For the fun of it. And its easy. Leave the computer on, thats it. My tech skills are low so im learning new stuff and thats always fun. And if the pay makes my server run for free thats a big bonus
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@tikh keep in mind youāre going to get responses here from the most engaged SNOs. It may not be representative for the wider sample of set it and forget it node operators who are more likely to be in it just to make some money.
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Great point @BrightSilence! Iām going to try and find more responses, but have def appreciate these! 
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This is one of those projects that actually manages to be transparent to a certain degree. I personally prefer the opportunity to follow engineering discussions while learning the details of the operations of a storage node.
The project is interesting on many levels - and since itās a simple docker spin-up to participate, everyone can do so on their own level of techiness.
Iāve been working professionally with distributed systems for years, thus my own interest and engagement, but when mentioning it to peers and friends - theyāve been triggered by the challenge of the big corp operators (google, amazon etc), and their personal rebels (in lack of better word) come to life. A few of them actually signed up and are happy to follow the progress of the development.
Just a few cents from me, hope itās useful.
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Hmmm, hard to say, I want to be a part of new things coming out for one. I have a industrial grade setup capable of assisting without it even feeling anything. And finally I guess the thought of getting even just a bit back from keeping my server up 24/7 is nice even if I would do that anyway. Well thatās my thoughts put in.
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I did the mining thing for a bit but felt that I got into the hardware mining game too late and it wasnāt really worth the costs. I started to look for something that was new - fresh - under valued that I could get in on the ground floor and ride to the penthouse.
I found Storj - I read the whitepaper, joined the community on rocket chat, and did some homework.
I felt that Storj was just what I was looking for. New - Still in Alpha, fresh - a lot of interest, a lot of activity on chat, a lot of dev progress, under valued - I am being optimistic and hopeful but I really want Storj to grow and become something formidable against the giants. If it does then more profit for those who were in it early. All riding on these customers that have PB of data to save!
Mining with ASIC was boring - plug it in and pay the electric bill. Because I had to build out the system, get the system working, configure the storage and software, and then find ways to monitor the system and the network I have been mentally and physically invested in this project and continue to be educated by the Storjlings and the experienced SNOs out there.
I am even now trying to optimize my SN with Internet connection speeds, hardware, concurrent sessions, etc with is all added value to my technical growth vs plug it in a pay the bill.
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Dear @tikh,
an interesting question indeed! As I have been explaining the Storj project to my friends I have been asked the same question a few times already. The short answer: it is fun. The more elaborated answer comes here below:
Folding At Home (F@H) - Paid but unused internet bandwidth & HDD space
I have a computer which is working the whole time as it is dedicated to the Folding At Home project*. Such project stresses the GPU and CPU mainly not the HDD, nor the internet connection. Some years ago I thought that I may try to ādonateā even the HDD space and the internet bandwidth which I have unusued at home. This was the first thought that brought me to storj, V2 at the time. I was able to run both projects on the same computer withouth issues.
*Please feel free to join our team, the Swiss Folding Team, we definitely could use some help! . Our stats can be checked at this link
Building an alternative
I like about the Storjshare project as we are building an alternative to the solutions created by major providers.
Online 100%, is that difficult?
My computer is not a server, it is an old gaming computer, therefore I do not dispose of all the available redundancy tricks which help you have a computer online the whole time. Still I have the feeling of having a very stable internet, power supply and computer: the storjshare project is a way for me to test if this āstability feelingā I have is correct or not.
For the moment being I have noticed that with V3 on Windows it is way more difficult to grant high levels of availability. After having switched to linux, though it is much better.
Learning new things
I never used docker before. I now have! In order to test V3 I had to install Windows 10 as Windows 7 is not supported. Windows 10 and docker do not work that well for our project, so in order to reduce the number of ERRORS in the logs I decided to install linux. With the help of the moderators and of the community I was able to install linux and move all the data.
Community feeling
I like the fact that chat is always populated that there is always someone who answers you. And also the emails updating us on the developments of the projects make me feel as part of the whole, which is great. We are doing something together, even if very afar from each other. Seems very difficult to me but it is happening. I think this is great. I never thought I would listen to those very long youtube videos, but indeed I am.
