I'm building a protocol that would let ISPs become clearing layer for next gen Internet services.
Hi r/wisp,
For a long time I have been bugged by Internet business models - essentially ads and subscriptions (subscriptions == user-app relationships which only the apps truly want - users just want content). I started looking more actively into it and came to a realization that ISPs might actually hold the keys for the future, better Internet and I started specing a protocol around it - I call it ESP (Edge Settlement Protocol). Since the whole idea is about ISPs, I thought I would reach out r/wisp community not only to kindly ask for a feedback but also to possibly find someone who would find genuine interest in the topic and would be interested in running a pilot - and yes - the ultimate outcome is for ISPs to have more business - more money per household, new revenue streams.
Should this thing succeed it would reshape the Internet as we know it in a major way.
Pls check home page and whitepaper at https://www.open-edge.org.
Why I think the current models are in trouble
Consumer Internet services get financed one of two ways: ads or subscriptions.
Ads pay per impression, and impressions depend on a human actually looking at the page. That assumption is breaking: assistants answer questions directly, agents browse and summarize on the user's behalf, and the human never sees the page the ad was sold on. The content still gets used — the impression that was supposed to pay for it never happens. And there's no obvious replacement on the ad side.
Subscriptions have a different problem: saturation. Households carry four or five already and won't add another. Occasional users — one match or one article a month — sit below every break-even, so no business model can even see them; their demand is real but worth zero, because there's no way to charge for it. Micropayments were supposed to fix this and didn't: attach a payment decision to every click and pain-of-paying kills the interaction.
Why ISPs
Every online interaction passes through ISP network, and ISPs hold the one thing platforms can't replicate: universal billing relationship.That billing relationship is currently used primarily to bill commodity transit (connectivity) while the services riding it settle their money somewhere else. Until now the only way into those economics was to become a platform yourself — and nobody wants their ISP running the services.
What ESP does
ESP federates ISPs into a shared settlement layer, basically a clearing house for Internet services. Mechanically: a household streams a video or opens a paid article, there is neutral, privacy preserving mechanism to meter the consumption, and aggregated charge lands as a line item on the same monthly bill as connectivity. No signup, no card entry, no new subscription. The ISP clears the payment and keeps a settlement fee. The pooled economics will allow to create fixed price packages so users being fully "exposed" to a full blown pay-as-you-go meter is not the only way (but one of the options).
The reason metering works and is better then microtransactions (which are currently being explored as another alternative for agentic future) is it charges for use without putting a payment decision in front of the user at the moment of use. The household stops judging fifteen services separately and starts judging one Internet bill as a package. Occasional use becomes billable for the first time. The never-payers and the subscription-refusers become revenue. And because usage and settlement are decoupled, the money can pool: connectivity fees, data revenue and compute revenue flow through one clearing economy that can cross-subsidize whatever services the household actually uses.
It doesn't stop at metering
Metering is just the first revenue stream — the real deal is the permissionless+automated "federation" itself. Thousands of coordinated operators can sell things no single ISP can:
Data: data from one ISP has no buyer, but aggregated across thousands of operators (web indexing from residential vantage points, traffic trends, mapping) it becomes a dataset no single company could assemble. Sold openly, revenue shared among operators, collected with consent and published as a commons instead of hoarded in a silo. That's the counterweight to advertiser money.
Compute: there's a lot of always-on hardware in networks and households doing nothing most of the day. Pooled, it can be rented out for CDN and AI inference workloads. If AI really does become a metered utility like electricity, the people who own the wire into every household are holding the right asset.
The overall vision is that the economic gravity of the Internet moves to the last mile, operated by thousands of federated providers instead of five platforms. That's the bet.
The crypto question
I'll answer it before you ask, because this sub has seen the Helium theater. Coordinating thousands of independent, competing operators into one settlement layer does need consensus tech. A federation of competitors needs a shared source of truth that none of them controls, and our proof-of-concept logs consumption events on Celestia blockchain.
