How a Cascade fee is calculated
Cascade is priced with a base fee plus a per-size component.ulume plus 10 ulume per KB. For a 1 MB file that is roughly 0.02 LUME.
ulume is the base denomination. One LUME is 1,000,000 ulume.
Treat these as current values. Every parameter is governable, and the authoritative numbers live on chain.
How a Sense fee differs
Sense is priced by the size of the data and the analysis performed, and it costs less than storing the same file through Cascade. The reason is what persists. Sense records an analysis result rather than retaining the submitted media, so the network takes on no long-term retention obligation. This is the general rule behind Protocol pricing. Fees track the obligation created, not the size of the request.What the fee includes and excludes
Included. Encoding, distribution across the SuperNode mesh, verification at finalization, and the contribution to long-term retention funding. For Cascade, retrieval is not separately metered. Excluded. The transaction fee that gets your registration into a block. That is gas, it is paid at the network minimum gas price, currently0.025ulume, and it is not refundable if the action later fails.
One payment, not a subscription
A completed Cascade action is never billed again. Continued retention is funded by Everlight, which draws from protocol reward flows, a share of registration fees, and endowment yield rather than from the uploader. This is why permanence can be priced once. The obligation is funded by a mechanism designed for it, instead of by a fee that has already been spent.Failed actions refund
If an action fails verification or expires before finalization, the escrowed service fee returns to the creator. You pay gas for the attempt and nothing for the service. See Escrow and settlement.Governance parameters
Pricing is set by on-chain parameters, so it changes by proposal rather than by announcement.
Query current values before quoting a cost to anyone.
Estimating cost in an application
Two practical notes for anyone building a cost model. Round up. The per-KB component applies to whole kilobytes, so many small objects cost more in aggregate than the same bytes batched into fewer, larger ones. Applications writing frequent small records usually batch before anchoring. Budget for gas separately. It is small relative to the service fee for large files and proportionally significant for very small ones.Escrow and settlement
What happens to the fee after registration.
Governance
How pricing parameters change.
LUME
The asset fees are denominated in.
How Cascade works
The action a Cascade fee pays for.