In reply to Pete Welcher.

@Pete I suppose the same argument exists for why companies would increase their peering arrangements. There needs to be sufficient volume to justify the investment.

My guess is that (someday) when IPv6 really comes into use, the sheer addressing space volume will motivate companies to migrate to a solution like LISP that allows for a more dynamic lookup. When every end customer has a IPv6 /64 and it is becoming too difficult to summarize due to roaming or some other new application. They will need a more DNS like solution to route lookups.

I'm not convinced LISP will be 'the' solution, but it's the best idea I've seen so far. Also, as the volume increases, there will be pressure on both ends of ISPs to become fully LISP and avoid the PITRs. Lookups are cheap, the PITRs are what will require more 'big iron' as you say, even if virtualized.