It pains me to say it after 3 years of building on it but I think lightning is ngmi, at least for non custodial pleb payments.

I think ark and liquid are fundamentally a more sound approach to L2 for end users.

If it REQUIRES the end user to run infrastructure, even if that is just a phone, it's going to be too janky to actually scale.

Not to mention that somehow lightning is already more ossified than L1...

If we continue down the custodian route people will get rugged or KYC d

I am ready for your hate, but this is my current take. Also would be happy to be proven wrong.

Now back to sshing into my node and working on chantools to recover a force closed channel utxo that lnd didn't report.

Totally easy for everyday users to solve if they run into this problem...


Fedimint?


Fedimint will be the best compromise imo


Still a custodian and a single ln node at end of the day. Better than using WoS or alby tho 🙏


This is the best option Bitcoin has for scaling, privacy, and destroying the central banks

https://www.truthcoin.info/blog/thunder/


Are we going to have Zaps with Ark? :)


Unfortunately for me, the on-chain transactions are the pain of my existence.

Lightning or Liquid cost a lot to bridge.


Agree with everything except that liquid is a more sound approach. Can't comment on ark since it does not even exist.

Self custody is my red line. Any tradeoff that interferes with that is ngmi.


Yes you crazy mofos will figure it out


Hmm looked at liquid but I am not convinced that is a better solution. I'd like to see what ark does, but think there won't be a solid solution to this for a while.


No more of a custodian than Liquid is. Probably much less of one actually.


Like most things in life, it is what people make of it. I still think apps like Mutiny, Zeus, and Phoenix are user friendly enough that 80% of people could figure them out and use them if they want.

Most people still want banks, so that’s what they will get, but there’s nothing preventing a pretty good mobile lightning experience for a decently large percentage of people.

Fedimint is very cool and products like that are probably what will get this to 1B somewhat independent users. Until then, I’m just happy when my friends pay me in Bitcoin over Cash App.


Liquid requires 11 ppl to collude to steal coins.

Fedimint only needs a single macaroon to leak to drain all the channels. Multisig doesn't help


I'm more worried about Lightning potentially failing in the United States for lack of adequate custodial providers


I want to see Ark developed enough to play with it. Seems really interesting to me.


Only sovereign lightning users actually assimilate reality. I gave it my best effort, but the sad fact is it's 💩.
I would love it if LN was "it" but it's not. Feel free to keep liveling in denial while you zap the same custodial pennies around.
nostr:nevent1qqs04zwza60a8dlmxnyujakae965esunnd0mu0asc4w3e4zyhjq9grgpz9mhxue69uhkummnw3ezuamfdejj7q3qutx00neqgqln72j22kej3ux7803c2k986henvvha4thuwfkper4sxpqqqqqqz40u7wh


Ya bro like when ppl really get in the weeds with lightning like I mean really really deeply understand it. 90% of ppl have shared the idea that it's not gonna function correctly. The other ten percent of ppl have business on the line so they just say it's problems will be fixed open source blah blah blah


All my zaps are self-custodial and I’ve done thousands of transactions using the blockspace of dozens. Lightning is a step-function improvement for Bitcoin payments. It’s not a silver bullet for sovereign scaling, but there never will be one.


I feel and agree with this pain. My only difference in thinking is that I'm hopeful that solutions will be found in the future to make Lightning easier for the average person to be using their funds in a non-custodial way.


So what’s the solution? Or it doesn ‘t exist yet


Doesn't exist yet. I'm not pretending to having it all figured out.


Do you are saying we are stuck with DOGE for micro payments?


I see LN as the best thing we have now that is usable, but there are limitations that would just make it impossible to operate in a non custodial fasion for everybody.
It will either become an infrastructure layer or superceded by something better.


Care to check out fedimint?


Me two. I've never touched a custodial wallet.

I managed to set up everything: zaps, NWC, lnaddress, etc, etc.
Do I expect everyone else to follow my footsteps? Nope.


Oh you want to receive 50,000 sats?

My lsp will open a channel to you!

The fee will be 100,000 sats because mempool is full.

😭😭


I have, pls see comments below


Even I'm too lazy to do all of this to collect a few dollars, and I know exactly how to do it, rather just risk getting rugged


At a minimum, I can Uncle Jim channels or liquidity for 100+ close friends and family members. And hybrid LSP solutions like nostr:npub1xnf02f60r9v0e5kty33a404dm79zr7z2eepyrk5gsq3m7pwvsz2sazlpr5 make that whole process, which used to require days + lots of experience in tech to now require minutes and just a basic understanding of lightning.

Again, lightning doesn’t scale to 8B people under its current structure, and there aren’t 8B people who can figure it out anyway. But directionally it’s moving towards being much much easier to manage for the average person.

The real challenge we face today isn’t the technology, the tools, or the implementation of them. It’s getting 100 million people to actually have demand to use them. Once we get there, then we can talk about further scaling challenges.


This is non sense. Nobody learn from eth ? So when isnt possible to interact with the main chain, the non sense begin. First lightning then bridges and side chain and ... its boring to look at this non sense. In the end fiat will remain strong.


