#Alexandria @npub1s3ht...75wz

Paid smart relays, such as algo relays. We have this model being worked on by @utxo the webmaster 🧑‍💻.

Relay hosting provider relay.tools is run by @cloud fodder

Why should note hosting be commoditized? Can it even be commoditized? Compare it to renting servers. There isn't a single market price to host a web app. Every host has its own features, pricing structure, free tier etc. Same with relays. Why standardize income source? The default might be to pay to have your notes hosted, but you could just as easily have a format where a relay invests in scouring and indexing all kinds of posts, and users pay to have a curated feed of the best posts of the day, or maybe even a personalized feed. You could see relays that charge for notes on demand you can't find elsewhere where you give the note ID and pay them to get the note back. I even imagine there will be relays that hold on to notes that people request to delete and will charge to see them like a paid wayback machine. Even in the most common case where relays charge to host your notes, they will differentiate on many factors such as $/storage, $/bandwidth, uptime, speed, hosting location, redundancy, censorship resistance etc. Hosting is not something that can be commoditized. One thing for certain though, and it's biggest difference between your concept is the ad funded relays. I don't believe this can ever gonna be a significant part of Nostr and the best thing about it. It will be a thing when there is a company that builds out a full stack with a client that works with their own relays but even then it's not necessary for any standard protocol to pay for it. The client side decides what the users see. It always has last say in that field. Therefore, any attempt to fund a relay with ads will be fought off by client side filters if it ever gains significant market share.

Here is the thought experiment we need! * So clients and relays are not tied. * Therefore clients actually control what a user sees. Business ideas: 1. Subscription to relays/pay for premium client feature (current status e.g. #damus purple and premium relays) 2. Clients or Relays sprinkling adds 3. Promotion via zap sharing, e.g. each time a user gets zaps, that user’s primary relay gets a haircut. This would require cooperation and “trust” but content providers may go for it.

Nostr relays are highly decentralized because we have negentropy and outbox models. That means its easier to cover the running costs, for every relay that isn't especially large and overrun with users. You can't actually see most relays, as they're just little apps running on people's cell phones or laptops. I run the #Citrine 🍋 relay on my Android phone, and it has hundreds of books on it, takes up only 630 MB of space and doesn't noticeable increase my mobile bandwidth usage, since I sync it when in WiFi. Probably costs me a few euro-cents per month, and contains the notes that are relevant to me.