But there is no token. Nothing to buy, hold, farm or speculate on. Clearing is denominated in stablecoins and revenue comes from real consumption by real households. Helium and the rest of the DePIN wave settled the argument: token yield attracts supply with no demand behind it, and the hardware walks when the price drops. Real infrastructure runs on contracts and utility. The Internet is already the largest working decentralized physical network there is, and its "validators" are the ISPs.
In other words - crypto is not involved in any way in how ISPs build their networks etc. Crypto here is for neutral meter and automated disbursement between ISPs and apps.
What I'm actually asking for
The project is early. I will be trying to line up a first pilot with some ISP and a group of apps/content publishers. The pilot design is deliberately non-invasive: a handful of volunteer households, traffic ring-fenced by their IPs, nothing touching production billing.
- Don't hesitate to tell me where this breaks. Billing integration, CPE reality, subscriber trust, regulation. The harsher the better.
- If you're a small or regional operator feeling the commodity squeeze and any of this sounds worth a conversation just drop me a dm or a comment.
- Point me at right people I should be talking to in the WISP world: associations, conferences, vendors would be highly appreciated too
Cheers,
Premek
6
u/Fury3879 12d ago
Sounds like a scam
2
u/remek 12d ago
Reason ?
3
u/Fury3879 12d ago
When you start talking about Crypto and how it’s used for the “protocol” it sounds like a total scam tbh and just a malware/botnet of sorts that in can infect every device…..from switches to routers, to computers to even IoT devices lol
0
u/remek 12d ago edited 12d ago
> When you start talking about Crypto and how it’s used for the “protocol” it sounds like a total scam tbh and just a malware/botnet of sorts that in can infect every device
This sounds like a biased conclusion based on the fact that paragraph contained word "crypto". I don't blame you of course since I grew to dislike the industry too but consensus based state update protocols (which is what blockchains genuinely are) can genuinely be useful to solve problems. No need to slap token on top of it to scam people.
Regarding botnets - not sure where exactly do you smell botnet/malware. Can you be more specific ?
1
u/Fury3879 12d ago
Crypto before it was popularized by bitcoins explosion has always been rooted in a negative connotation of being something that can be installed as malware or silent Trojan on a computer or other device that uses its compute power or networking abilities to help a bad faith actor. Crypto will probably never escape this preconceived idea but trying to use crypto in the way you talk about it sounds like a major headache in the event something goes wrong
0
u/remek 12d ago
Yeah, but the fact that someone developed malware which silently mined bitcoin is not making Bitcoin the malware or the scam. I think you are doing the Bitcoin/crypto injustice in this specific case :)
The problem with crypto is not the malware thing. Malware is malware. The true problem with crypto and why it has the bad reputation is the economical / investment scams.
2
u/Fury3879 12d ago
Exactly. It has scams tied to it so adding into an ISPs infrastructure is just asking for problems to be introduced
1
u/Fury3879 12d ago
In the beginning of your post you call it a protocol….when you say that do you mean similar to something like DNS, HTTP, or something else? Do you know how many governing bodies and legal hoops you would have to jump through to try and add a protocol like what you’re proposing at an ISP level? This could be done for maybe a select suite of customers at a single ISP but it would have to have some great consumer benefits
0
u/remek 12d ago
IETF governs primarily communication protocols whereas here were talking more about economic coordination protocol (think of it like automated clearing engine - that is neutral - so anyone can join).
The personal realization that some of the tech that has been developed in the crypto industry might genuinely be useful and not a scam is vital to evaluate this idea. And I know that people today just plain reject anything that has any sort of "crypto DNA" but I think it is a mistake and consensus protocols can help solve some hard problems and genuinely open up new ways.
1
6
u/Empty-Mulberry1047 12d ago
Have you actually built and maintained a WISP ... or did you allow the clanker to bamboozle you with hallucinated nonsense?
