FAQ: ALICE Rewards

Published in

Muon

9 min readMar 6, 2023

Isn’t the reward plan clear for you? You think you might not have understood the plan well. You don’t get how the dashboard works? Read on to get illuminated.

This article does not follow the routine that our readers are used to; it is actually an interview. Muon’s socials admins have collected and categorized the most frequent questions that our community had about the reward plan. Here are the answers from Muon’s technical writer, Robert, to fifteen most asked questions. (You can skim through this interview and find YOUR question/questions.)

Reward Plan

Question 1: I am really confused. How can I get my node-drop and what are these percentages? And why is the reward divided into two parts: a 20% and an 80%?

Robert: Before I start answering, I should thank Lafayette Tabor, Muon’s co-founder, for spending time and sharing his views on how to answer these questions, in spite of all his preoccupations.

Perhaps this question was the most frequent in the community. Understanding the reasons and dynamics for the reward plan is crucial for all node operators. So I will answer this one in detail.

As you all know, the full reward is the minimum amount of locked $PION necessary for running a single node on the Pioneer network. All node operators need to prove their uniqueness and this is the one necessary prerequisite for getting any amount of the reward.

The reward plan is super simple. Consider the time before February 27th as a start-up phase when everybody had the chance to set up their nodes and the devs had time to fix bugs and implement the necessary stuff. Now if you host your node for a longer period, you get more rewards than if you host it for a shorter period. Here are three examples to make things clear:

Example 1: If you host your node from January 19th (launch of ALICE) for 90 days, you will get the full reward.

Example 2: If you host your node from any time before the 27th of February and keep it up until the 27th of April (for 60 days), you will get the full reward.

Example 3: If you host your node from the 27th of March until the 27th of April (30 days), you will get 40% of the full reward.

We have recently deployed the Liveness Monitoring System that keeps track of the nodes.

Here is a chart to showcase the relationship between the date you join the network and the percentage of node-drop you will get.

As you see, hosting from the 19th of January until the 27th of April gives you 100% of the reward.

To sum it up, in addtion to uniqueness verification, there are four requirements for your node to be eligible for the full node-drop:

Joining the network before February 27th, 5 p.m. CET
Having a valid IP address for the period between February 28th until April 28th
Running the node for at least 60 days after February 27th
Having 90% uptime since joining

Requirements to get the Full Reward for Running an ALICE Node

I hope things are crystal clear now.

Running Nodes

Question 2: My node stopped last week (Feb 22) and I added a new node. Will I get any reward for the first one as well?

Robert: Because all node operators should pass uniqueness verification, a single node operator can only get one reward. So because adding your node was before the 27th , you will get the reward for the start-up period, that is 20% of the full reward and you don’t need to worry about your first node.

How about the rest of the reward? That depends on the requirements I mentioned in the answer to question 1.

Question 3: I started my node on Feb 10, but it has been on and off many times. How is my reward calculated? I mean, are there any benefits to having a good uptime before February 27th?

Robert: The first part of the reward, I mean the 20%, does not depend on your uptime; that is, node operators who have joined ALICE by February 27th will get 20% of the full reward regrdless of their uptime. So up to the 27th of February, no matter how long your node was live, you will get the 20%. However, after the 27th, 90% uptime is one of the main requirements.

Question 4: My node has been down for the last 12 days and now my VPS has also expired; so is it possible to connect to the same wallet with a new VPS and what happens to my rewards?

Robert: If you have backed up your node, you can easily restore it on a new VPS and your reward is sound and safe. But if you haven’t backed it up, and you run a new node, you lose the portion of the reward that your first node earned.

However, the 20% of the reward will be given to you, no matter what happened to the node before the 27th of February. But that is only true for the start-up phase. A word of caution to all node operators: “If you don’t want to lose your reward in the second phase, do back up your nodes.”

Question 5: Is there an additional reward if my node is running from January 27 until the end or should I shut it down after 60 days?

Robert: The reward plan for after sixty days from the 27th of February will be announced later, so you had better keep up the good work and leave your node up.

The Dashboard

Question 6: Are the rewards shown on the ALICE dashboard worthless?

