Blockchains promise a new kind of digital economy, but right now, they’re still running on the same public internet built for email threads and static web pages. If we want blockchains to operate at a global scale, we have to strengthen the pipes underneath. Blockchains will only move as fast as the networks powering them, something traditional finance has known for decades. It’s time for blockchain to embark on the same journey.
I spent the last four years at Solana Foundation as the Head of Strategy, working closely with developers building two validator clients capable of handling one million transactions per second – in theory. The performance of the public internet, not the speed of a modern CPU or the quality of the software, was the last holding back Solana from reaching the true potential of its programing.
Validator clients could process data far faster than the network could deliver it. Think of building a race car that can hit 300 mph, then forcing it to crawl through rush-hour traffic. At peak times, validators weren’t limited by their own hardware but by data packets crossing congested routes. Every millisecond of added latency meant fewer transactions settling per second.
The Limits of the Public Internet
The internet was designed to host websites, not to be the backbone of high-performance systems. Companies we think of as the largest ‘internet companies,’ from Google to Meta, operate massive private, dedicated fiber optic networks to move data across the world. Meta, the parent company of Facebook, is one of the largest investors in subsea fiber, in large part because the public internet is not up to the task of serving billions of WhatsApp messages and millions of Instagram Reels. If the public internet is too slow for Instagram, what does that mean for decentralized finance?
For blockchain to move billions of dollars onchain in a matter of milliseconds, without relying on centralized systems, we must build a parallel, superhighway that’s dedicated to these new systems that power real-time systems like blockchain networks and AI training models.
Why We Need a New Backbone
By activating unused fiber around the globe, it’s possible to unlock a new level of speed and reliability that the public internet just can’t match. This goes beyond supplementing existing systems and instead rethinking the fundamental foundation of how high-performance distributed systems communicate.
It is not a new idea. Banks, trading desks, and payment networks already rely on private connections because reliability is not optional when trillions of dollars are at stake. If blockchains are going to anchor the next financial era, they will need the same level of infrastructure.
Beyond Blockchain
This shift to purpose-built high-performance networks goes well past crypto. AI systems, real-time markets, and even multiplayer games all require low latency and reliability. A dedicated backbone, owned by its participants, is like upgrading from a two-lane country road to the German Autobahn. Bottlenecks disappear, latency becomes deterministic, jitter is all but eliminated, and builders can build systems to levels of throughput and performance not previously possible.
The Public Internet as the Benchmark
The ultimate benchmark for any purpose-built network is the public internet. The public internet Speed is only part of the story. The real test of a network is whether it can stay online when things go wrong. The public internet was never built with much redundancy, which is why small glitches often snowball into major outages. Dedicated networks are different. With spare capacity and alternate routes, they keep humming when traffic surges or nodes fail.
For blockchains, that difference separates an experiment from a system the world can rely on. The same is true for AI models, markets, and other critical systems that cannot afford downtime. Redundancy is insurance, especially for a system like blockchain, where failure means lost value. It is what keeps the digital economy moving when pressure hits.
A delayed payment, a missed validator vote, and a lagging AI model can all mean lost money, broken trust, or missed opportunity. Think of the systems we do not let fail: stock exchanges, hospitals, and air traffic control. Tomorrow’s technology deserves the same standard.
Dedicated Networks Are The Next Era of Infrastructure Hyper Scaling
The public internet carried us through Web 1.0, but expectations changed with the rise of Web2. Companies we think of as public internet companies (the likes of Facebook, Google, Amazon, Apple, and others) make extensive use of private networks because the public internet is rarely up to the task. With the advent of Web3, we find ourselves in a similar situation. Dedicated networks for blockchains and distributed systems aren’t optional anymore if we want to see true progress.
The next leap in blockchain innovation will come from dedicated networks. When independent validators can depend on new network rails, the entire ecosystem benefits from faster transactions, and developers are able to focus their energy on building new ideas, rather than constantly engineering around constraints.
The builders who recognize this shift now are the ones defining the next economy. For blockchain systems to truly complement and compete with traditional finance and traditional Web2 companies, we need to embrace the future of high-performance dedicated networking, run by multiple independent contributors, as the backbone of decentralized blockchain systems.