When I first encountered on-chain storage, I naturally thought the bottleneck was in the upload process. It wasn't until later that I realized I was oversimplifying. The real challenge comes afterward—after days or months, how do you prove that the data is still there? How do you confirm that you actually paid to store it and weren't just fooled by some organization?

The Walrus project is precisely addressing this pain point. Its approach is straightforward: don't let storage become a gamble-based custodial service, but instead move it on-chain, transforming it into a visible, tangible promise.

To be more specific, you're no longer just throwing files at a few machines and hoping nothing goes wrong. Instead, you predefine storage capacity and time periods, with clear ownership rights recorded on the chain. Each file can be linked to specific storage resources, with the system recording key data such as node committee members, remaining capacity, and current prices in real time. The official term for this is "storage resources." They can be divided, combined, traded, and even linked to file IDs for tracking.

The cleverness of Walrus lies in its epoch design. The project doesn't pretend that nodes are always stable—that's unrealistic. With each cycle, the list of active nodes is readjusted, and important parameters can only be changed through consensus by a supermajority of nodes. This mechanism avoids centralization risks while ensuring the network's flexibility and adaptability.

As a result, storage is no longer just a technical issue but becomes an on-chain resource allocation problem that is verifiable, traceable, and economically incentivized. For investors, risks are more controllable; for traders, liquidity is also secured.