server/client side implications and implementations. However I understand them good enough from user point of view to use SSL and encyrption daily.

I was thinking that how silly it is to trust some unknown/known CAs when it comes to our our certificates for our servers. There had been many cases of misconduct, misuse, compromises and theft of certificates/ca keys from those places. On top of those known issues we also have to pay these guys regularly.

I am wondering why can not we use/treat web server certificates like we use our pgp keys? So I sign a SSL certificate and send to a central server. And then each user accessing my site checks the validity and the keys from some central server (like pgp key servers).

Is this a stupid idea? If so what could be a better idea than current system of issuing valid certificates. I am looking for a better than more secure idea. Naturally this is not a solution to an existing problem, rather it will be a hypothetical solution for some future implementation of a currently messed up web of trust on the internet due to recent news about NSA and their criminal buddies around the world.

thanks