Why Decentralized Social Needs Its Own TCP/IP

Social needs a base layer. The current web2 model centralizes data, identity, and monetization. Decentralized applications like Farcaster or Lens Protocol built on Ethereum or L2s still rely on a financial settlement layer not optimized for social's high-frequency, low-value interactions.

TCP/IP for social graphs. The internet succeeded because TCP/IP provided a neutral, open data transport layer. Decentralized social requires a similar native protocol for identity and data that separates the social graph from the application, enabling permissionless innovation akin to how HTTP enabled the web.

The cost is the bottleneck. Storing a post or a like as an on-chain transaction on Ethereum mainnet is economically impossible at scale. Even optimistic rollups like Arbitrum or zk-rollups like zkSync are built for asset transfers, not for the petabyte-scale data of social feeds and media.

Evidence: Farcaster's architecture, which uses Ethereum for identity and off-chain hubs for data, demonstrates the necessary split. However, it reveals the missing standard: a decentralized, incentivized data layer that isn't a single company's server.

Sovereignty defines ownership. A protocol like Farcaster or Lens Protocol must control its own data graph and logic. Relying on a general-purpose L1 like Ethereum for all operations cedes control to its fee market and governance, making social primitives economically unviable.

Client diversity prevents capture. The web succeeded because HTTP/HTML were neutral standards, not AOL's walled garden. A decentralized social stack needs its own TCP/IP layer, a minimal protocol for identity and data, enabling independent clients like Warpcast and Hey to compete on UX, not control the network.

Modular architecture enables scale. Social graphs are write-heavy and require cheap state transitions. A sovereign rollup, like those built with OP Stack or Arbitrum Orbit, provides dedicated blockspace and customizable data availability, avoiding the congestion and cost of posting every 'like' to Ethereum mainnet.

Evidence: Farcaster's migration to its own OP Stack L2 reduced storage costs by 99%, proving that protocol-specific infrastructure is a prerequisite for sustainable growth, not an optimization.

Sovereign Data Layer: Social data requires a permanent, portable, and permissionless data store. This is the antithesis of mutable, rent-seeking cloud databases. The solution is a decentralized storage primitive like Arweave for permanence or Ceramic for mutable streams, enabling users to own their social graph and content outright.

Identity and Attestation Primitive: A social protocol needs a cryptographically verifiable identity that is not a wallet address. This is the role of decentralized identifiers (DIDs) and attestation frameworks like Ethereum Attestation Service (EAS) or Verax, which allow for portable reputation and credentials across applications.

High-Throughput Execution: Social interactions are high-frequency and low-value, which makes Ethereum L1 gas costs prohibitive. The execution environment must be a scalable L2 or appchain like Base or a Cosmos SDK chain, optimized for social transactions, not financial swaps.

Intent-Centric Curation: Curation cannot be a centralized algorithm. It must be a user-defined, composable filter. This requires open indexing (The Graph) and intent-based relayers (similar to UniswapX) that let users express preferences (e.g., 'show posts from people I follow who used EAS') which are fulfilled by a competitive network.

Pragmatism creates permanent dependencies. Using centralized cloud providers like AWS or Google Cloud for core data storage reintroduces the single points of failure and censorship vectors that decentralized social aims to eliminate. The protocol's sovereignty is outsourced.

Hybrid architectures are security theater. A front-end protocol like Farcaster using Optimism for on-chain actions but relying on Hubs with centralized infrastructure for data availability creates a brittle system. The user experience is still gated by web2 reliability.

The economic model breaks. A true data ownership economy requires verifiable, portable data assets. Storing social graphs in a proprietary database, even with a cryptographic wrapper, prevents composability and traps value within a single app's walled garden.

Evidence: The failure of Steemit demonstrates this. Its social layer was centralized, leading to governance capture and collapse. A new TCP/IP layer, like what Nostr attempts with its relay network, is the only path to credible neutrality.

The winner owns the identity layer. Social graphs are worthless without a portable, sovereign identity standard. The protocol that becomes the de facto DID standard—like Farcaster's FID or Lens's Profile NFT—will capture the network's foundational value, similar to how TCP/IP owns the addressing system.

Data availability is the new bandwidth. Current social apps like Bluesky rely on centralized servers for data. The winning stack will use permissionless data layers like Arweave or Celestia to ensure posts and interactions are uncensorable public goods, separating storage from logic.

Interoperability requires a social AMM. Content and connections must flow between protocols. The standardized social graph primitive will enable cross-protocol composability, turning platforms like Farcaster and Lens into interoperable neighborhoods rather than walled gardens.

Evidence: Farcaster's 300,000+ paid sign-ups prove users will pay for protocol-level identity and data portability, a direct rejection of the Web2 model where platforms own your social capital.