this post was submitted on 01 Sep 2025
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I think this is a common misconception based on some critics' incorrect assumptions and back-of-the-envelope math. See the atproto overview for the different components involved, and then this post (from a BlueSky employee) "A Full-Network Relay for $34 a Month" for some numbers.
If I understand correctly, to run a "full nework relay" does mean to consume all of the text posts from all known servers, but not necessarily all of the media, and not necessarily to keep data you aren't interested in for any long period of time.
Also, you can run your own PDS and/or App Views without running your own relay at all. And, you can also use multiple other people's relays.
Disclaimer: I'm not an atproto expert, and I haven't set any of this up myself.
You can design an appview that crawls PDSes directly, no relay needed.
AppViewLite does that