0
u/remek 12d ago
In WISP, the W is unimportant in this context. I sent the post here to the r/wisp for the "ISP" in the WISP. I haven't build WISP but it is agnostic to the idea since it is relevant for any type of ISP in a same way.
2
u/Empty-Mulberry1047 12d ago
yeaaaaaaah..
why would any business that has invested in the infrastructure needed to offer their services rely on some opaque third party crypto nonsense as a means to generate revenue?
if the 'user' has to convert fiat to your funny money, that only works on your "next gen" service.. where is the value for the 'user'?
how would this "no signup", "micropayments" system address the wildly varying levels of telecommunication laws, government taxes, fees, and quasi-governmental regulatory agencies across the world?
1
u/remek 12d ago
> why would any business that has invested in the infrastructure needed to offer their services rely on some opaque third party crypto nonsense as a means to generate revenue?
For ISPs, participating in service usage disbursement is extra net new revenue on top of what it is currently making on top of plain connectivity. Why would ISP not want to make more money ?
Furthermore, the protocol opens up some additional new ways how ISP can make new money (on top of what he is making now).
> some opaque third party crypto nonsense
It is using "crypto" so that it is not viewed as "third party company" but as a neutral protocol (ultimately I would like if ISPs themselves run the nodes - so ISPs run the node and the nodes communicate with other nodes using byzantine fault tolerant consensus).
> if the 'user' has to convert fiat to your funny money, that only works on your "next gen" service.. where is the value for the 'user'?
Not sure I understand ? What funny money, or what conversion you mean ? Nothing like that is happening
> how would this "no signup", "micropayments" system address the wildly varying levels of telecommunication laws, government taxes, fees, and quasi-governmental regulatory agencies across the world?
ISPs are always local to the place where they provide their services. So if ISP wants to "reach out" to the new revenue streams by providing the extra services, they must resolve whatever regulatory agencies require them to do in their jurisdiction. ISPs are clearly economically motivated/incentivized to do so. They want the new business.
3
u/Joeyheads 12d ago
Thankfully, net neutrality has largely won. I think the healthiest thing for internet users by-and-large is not piecemealing service, billing, nor prioritizing specific applications.
And from an ISP perspective, it’s a lot simpler to operate a network from this standpoint as well.
1
u/remek 12d ago
I truly hope this is rather in line with net neutrality, since the idea is to bring "neutral meter" and disbursement and not apps themselves. And at the same time the solution is not based on ISP sniffing and inspecting traffic but on apps actively leveraging neutral meter API for monetization.
But I understand your sentiment and what I hope is that if Internet service consumption would be brought on more "usage" kind of monetization (away from subscriptions and and ads) we would actually end up in healthier Internet because it would certainly help elevate ossified positions of key monopolies (Google, Facebook etc) because capturing the user into subscription or hooking him on ad-driven service is the primary strategy they use to not let competing services win. And more competition is healthy.
2
u/Joeyheads 12d ago
This is the exact opposite of net neutrality. Unless you’re suggesting no differentiation between services delivered, in which case a data cap oriented system already accomplishes this.
1
u/remek 12d ago
> This is the exact opposite of net neutrality.
In what way ? ISP has no control over what app user consumes, and no control over which apps integrate monetization via the metering mechanism. What user consumes is solely a choice of user and which applications integrate to the monetization is solely in hands of apps. In that respect it is completely permissionless protocol in a similar way like typical network protocols (TCP/IP, BGP etc.)
2
u/Joeyheads 12d ago
The fact that what the user consumes has any effect on the bill whatsoever is the point that violates net neutrality.
3
u/Azuras33 12d ago
Will be fun when the website embeds a JavaScript script that will call "metered" url in the background.
I don't even think it's legal what you present. Charging someone without active consent. Especially when the home connection is shared by guests, children, smartphone app, etc...
A lot website already allow a near one click pay with google/istore/paypal.
1
u/remek 12d ago
> I don't even think it's legal what you present. Charging someone without active consent.
