I’m considering operating a neutral relay, but is it actually worth the effort, or how does the community view this? Flashbots has announced TEE-Boost. There are also discussions about Preconfirmation and PROF.
Regarding the direction of the PBS market and relays, I’d like to discuss with the community whether they would welcome new relay operations at this point, or if there are specific items they want to test through relays.
due to the existence of free relays and subsidized builder-relays, it’s hard to successfully monetize a new relay. if your viability depends on breaking even or even making a profit, that would be a problem.
the continued existence of relays is becoming less certain (which is good!) proposals like TEE-boost would allow the builder to handle some of current relay duties, such as credibly committing to a certain bid. There is also a proposal for ePBS to replace relays with in-protocol committees.
Of course that is just my opinion. let me know if you have any further questions
Tee-boost is very cool, but I wonder if there is actually an incentive for existing builders to use it. Won’t the transition costs be too high. What kind of builders do you envision using this service and can they provide high value to Proposers.
It is not intended to be monetized, but to function as a public good. The survival of relays is uncertain, but I think they will be necessary in the short to medium term until we eliminate the trust assumptions such as ePBS.
Yeah, personally I think the right timing for mev-boost is once 20-25% blocks are already being built by tee-based builders builders. these builders don’t need relays to act as an intermediary.
so tee builders benefit from tee-boost, but also tee-boost is not useful until there are some tee builders.