Hi,

Our current specs can be seen on github.com/Storj.

In regards to your second question I have actually been doing some reports and thinking about the economics behind a commodity/ currency that is based off of digital storage. I have not made my way over to the maidsafe article you pointed out but I will read that as soon as I am done.

It is simpply just a supply and demand idea that is behind most currencies. Let us say that in the early stages of Storj we have a user that joins who is bringing a lot of demand with him/her (might be a video producer or an engineer that has huge files to store on our network) obviously they are willing to pay more and that will drive the price of SJCX up. Now, on the flip side, you have a person that wants to make some decent profit off of Storj and brings massive amount of data but not much use to use it. This increase in storage will bring the price of SJCX down a bit. But again, once Storj grows to the scale we are hoping for, these fluctuations will be quite small because of the amount already there.

And yes you are correct that storage is getting cheaper, but if you look at it from the other side; there is a lot more demand that is coming soon from all the companies and large groups of people that are going to start to store data on the "cloud"

I would love to have a discussion about the economics behind Storj if you would like to email me with questions: derek@storj.io

Great questions!

We really appreciate your thoughts and are glad you are involved.

Cheers

Pocketfullofapps interviewed Shawn Wilkinson (super3) while he was in San Fran at Coin Congress. Here is the interview for those that are interested: http://pocketfullofapps.com/2014/07/27/coin-congress-interview-with-shawn-wilkinson-of-storj.html

No, in the Storjcoin X blockchain. We may integrate it later on into the Bitcoin blockchain if treechains or sidechains ever become a thing.

1.) Correct, we shred the entire file and therefore no one other then the uploader has the ability to have the entire file at once.

2.) You will only have to pay for the amount of space you want, the upload speeds will be as fast as your download speed is. The reason behind this is that while one node may have a slow upload speed the others will make up for it, much like the torrent networks, but it will be even faster because our network has no constraints. So no, there will be no additional fees.

Keep in mind that while the two are connected over the network, any host storing a bit of an illegal file cannot be held liable for the file. There is absolutely no way they can know what is being stored as the data is encrypted before being stored. This way, the only person who can be held liable is the person with the private keys (i.e. the person storing the file).
 
The incentive for a host to store data is that there is a recurring fee, though exponentially smaller than a traditional cloud storage provider as one might think. If the network checks a file and something seems to be out of place (as in the host has stopped storing the file), the host stops getting paid for the file.

The blockchain isn't actually storing any of the data from a user; the blockchain is only storing the metadata that points to where the data is being held. This significantly cuts back on blockchain bloat and keeps the size very manageable.

We reached 500 BTC so far! Thank you all so much for the continued support. We at Storj are very thankful and appreciative for anybody helping us get closer to our vision.
As usual, we would be glad to address any questions, concerns, issues, or suggestions.

There was a small 200 BTC limit pre-crowdsale that was used to cover some of our business expenses up to this point. We reached about ~35 BTC.

Again, the community has just as much say as the developers in a situation like this; they're being allocated the same amount as the developers. We understand that it may look bad on the surface but rest assured we have provided enough resources to show that we are people with good intentions and experience. Our team members have put their reputations on the line in order to prove the legitimacy of this project.

We do not have a hard number for how many BTC we need. It is either we reach 9,800 BTC before 30 days is up or the time limit runs out. Of course, the more BTC we get then the more flexibility we will have in future projects and the more opportunities Storj will have. This BTC will go to hiring more people for the Storj team, marketing, and development of new protocols and apps.

The crowdsale began on July 18th and will last 30 days. Metadisk, our first app, is currently in beta and can be tested by crowdsale participatants. Once our second app, DriveMiner, is ready for testing, these participants are able to be the first to use it.

We created a test currency on Counterparty before we actually created SJCX. If you would like a little bit of SJCT, post your CounterWallet address. Also, SJCX will be sent immediately after sending your BTC to our crowdsale address. Our app Metadisk is currently being beta tested and DriveMiner is soon to follow.

Yes, they'll show up as a new holding of yours to the address you sent BTC from.

We're sorry to hear that! Thank you anyways.

You will receive coins after your BTC transaction has been confirmed. It would be best to give it time but should it take longer than expected, contact us here or on one of our other sites and we will happily help.

We do not intend to get all 9,800 BTC. While immediate profits should not be expected by crowdsale participants, we plan on continually adding new features, protocols, and apps to grow the Storj ecosystem.

Thank you for the kind words! We definitely plan on integrating with MaidSafe along with many other projects.

Nope! Many other similiar projects like MaidSafe have had bigger crowdsales (and rightly so). Keep in mind that we do not intend to reach 9,800 BTC.

Main members can be found at the end of the pitch deck. Seeing as how that's a little dated, we are compiling a list of bios from all current team members; expect it to be posted very soon.

We would love to chat with you about anything you can do for Storj! We will PM you our email.
As for translations, you can visit the Projects and Bounties board on our forums to see where you can help out!

If you read the Terms and Conditions, it will show that we (the developers) are not keeping the left over SJCX. That would be pointless as we would have no use for hundreds of thousands of coins.

We are taking most of the leftover coins and actually distributing them into the market for users to farm and get from the work they do. Users will use Driveminer to get these left over coins.

Yes we need funds to operate (all listed in the terms) but we are letting the users have access to the left over coins once the crowdsale is over.

In terms of our identity, those can all be found in the deck and our team members have disclosed their identity and pictures even. All of our emails are available if you would like to contact us directly, along with our phone numbers as well; just let us know if you would like them.

If you head over to the Storj forums or the subreddit, you will see that our head developer, Shawn Wilkinson is currently working on a revised white paper which will be published soon. The older one is available on the forums as well if you are interested but that one is slightly out of date.

Does that clear up some of your confusion?

Metadisk is available at http://node1.storj.io/ (keep in mind that this is a beta so there are some limitations). The arrival of Driveminer should appear in the very near future as our developers are getting close to done with a prototype.

On our pitch deck, the second to last slide has a short bit on some of our main team members. Seeing as how we have had many team members come on board since the creation of this deck, we are compiling a list of biographies for all current team members.

We're sorry to hear that you feel that way! We're always open for discussion if you have any concerns or issues to voice. Cheers!

It's on the top of our main website, but we've added it to the OP. Apologies for the confusion!

We are sorry to hear about your situation. Considering the terms of the project, we cannot give access to someone who doesn't participate in the crowdsale because other will expect the same, thereby losing one of the main points of the crowdsale.

Thank you both for the support! We are striving for nothing but the best end product. We will make sure the community is aware of updates on the project as they come up as well.