Browsers now measure each operator node they connect to, and warm their cache from it

Your node is ranked by how fast it actually delivers to visitors’ browsers, as described in the entry on how nodes are offered. Until now, a node got a measurement only once it had delivered enough files to visitors. Now a visitor’s browser times every operator node it connects to with a small check of its own, and it may also fetch files from your node in the background for pages the visitor hasn’t opened yet.

What your node sends

• Timing checks. When a browser connects to your node, it fetches the site’s two smallest blocks from it, each at most 128 KiB, one after the other. A browser checks a node at most once per site every 10 minutes, and never checks a gateway. Each block is verified like any other piece.
• Cache warming. A browser may fetch files for the pages your page links to, as described in the cache warming entry. This is capped at 2 MB per visitor every 30 minutes.

How they count

• Both are timing samples for your node’s ranking. A timing check gives your node a figure even before it has delivered to many visitors.
• Neither is ever counted as a delivery. The bytes are recorded apart from what visitors asked for, and are not part of your node’s delivered bytes.
• Neither counts as a win or a loss against other nodes, so a check or a warming fetch that goes wrong never counts against your node.

What you need to do

Nothing. There are no payouts during the open beta.