when you try to buy storage the massage is;
Estimate fee 114SC
estimate storage 20T
Is that a month? of 3 months? as the funds are locked for 3 months? and why is the refill every 6 weeks?
If someone from dev is reading this, please make it more clear how its works and the cost as it makes it more easy for firsttime users.
Devs are not reading Bitcointalk, but don't worry because they are aware the user experience for renting can be improved, and will be improved on the next release. In the meantime, check this guide for renting: https://siawiki.tech/renter/using_the_ui_for_renting
Yes, the estimation covers the 3 months of storage.
Funds are locked for the 3 months and the unused part is returned unless the auto-renew is enabled (and in this case, after 6 weeks your client will refill the used funds of the allowance to extend the contract for another 3 months)
Auto-renewal of the contract is enabled by default, it can be disabled using the command "renter allowance cancel" on the terminal (be aware, this will terminate automatically the contract and you will not have access again to your files).
I've been silently following this project since a couple of months, and I find it more than interesting !
I was about to recommand using Sia to a friend who owns a small IT company. The guy is an IT genius, pro open-source, slightly against G.A.F.A.M, and has data to host.
However, he is not into crypto world, not at all.
AFAIK, at this point of the project, he will be forced to use an exchange, have a verified account, transer fiat currency, change to sia, and finally he will be able to use the service (please correct me if i'm wrong ).
There won't be any alternative to this ?
Yes, at this point, any costumer that wants to store his data in Sia needs to buy Siacoins in a exchange.
However, Sia is open-source code with a lot of APIs for developers, and I am aware of several projects of software and websites that will allow you to pay in FIAT and use the Sia network as a backend