#3: The Design of a New Internet
Last updated
Last updated
We’ve explored the problems of the current internet and the need for a new one, but now it’s time to discuss the design of this new internet.
Before diving into its design, let’s outline the design goals—what this new internet should achieve. These goals aim to resolve the issues of the current internet:
Fat Protocol: To tackle the problems of the current internet, the gaps in the original internet protocols must be filled with new internet protocols. At a minimum, this means we need protocols that don’t just transmit data but can also store and index it.
User Ownership: Following the first goal, if the protocols store and index data, someone needs to cover the costs of servers. Whoever pays for these storage and indexing costs becomes the owner of this new internet. To avoid centralization again, it’s crucial that content creators pay for storing this data so that they can own their content and intellectual property.
Financial Primitives: If creators need to pay to store data, the protocol must include financial primitives, like low-cost payments, built-in. Financial primitives can also help create a vibrant information market in which users pay to access valuable information, and incentives are in place to reward the creation of truthful content and penalize misinformation. Mechanisms similar to those used in financial markets, such as investing and trading, could be applied to discover truth in information markets.
Transparency: Transparency is key to ensuring high-quality content. In the current internet, platforms like Facebook and YouTube do not make their entire content databases transparent to the public; instead, only a subset of content is accessible through search and recommendation features that undergo heavy filtering. This means the source of all information is hidden. Transparency in this source would allow diverse participants—including individuals, scientists, startups, and even governments—to help identify misinformation and promote accurate information.
Interoperability: Once a transparent database of all the world’s information is established, we can achieve a state where the information database is de-linked from the web applications that access it. Thousands of apps could use the same content data source and the same follower graphs, allowing users to easily transition based on their UI or content policy preferences. This approach would address the current fragmentation of identity and follower graphs across individual apps, creating a unified identity and follower graph that users can seamlessly switch between different applications.
The resulting design of this new internet, based on these goals, will be compared to the current internet in the sections below.
In the next essay, we will discuss, the various players trying to achieve these design goals.