# Radworks Seed Node Incentivization

### Problem statement

1. Relying on a single Radicle Seed Node is neither sovereign nor user-friendly or performant.
2. There is currently no market for Seed Node operators.
3. Assuming that a market of Radicle Seed Node operators has emerged that offers hosting and content delivery, switching between them based on $ rates or reputation comes with switching costs and UX complexity.

If you rephrase the above in terms of user needs then:

As an end-user:

1. I want to have guarantees with regards to availability and performance of Radicle
2. I want to not have to think about choosing and switching between 3rd party gateways

### Proposal / Discussion

Users will always have the ability to self-host and professional node operators will always have the ability to create a paid offering on top of Radicle.

The goal of this session is to discuss ways where Radworks tries to create a third option that addresses (some of) the problems that I mention above.

**At a minimum, this initiative should incentivize a market of Seed Nodes to emerge globally and, more specifically, in areas where Radicle's offering can have the most impact.**

At best this initiative should coordinate a group of Radicle Seed node operators around the world that provide hosting and content delivery to end users, without the need for the end user to continuously monitor their performance and switch between them. In this scenario, the user pays one fixed rate and the network takes care of the rest.

### Prior Work / What's out there?

Radicle Seed Nodes serve mainly two roles within the Radicle ecosystem:

1. they host content for end-users
2. they serve content to end-users

Most relevant work here comes from Content Delivery Networks (CDNs) or retrieval markets. **To my knowledge, there are currently no cryptographic protocols for proving a retrieval, so proof-based systems are out of the picture.**

In contrast, there are a number of projects that attempt to offer a decentralized CDN without proofs. Within tokenized networks the term used to describe similar crypto-economic designs is [Decentralized Physical Infrastructure Networks (DePIN)](https://medium.com/wihi-weather/depins-are-three-sided-markets-an-evaluation-guide-for-investors-to-access-decentralized-8f82273c8d02).

Some of the most notable ones below:
- [Saturn](https://docs.saturn.tech/) that operates within the IPFS / Filecoin ecosystem.
- [Ar.io](https://ar.io/) that operates within the Arweave ecosystem
- [Fleek](https://docs.fleek.network/docs/learn/introduction/) that operates across decentralized storage ecosystems

**All of them attempt to utilize economic incentives to reward node operators who perform well on various relevant metrics, such as bandwidth served, download speed, or latency.**

A simplified way to think of the above designs is the following:

1. the network provides a pool of rewards (usually in tokens) for node operators that behave as desired. This pool of rewards can come from the fees that end-users pay and / or by some form of treasury or minting process.
2. within the network there is a group of monitoring nodes that monitor Seed Node operators and collect and compare logs of performance
3. there is a scoring function that scores each network operator based on the logs collected and the metrics specified by the network
4. based on that, rewards are distributed to node operators every epoch. Epochs are specified at the network level.

For a more detailed view check the [Reword Distribution Module from Saturn](https://hackmd.io/@cryptoecon/saturn-aliens/%2FMqxcRhVdSi2txAKW7pCh5Q), as it does a good job at outlining potential options and how they navigated them.

### In an ideal world...

- An end user pays a fixed price for hosting and bandwidth, so they don't have to think about dynamic pricing and similar complex things.
- An end user pays the network in a stable currency.
- The end user should also have the option to pay in multiple currencies (like ERC-20s).
- Any Seed Node operator can join the network and be considered for the pool of rewards (ie the network is permsionless).
- There are Seed Nodes across the globe and the network can dynamically incentivize the operation of Seed Nodes in specific territories of interest.
- The set of monitoring nodes is also permisionless. Anyone can join, contribute and be rewarded.
- The network manages the above functionality on a private setting/environment, so it's harder to capture.

### What are our options

1. It's not worth taking on this problem at all.
2. It's not worth taking on this problem right now.
3. Let's incentivize professional node operators from our treasury, but no new offering
4. Let's piggy back on some of the existing decentralized CDN networks like Saturn
5. Let's experiment with building something Radicle specific that tries to satisfy the above mentioned user-needs

## What I think we should?

1. Recruit a team of two engineers to work on the above problem

Candidates should have expertise in decentralized systems, content delivery networks, and crypto-economics.

2. Early in the process, allocate a pool of RAD tokens from the Radworks treasury for a permissioned testnet that runs for a quarter.

Here, we would need to clearly define the objectives of the permissioned testnet and outline specific metrics and performance indicators we would like to assess during this testing phase. I think that we should do this rather early so we have the possibility to co-design this with actual node operators rather than in a vaccuum.

3. Work with Seed Node operators and Monitoring Nodes to co-design this offering and bring this to production at some point in the future.

The goal here would be to understand their needs, challenges, and expectations. This approach will result in a more robust and user-friendly system that caters to the actual requirements of the operators.

4. Document the whole process

The goal here would be to document the entire process, including technical specifications, guidelines for Seed Node operators, and monitoring node participation. Clear documentation will facilitate easy onboarding and understanding for all stakeholders.