Hey everyone, we are back with an improved long term plan for Polkadot Storage.
Last December, phase 3 got rejected during confirmation with a very narrow margin. Work has continued uninterrupted and we now have over 90% of phase 3 completed. We are testing the system in our private testnet and will move to a public testnet soon. Integration with mainnet has been postponed because of the JAM integration plans and we’ll continue improving tools and interfaces. For more details on our progress check the weekly updates on the forum.
During this time we have also been working with Parity and with their guidance have improved our long term approach. These ideas have been incorporated into Phase 4:
Jam Integration
Light weight proof system
Replication
Legal
Economic model:
XCM
Marketplace model
Overall the plan is to turn this into a proper Storage product and build applications on top. With so much potential and attention on storage lately, it's an exciting time to build.
Links:
Polkadot Storage has a new long-term plan to improve their storage system. They have completed 90% of phase 3 and are testing it in a private testnet. They will soon move to a public testnet and work on integrating it with the mainnet. Here are some of the new ideas they have for phase 4:
Overall, they want to turn this into a proper storage product and build applications on top of it. They are excited about the potential and attention on storage lately.
Threshold
PolkaWorld has voted NAY on this proposal.
Setting aside the broader question of whether storage is a critical and urgent need in the Polkadot ecosystem — and whether this initiative overlaps with existing solutions like Crust or Filecoin — we believe the salary level proposed by the team is simply too high.
Polkadot Treasury, as a public funding source, should not passively accept flat-rate pricing. There must be room for discussion and accountability on budget justification, especially when the community is funding the work.
While we recognize the technical complexity and depth of the proposal, we would like to raise a concern regarding the cost structure — specifically the rate of $25,000 per FTE, which implies an annual compensation of $300,000 per engineer.
This figure is significantly higher than typical Web3 developer salaries, even in high-cost countries. For context, according to Web3.Career’s latest data:
Given that the team is based in Finland, where compensation expectations are likely in line with or below those of Sweden and Norway, the proposed rate appears disproportionately high.
Moreover, this compensation level is equivalent to or exceeds that of CTOs in most Web3 organizations, yet it is being applied uniformly across all engineers in the proposal.
We believe it’s important for Treasury-funded public goods to maintain both technical excellence and cost efficiency. We respectfully request the team to revisit the rate and consider aligning it more closely with regional benchmarks to better serve the long-term sustainability of the ecosystem.