Protocol-node baseline cost ~$46/yr; protocol-daemon memory footprints near zero

For an institution starting from nothing, a Hetzner CX23 instance — 2 vCPU, 4 GB RAM, 40 GB disk, 20 TB monthly transfer — costs ~$46/year. It can run any protocol node simultaneously (S-0080):

• BitTorrent seedbox $36-$84/yr
• AT Protocol PDS $42-$72/yr
• Matrix homeserver $60-$240/yr
• Self-hosted Git forge $60-$120/yr
• IPFS pinning $60-$360/yr

For institutions with existing infrastructure, the marginal cost is closer to zero. Daemon footprints:

• BitTorrent seeding daemon: 9-14 MB resident memory on Linux (S-0097).
• Tor relay: 512 MB RAM, 10-16 Mbps bandwidth (~0.016% of a 100 Gbps campus Internet2 connection) (S-0098).
• Forgejo Git forge: 100-150 MB resident memory; runs on 1-2 CPU cores.
• BitTorrent WebSeed: any existing web server can function as a seed with no software modification (S-0099).

The case shows the absolute and marginal cost of Tier 3 deployment. Both numbers are small enough that they fit within ordinary noise on institutional IT budgets — which is why TU Dortmund/Dresden/MIT (E-0057) can run such deployments without published cost studies.