Money
This is, for me, the least interesting part. I have no idea how one could change Storj in ā¬: I believe it is possible, but I am pretty sure it will cost a lot. And given the scarce amount of Storj I have earned through the months I am not bothered in understanding how to exchange Storj in ā¬ or USD. My computer is always on in any case, so it does not matter to me, the money I spend for the electricity is spent anyway (and again, in my case, it is not Storj which is increasing the power consumption making me consume more electricity but F@H is).
So, I believe I have added all my pointsā¦ ā¦ @tikh thanks for the opportunity to share all my enthusiasm about the project.
Regards.
aseegy
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I was attracted by the idea of decentralization, useful and so lacking in this world. I love bitcoin and the idea of it all.
I also like to learn something new in the settings of programs and equipment.
Even if the income from all this will just cover the costs, thatās enough for me.
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Why?
Thats the first question of all my friendsā¦
For me it starts with this wonderful idea of decentralization cloud services based and
supported by its own users. I started with an rpi3 and learned a lot about Linux, storing Data and
its various ways to store them. It was kinda challenge for me to set up a Node and i was bored as the Node was finally up. So i decided to set up some more Nodes on more powerful Hardwareā¦
It ended up with multiple Nodes on industrial Hardware on different locations for now 
So why?
Because fun, interested in to be a part of this new generation of storing Data and most likely a kind of hobby to bring it work.
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I like decentralization. I saw through the years the direction that internet has taken and it really bothers me. When I read about Storj I was like āoh, that seems nice. Itās different. I like itā and I setup a V2 node on an old HDD in November 2017 just to try.
Fast forward to today and in the process I learned a lot, and even though my rig is kinda limited Iām happy with the results. Itās nice to see a project grow if you care about it.
Tl;dr: I like the idea behind this project. I hope it will succeed.
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Same story here. Iāve hit obstacles, even stumbled badly, but I still love the project all the same.
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There is another thing that would be important to me:
As a home user, I think nodes should be fully automated.
As commented in other places, disqualification shouldnāt be a thing unless itās evident that the node operator is trying to cheat. But I donāt want my node to be disqualified because of a power outage during my 2 week hollydays for instance.
It would make sense to reactivate some escrow mechanisms if this were to happen, or to earn way less money during some time for paying the network rebuilding of the data that became unavailable. But really, disqualification should happen in last resort, if the node is clearly bad, cheating, or has been away for months maybe (but even in this case, if it were to get back online eventually, it could simply start from scratch with 0 data and reputation).
But that applies to other aspects too: if something goes wrong with the node, it should do its best to fix the problem on its own.
For instance: Corrupted database? I see on the forum that there are ways to fix the issue: then if there is a known procedure, the node should do it to fix what it can automatically.
Many people monitor the logs to detect issues: I donāt want to be doing that personnally, Iām expecting my nodes to be autonomous.
I truly think that if StorjLabs want many people to provide storage space, they should provide people with a simple solution that requires only power, storage and network. All the rest should be automated, or at least hints and guidelines should be automatically suggested by nodes, in step with the current good/bad state of the system.
Otherwise, if we need to have system administration knowledge for running our nodes, thatās gonna exclude a lot of potential home SNOs.
Itās my opinion 
and I know nodes are going to improve with time, and that itās not going to be that easy to doā¦
But leaving my house without having to worry much about my nodes because of a network, a power or a disk failure while Iām away would be a greatly appreciated peace of mind.
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10 posts were merged into an existing topic: Anyone managed to exchange STORJ tokens to something else ? Mewconnect doesnāt work!
For me, Iām a server/storage administrator and I love the idea of being able to contribute my knowledge and passion into something to build. I like the idea of this āhobbyā paying for itself and allowing me to put more storage into my nodes. On the V2, I participated in the past, I believe I was able to set up multiple SNOs per physical machine which helps when you have two raid levels in a single unit.
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