Makes you wonder, will there ever be a replacement for the Internet?

What would that look like? An incompatible sister network that offers something the existing internet does not offer? A new network created after major disasters and world wide nuclear war destroy all existing infrastructure? I can’t imagine the existing internet would ever be replaced, certainly not by something offering privacy like ToR, because not enough people really care about privacy. The average person doesn’t really give a damn.

Chances are, just like modern internet took advantage of old communication technology (telephone wires) to spread, the "next" internet will take advantage of the "current" one.

It's already happening with new protocols not running on their own TCP port, but being 'tunneled' over HTTPS on port 443 (eg DNS over HTTPS).

At some point we can optimize away the IP and TCP layers.

Interesting question.

"Replacement in what sense?" probably deserves exploration.

The underlying fundamental concepts of the Internet are 1) packet-switched (as opposed to through-circuit) communications, and inter-connected networks, via BGP.

There's a lot that's layered on top of this which is seen as fundamental, but is not entirely so, most especially end-to-end connectivity and universal point-to-point access. The Internet formed under tremendously different conditions than exist today, with only a handful of nodes through 1980, and even as late as the late 1980s only a few thousands.

Roughly each order-of-magnitude increases since then seem to have come with its own set of additional headaches and concerns, mostly regarding management and mitigation of abuse. The idea of guarded borders has long been seen as anathema. I see it as all but inevitable, and the question is whether that's done well or poorly.

There are a number of earlier networking ideas which might resurface or be adapted for new use, and a survey of history might be useful here. (John S. Quarterman's The Matrix, 1990, is a fascinating time-capsule exploration of these just at the cusp of the modern Internet -- the World Wide Web does not even make mention, though "The Web, a national Canadian nonprofit conferencing system formed in 1987, does.

I'd also look at uses of the Internet and user needs.

Fundamentally, digital networks serve as communications and control media. Whether or not these need to (or can be) segregated is an open question, but splitting off, say, the IoT from other communications, might make sense, along with SCADA and military communications -- all largely control networks.

Splitting out video and voice from text and data, likewise. Much of high-demand comes from those.

As the Internet heads from the first billion or two users to the remaining five or so, questions of what technology, interfaces, and devices are appropriate for a set of digital newcomers may be worth consideration.

Or, looking at this differently: the degree to which those already here may be interested in maintaining a separate space for themselves. Not that this is necessarily equitable, but it may well prove to be attractive, say, in particular to minimise fraud and other malicious use or attacks originating from the global poor, who are in many ways justified in wanting some of the pie that's been denied to, or taken from, them.

How the needs, wants, attractions, and/or detractors or aversions affect technology development and adoption remains to be seen.

> Makes you wonder, will there ever be a replacement for the Internet?

Google. Circa 2030.