Even before the HDDCoin store had launched, Chia fork Stai also had a store open where you can buy hard drives. They are following a slightly different model than HDDCoin, but the store is just one of their many ambitions. Primarily they are selling something called the Station-I, and the Stai coin cryptocurrency is merely a means to an end for them. Check them out here.
This one has been sitting on my desk for awhile, because it is very difficult to know what to think about Stai. They have huge plans compared to other Chia forks. They are also not focused only on their coin, but on the real world outcomes they are hoping to create with the rest of their businesses. I am going to very briefly touch on each one here, but I think some of these deserve their own deep dive. If Stai and the company behind it, Zuweso GmbH, achieve even some of their goals they will likely need full time reporting as much as Chia Network itself does. If.
So how does the coin work? Well, its not exactly the same as Chia or the other popular forks. They have a large premine of coins, similar to Chia, of 55 million Stai. They are also taking a percentage of all farming rewards according to the article listed above. I am going include the following quote, but it is a Google Translation of a recent German article about the company so do not attribute any particular word to the Stai team later on.
STAI developer explains the main features Evgeniy Mikhalevich, who acts as a cooperation partner with his GFT GmbH, the cryptocurrency works as follows: Within the first twelve months, the finder gets five STAI per new block. After that, however, there are only three coins and after another twelve months two. For comparison: It was the same principle that made Bitcoin a rarity. Initially, a block find contained 50 coins, today it is only 6.25 coins and in spring 2024 it will even be only 3.125 bitcoins.
One coin per new block goes to the company. This initially flows into the Premine Wallets. The majority of all income then flows via the Community Wallet into the assumption of the costs of electricity, food and drinks for all members. A smaller proportion goes into the Construction Wallet for the construction of new Station-i mobility stations to cover all services worldwide. These projects are financed mainly through debt and equity capital as well as subsidies. Investors also have the opportunity to participate in product and site development via participatory subordinated loans, with loans from EUR 5,000 upwards and a return of between five and seven percent p.a.
Google Translation of German article about Stai Global issuance policies.
The main crypto-adjacent plans I can see being integrated here are as a payment system for their Station-i filling station, an automated “gas station” for electric vehicles; a residential energy provider where you can pay some fees with Stai; an electronics store where you can pay the margin in Stai, but the rest in Euros; and apparently there is a new, larger shop coming where you can pay the entire price in Stai. A lot of these are already in place, and you can leverage Stai for them today. This makes Stai one of the only Proof of Space and Time coins with actual utility today – including Chia (for now).
Any one of these plans would be highly ambitious for a Chia fork, and set them apart from the rest. HDDCoin has a small web store run on WordPress and we are all suitably impressed, but this is something else. I have spoken to the Stai team, and I think they are very much trying to accomplish all this. However, I am not sure anything is done the best way it can be. This is going to be a part of the Chia and Chia fork ecosystem that I will be keeping a close eye on, and check back in a couple of days for a deeper look into some of the businesses they are getting into.