Robert: ALICE is a test network and, naturally, its token has no real value. And by real value, I mean tradable or market value, just like ETH on the Rinkeby Testnet (Ethereum test network).

Question 7: How can I understand that my node is up at least 90% of the time?

Robert: On the latest update of the dashboard, this feature is included. So now you can see your node’s uptime percentage and the details of its downtime.

A Sample Node’s Uptime Percentage and Downtime Details

Question 8: How is the online percentage calculated? What I remarked yesterday, for 1 h offline my percentage was 97%. Maybe you can share information about that.

Robert: This number shows the percentage of your node’s uptime after the start of the second phase. It is based on the chart illustrated in the answer to Question 1 and is technically called “linear decay”. It is calculated as follows:

So if your node was added to the network by February 27th , this number shows the percentage of the node’s uptime from that date to the present time. And if a node is added after that date, this number shows the percentage of the node’s uptime from when it is added to the present time.

Let’s take an example: today (March 7) is 8 days after Feb 27, so if a node was added before Feb 27 and ithas been down for, for example, 48 hours, the percentage is 75% . This means the node has missed 48 hours out of 192 hours.

Presale Participants

Question 9: I bought $MUON in the presale, but have not run an ALICE node? How much of the node-drop will I get?

Robert: $Muon presale participants will get a reward based on their pre-sale participation, so they do not have to run an ALICE node. The details of the rewards for presale participants will be published by the time Pioneer launches.

Question 10: I bought $Muon in the presale and have run an ALICE node too. Why can’t I get two rewards, I mean two nodes? And Could you explain how the multiplier for pre-sale participants operates?

Robert: We really appreciate your devotion and attachment to Muon. But no one can get more than one node on the Pioneer network and we have uniqueness verification to guarantee that. However, there will be different levels/tiers for Pioneer nodes based on a few criteria such as a user’s level of verification, participating in the presale, and, the percentage of ALICE node-drop. It means there will be a difference between someone who has just run an ALICE node and someone who has participated in the presale as well. The details will be announced shortly before Pioneer launches.

A very important word of warning: “Be cautious, no one can ever have a bigger total reward than 100%, and trying to game the system by hosting multiple nodes will result in slashing and could mean you will lose all your rewards. We make sure to identify fraud.”

Question 11: I participated in both presale and ALICE but with two different wallets. What will happen to my rewards? Can you combine both?

Robert: Our tech team is developing a form/webpage where users can “merge” the rewards from presale and ALICE wallets. This will be implemented with the launch of the Pioneer. So you don’t need to worry if you’ve used different wallets for the presale and ALICE nodes.

Question 12: How can I prove that the wallet I used for the pre-sale is linked to the one I’m currently running a node with, if they are different wallets? Where does it ever say that it’s mandatory to use the same wallet from the presale for the node as well?

Robert: As I mentioned earlier it isn’t mandatory or necessary for pre-sale participants to join ALICE. Of course, we are very thankful that you have contributed to expanding the network. And, it isn’t technically difficult at all to have a record of pre-sale or ALICE wallets. Please see the answers to question 4 & 10.

Miscellaneous

Question 13: Having a valid IP proves my uniqueness, doesn’t it?

Robert: Having a valid IP is only one of the simpler ways of proving uniqueness, but there are a few other more efficient and complex ways. We are going to give ALICE node operators a choice of a few verification methods. Each method will represent a certain level of uniqueness verification.

Question 14: Will Pioneer network eventually change to the Muon mainnet?

Robert: Pioneer, Muon’s canary network, is an independent network with its own services and tradable token and will go on even after the Muon Mainnet has been released; just as Kusama is the canary network for Polkadot and they are both running and active.

Soon, more information about the Pioneer network will be given to our community in a Medium article. So be sure to check our socials.

Question 15: Who should I contact if my node has a problem?

Robert: Contact one of our admins on discord or telegram and they will help you. And if necessary, they forward your problem to one of the devs.

Keep up the good work and stay tuned for more updates on the Pioneer network.

Muon Network

Muon is a decentralized node network enabling applications to run on-chain, off-chain & cross-chain. Its technology allows for projects to build customizable web3 solutions that enable possibilities beyond the existing constraints of blockchain.