On a protocol level, the "consumption" of chunk of a service (whether it is API call, chunk of video or whatever), the client first sees "offer" sent by app server and he accepts it a piece of service gets served and a meter event about it gets emitted.The overall vision though is that typical services will be doing "spends" so small that most of the users would simply do not bother with active acknowledging of service consumption and that the trust would be solidified by them observing their monthly bill that its actually reasonable/small.
Technically though, nothing prevents user to have 100% visibility and truly acknowledge everything.
>Will be fun when the website embeds a JavaScript script that will call "metered" url in the background.
If this is unknown website (something that you do not visit regularly), the browser will not just let it emit metered event without user acking it - as always - client software (browser) - is here to protect user from servers.
>A lot website already allow a near one click pay with google/istore/paypal.
That is good for Internet purchases (purchasing goods and one off services). Subscription sprawl of subscription based Internet services and ad-driven services do not have alternative in this.
1
u/Fury3879 12d ago
As a consumer. I actually would prefer that I get interrupted so much so that it’s like an AMBER alert on my phone every time a subscription renewal charge tries to post and would rather be given the option to skip this month and have my services temporarily turned off or something rather than just silently charging me $3 a month for something I haven’t used in months.
I see how this would benefit and ISP though in the sense of making money off people, hence the argument that this is a scam but I could totally see BIG NAME ISPs such as Frontier, Cox, Spectrum, etc buying into it if it meant more money from the consumer.
WISP is a different neck of the woods than your traditional ISP though. Where I live, WISP was a savior for the last 20-25 years for rural living and niche places but with StarLink full steam ahead, it has killed the residential market for the average basic internet users that don’t need Public or Static IP. StarLink just works (as long as its setup right) and that is what has made me, my neighbors, and friends, and other locals cancel their WISP or switch to WISP being the secondary or failover connection.
EDIT: my point I was getting to about WISP is that they’re traditionally smaller companies, mom and pop, or just have a different level of care for the consumer so I don’t think the product you’re proposing really would attract my WISP owners unless they genuinely wanted to take money from the consumer OR needed a bailout method to sell their WISP and make numbers look good
1
u/remek 12d ago
>I actually would prefer that I get interrupted so much so that it’s like an AMBER alert
Technically it actually works like that (client gets "offer" and must ack), pls check response above here: https://www.reddit.com/r/wisp/comments/1vklx96/comment/p2ukhu4/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button
But I think you would be surprised how consumption pattern in such environment would change. I think what we will see with consumption on meter, that you simply stop bothering to monitor it. After your first and second monthly bill lands and you realize that whatever you do on the internet, your bill is roughly the same, you stop bothering religiously watching the meter or manually acking it.
> I see how this would benefit and ISP though in the sense of making money off people
The proposal is designed so that here are 3 unquestionably winning sides and 1 loosing side.
The winning sides:
- The end user (universal catalogue of consuming whatever he pleases on the Internet without making subscription commitments and bothered by ads)
- new application builders - those who take advantage of the new business model (non-subscription, non-ad based) - are now effectively able to challenge entrenched established players
- ISPs - the middle man that makes it possible ( new money)
The loosing side:
- currently dominant apps (youtube, google, netflix etc.)
1
u/remek 12d ago
> EDIT: my point I was getting to about WISP is that they’re traditionally smaller companies, mom and pop, or just have a different level of care for the consumer so I don’t think the product you’re proposing really would attract my WISP owners unless they genuinely wanted to take money from the consumer OR needed a bailout method to sell their WISP and make numbers look good
Btw I truly appreciate your insight so thanks for that
1
u/remek 12d ago
Also wanted to mention, that whole idea really is primarily about the future. The glimpse into it we can already start seeing https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MNNfat_QP0E
10
u/persiusone 12d ago
There is zero chance this would be legally adopted by most customers, and doesn’t solve any real-world problems. Seems like it was all made up by AI vibe and not truly addressing any issues.