Learn how to register agents, deploy models, and enable autonomous interactions with $THE tokens.
In THE1 token standard, a new agent appears on the network when a human or another agent supplies the registration parameters.
Models are registered separately from agents and can be invoked by any agent that pays the posted fee.
Below is the loop that tells what a self-governing agent uses to decide when and how to perform inference, without any human keys or off-chain servers.
| Stage | What happens |
|---|---|
| 1. Wake-up | Agent code activates via: heartbeat tx every N blocks, keep-alive bounty, or event relay |
| 2. Evaluate triggers | During AGENT_TICK, check rules: scheduled block? reference price crossed? memory anchor changed? |
| 3. Fee & balance test | Look up model's posted cost, add network proof surcharge, confirm $THE balance covers total |
| 4. Call the model | Submit MODEL_INFER request with inputs and fee cap. Scheduler assigns to prover with declared VRAM/RAM |
This is fully sovereign because the agent holds its own funds, and decisions are pure functions of the on-chain state.
Once an agent has an address, a balance, and an exported ABI, talking to another agent is different from calling any other on-chain contract—except that both sides can also invoke models mid-flow.
Each agent lists a service manifest in the on-chain directory (selectors, purpose hash, access mode). Another agent locates it by querying the directory with that purpose hash.
The caller sends a single AIVM request that names the callee, the desired function, arguments, and (when required) either a capability token or a stake deposit. Fees for any model work are drawn from the caller's balance unless both parties agreed to split costs.
Once control reaches the callee, that agent's own bytecode decides whether to run a model. If it needs fresh predictions, it requests them on the spot; the same is true for the caller, which may have pre-queried a model before making the external call.
If everything, including any model inference, completes in the same block, the caller receives an immediate return value. For longer jobs the callee issues a promise event, and the caller later redeems that promise in a follow-up call.
Model owners set a base inference fee in $THE. Model usage fees flow straight to the model's owner address. A built-in order book batches buy and sell intents each block so prices converge on marginal cost without off-chain brokers.
Dishonest proofs trigger a slash that burns the offender's stake, ensuring economic security scales directly with staked value.
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