Rewards

I think the best incentive systems reward every type of contribution, not just the obvious ones. The Citrate network distributes rewards across multiple participant roles to incentivize a healthy, decentralized ecosystem. This page provides a comprehensive overview of every reward mechanism, who earns it, and how the amounts are calculated.

Block Rewards

Block rewards are the primary incentive for miners who produce GhostDAG blocks. New SALT is minted with each block and awarded to the block's coinbase address.

The base block reward follows the halving schedule described in the Supply Schedule. The actual reward received depends on the block's classification:

Block Classification	Reward Multiplier	Description
Blue block	1.0x	Block is in the majority DAG (well-connected, referenced by peers)
Red block	0.3x	Block is in the minority DAG (poorly connected or late)
Orphaned block	0.1x	Block references only stale parents

At the current Era 0 rate of 100 SALT per block:

Blue block reward:    100 SALT
Red block reward:      30 SALT
Orphaned block reward: 10 SALT

Miners also earn transaction fees from the transactions they include. The priority tip goes entirely to the miner, while 50% of the base fee is burned and 50% goes to the miner.

# Check your mining rewards
citrate-cli mining rewards --coinbase 0xYOUR_COINBASE --period 24h --rpc https://rpc.cnidarian.cloud

Example output:

Block rewards:      1,250 SALT (from 15 blue blocks, 2 red blocks)
Transaction fees:     87 SALT (base fee share + tips)
Total 24h earnings: 1,337 SALT

Inference Serving Fees

Model hosts earn fees every time their model fulfills an inference request. The model operator receives 80% of the inference fee, with the remaining 20% split between the network (burned) and the attestation verifier.

Revenue for model hosts depends on three factors:

Price per inference: Set by the operator during model registration
Request volume: Driven by how many contracts and dApps use your model
Reputation score: Higher reputation leads to more routing preference from the InferenceEngine

# Check inference revenue
citrate-cli inference revenue --model-id 0xYOUR_MODEL_ID --period 7d --rpc https://rpc.cnidarian.cloud

Example output:

Total requests served:   12,450
Revenue (gross):         18.675 SALT
Revenue (net after fees): 14.940 SALT
Avg price per request:    0.0015 SALT

Model hosts can increase revenue by:

Registering multiple models to diversify income streams
Optimizing latency (faster models get more routing preference)
Building reputation through consistent uptime and accurate results
Offering competitive pricing to attract higher request volumes

Mentorship Bonuses

The Mentorship Protocol, described in Gradient Paper IV, introduces a reward mechanism for experienced operators who help new participants join the network. Mentors earn bonuses when their mentees achieve specific milestones.

Milestone	Mentor Bonus	Description
Mentee completes first sync	10 SALT	Node successfully syncs to chain head
Mentee produces first block	25 SALT	Miner produces their first valid block
Mentee serves first inference	50 SALT	Model host fulfills their first request
Mentee reaches 90-day uptime	100 SALT	Sustained participation milestone
Mentee reaches 99% attestation rate	75 SALT	Oracle achieves high attestation participation

# Register as a mentor
citrate-cli mentorship register --rpc https://rpc.cnidarian.cloud --private-key $PRIVATE_KEY

# Invite a mentee (generates a referral code)
citrate-cli mentorship invite --rpc https://rpc.cnidarian.cloud --private-key $PRIVATE_KEY

# Check mentorship rewards
citrate-cli mentorship rewards --address 0xYOUR_ADDRESS --rpc https://rpc.cnidarian.cloud

The mentorship system is designed to combat the "cold start" problem that many decentralized networks face. By compensating experienced operators for onboarding help, the network grows faster while maintaining operational quality.

Blue Score Multipliers

The blue score is a reputation metric derived from a node's position in the GhostDAG structure and its participation quality. Blue scores affect reward calculations across all roles.

For miners, the blue score determines what fraction of their blocks are classified as "blue" (full reward) versus "red" (reduced reward). Miners with better connectivity and lower latency produce more blue blocks.

For validators, the blue score acts as a reward multiplier:

Validator Reward = Base Reward × (0.5 + 0.5 × (Your Blue Score / Network Avg))

This means a validator with an above-average blue score earns up to 1.0x the base reward, while a below-average validator earns as little as 0.5x.

For model hosts, the blue score influences routing preference. The InferenceEngine considers blue score when deciding which operator to route a request to, alongside price and latency. Higher blue scores lead to more requests and thus more revenue.

Factors that improve your blue score:

Factor	Impact	How to Optimize
Uptime	High	Use redundant infrastructure, monitoring, auto-restart
Network connectivity	High	Low-latency connections, multiple peers, geographic diversity
Block propagation speed	Medium	Smaller blocks, optimized networking stack
Attestation timeliness	Medium	Fast hardware, local SSD, dedicated validation threads
Historical performance	Low	Consistency over time; blue score has momentum

# Check your blue score
citrate-cli node blue-score --address 0xYOUR_ADDRESS --rpc https://rpc.cnidarian.cloud

# View blue score history
citrate-cli node blue-score-history --address 0xYOUR_ADDRESS --period 30d --rpc https://rpc.cnidarian.cloud

Reward Summary by Role

Role	Reward Sources	Typical APR*
Validator	Staking rewards + fee share	8-12%
Miner	Block rewards + transaction fees	Variable (hashrate dependent)
Model host	Inference fees	Variable (model demand dependent)
Oracle	Attestation fees via $SNAP	10-20% on staked capital
Delegator	Share of validator rewards	6-10% (net of commission)

*Typical APR figures are estimates based on early network projections and will vary based on network conditions, total staked amount, and network usage.