The way I think:
The fair price is when node operators and clients are both willing to keep using the network. This is fully in FIAT and depends on other options available on the market. Four years ago @TylerAbeoJordan came to the conclusion that it would be:
I realize it may be lower now, but as a ballpark figure that’s good enough. So for 1 MB that would be 14c / 1000 =0.014c.
If that would be an average fair price, it would be interesting to know how upload activity behaves around that point- to draw a curve based on observed upload behaviour. There’s of course nothing to observe, but I guess we have some folks here that could have theoretical insight about how customers behave when price change.
Anyway my guess is that the price of upload in FIAT is pretty stable, maybe slightly increasing over time when the network proves stable and useful. And I mean increasing compared to other options, not necessarily as an absolute number, as the cost of storage media should drop.
The network token price has it’s effect too. I think uploaders are thinking more of just the current price, as they have the need to get their data stored somewhere. Node operators may me willing to operate at some degree of loss in hopes of the token getting more valuable over time.
In my opinion the next exercise is to get the pricing curve set so, that the “fair price” would be around some decent fullness point. If it would be around 5% full, then the amount of empty space would be wasteful. If it would be around 95%, the network would not tolerate sudden upsurge of upload. Though I guess the curve can actually prevent that happening by going to infinity just before the network getting stuffed. So I think the pricing curve can be designed so that the “fair price” keeps nodes quite full.