Revisiting network neutrality for the enhanced internet

Digital infrastructure undergirds the modern economy. From streaming media and cloud applications to AI-enabled services and real-time communications, nearly every sector depends on reliable, high-performance internet access. While attention often focuses on last-mile broadband networks, a critical intermediate layer — performance-enhancing infrastructure such as caching — quietly shapes who can compete, innovate, and scale online. This infrastructure is increasingly essential, yet highly concentrated and largely privatized.

The network neutrality debates turned on whether broadband internet access should be classified as an “information service” or a “telecommunications service.” That distinction determined whether regulators could impose nondiscrimination obligations. Much of the classification dispute centered on caching and DNS services offered by access ISPs. For some time, regulators treated caching as incidental to transmission — an efficiency feature that did not alter the basic character of broadband as a conduit for user-directed communications. ISPs argued the opposite: that such features transformed broadband into a more integrated information service.

This project revisits that debate in light of contemporary technological realities. Today, distributed caching infrastructure is no longer incidental. It is functionally necessary for high-performance internet service. Streaming video, cloud-based productivity tools, gaming platforms, and AI applications depend on geographically distributed servers that store and deliver content close to end users. Without caching, many modern services would be impractical.

Yet the infrastructural enhancements that make these modern services real do not operate according to the internet’s traditional economic model. Historically, users of all types paid for their own connectivity and benefited from widespread interconnection, which kept barriers to entry relatively low. Network neutrality reinforced this structure by preventing infrastructure providers from selectively shifting costs or advantages among users. By contrast, today’s caching ecosystem — dominated by large content delivery networks and vertically integrated cloud providers — conditions high-quality performance on the ability and willingness to pay for specialized services. As a result, participation in digital markets increasingly depends on relationships with concentrated intermediaries.

We propose to democratize caching by requiring that first-hop ISPs offer standardized caching services as a component of baseline broadband access, subject to various regulatory requirements. Technically, this would integrate modular caching functionality into access networks. Economically, pricing caching into general broadband service would distribute its costs broadly, rather than reserving performance advantages for those able to negotiate private agreements.

By treating caching as essential infrastructure, this reform aims to reduce barriers to entry, mitigate infrastructural concentration, and restore conditions for broad-based innovation in the digital economy.