I'm not shitting on LN because I want to shill something else. I'm sad because there's really no goodalternative.
I just think it's important to be realistic in public and tell the rest of people how it really is. Painting this rosier picture the LN is perfect and gona change the world just makes bitcoiners sound like shitcoiners.


We are in p2p market but need bankers... i mean middlemen...hum i mean a federation of people to reduce the fee and make things right. No question ask.


I don’t see a problem with that if that’s how you economize. We will never “ban” banks or banking services, they have demand for a reason. Optionality and honest, open, legitimate money services is the end goal.


Thankfully I did it just before becoming a father. No way I would find the time now 🤣


here we  go like in the eth chain, bridges i wonder if they will take greek mythology.


As an everyday pleb user, I see a payment channel as the equivalent of topping up a custodial wallet. Send BTC, lightning becomes available to spend, done. Except about 843 things that I don't understand or even know about can go wrong in that process and my sats are gone. I'm running a node, doing self-custody, etc., but I know that I'm one power blip away from losing those sats.

So yeah, I think I agree with you.


But if this non sense on the main chain continue u will use them no ?


If you are right it’s sad for third world companies trying to adopt Bitcoin using lightning and most likely storing their funds on L2 instead of L1. We need to keep spreading personal responsibility and that custodial lightning can get you rugged.


Maybe he already had enough inbound to receive those sats? Fees were not always like this. Besides that high onChain fees should not be a problem becuase the lightning network exists longer than the period of high fees we are currently experiencing. Exciting times ehead for sure.


Thanks for correcting me, I misunderstood then. Better than I thought it was. +21% bullish on fedimints.


The node is in the phone. I’m not doing more than that. I agree, it’s a shit show.


Anything that gets the infrastructure out of the users hands is exactly what I think we need. Looking forward to it 🫡🫡


been thinking this for some time.

LN scales throughput, not userbase.


yeah, totally easy! 😅


If every user is non-custodial it means every user is capable of running an infrastructure. I don’t think it’s much of a problem. Plebs understand shit about plumbing but they all plumbery at home.
I think we shall not look for scaling without being able to scale self custody. It makes few to very little sense to me!


LN definitely requires division of labor. routing and managing liquidity is for specialized entities. end-users can interact with LN through the LSP model

the way Phoenix, mutiny, breez etc works is close to be consumer grade imo. the biggest pain point is still the limit of the protocol itself - inbound liquidity, and the need for the occasional on chain txn

covenant based models such as ark and timeout-trees don't replace LN. they enhance it by better handling the last mile problem. leaving LN to function as a very reliable real-time funds mover


But can someone explain to me when that message got signed by those keys saying " Craig's is a lier blah blah blah lightning is an interesting improvement yadayadayada " was that satoshi? A Satoshi assistant? Or just a skilled hacker? Bc they basically said lightning is good keep working on it right ? ??? Who was that generally???


nostr:nevent1qqs04zwza60a8dlmxnyujakae965esunnd0mu0asc4w3e4zyhjq9grgppemhxue69uhkummn9ekx7mp0qy2hwumn8ghj7un9d3shjtnyv9kh2uewd9hj7zxvdh7

One of the reasons apple is (was?) successful is they hide away a lot from end users. My parents are diehard apple fans for this very reason. So any non-custodial self-custody solution would have to have this level of hand holding. I have some doubt that you can have both hand-holding and non-custodial.

I can't recall where I read this story about Steve Jobs. It was during a design meeting for some tool on Mac and he says to his design team he wants users to click one button and the task they are trying to do gets done. Anything more than clicking one button is almost too much for some people.

Go to any store with self-service kiosks (McDonalds, Dunkin' Donuts, etc.) and watch how everyday people (with all due respect) struggle even with tools like that.

Granted, you can argue that these things might not be designed well. Fair enough. But I doubt it would be merely bad design.


Your post is getting a lot of views.
Added to the https://nostraco.in/hot feed


I had a similar thought yesterday as I was trying to withdraw BTC over Lightning from bullbitcoin to Phoenix wallet. I would have thought a sizeable exchange to a well known wallet could find a path. No go.

I tried using liquid through Green wallet in early 2022 but didn't really understand why it had a use. My mind has changed. Literally just ordered a Jade and plan to learn more there.

Custodial lightning with WOS was so easy.

Anyway, thanks for all your hard work in this space and sorry to hear your previous project was shut down. All the best with your next endeavour.


I have had the same hope for many years now but we don't feel any closer


This has been my position for a while.


It pains me to say it after 3 years of building on it but I think lightning is ngmi, at least for non custodial pleb payments.

I think ark and liquid are fundamentally a more sound approach to L2 for end users.

If it REQUIRES the end user to run infrastructure, even if that is just a phone, it's going to be too janky to actually scale.

Not to mention that somehow lightning is already more ossified than L1...

If we continue down the custodian route people will get rugged or KYC d

I am ready for your hate, but this is my current take. Also would be happy to be proven wrong.

Now back to sshing into my node and working on chantools to recover a force closed channel utxo that lnd didn't report.

Totally easy for everyday users to solve if they run into this problem...


We all knew the issue the LN had when implemented.
And it’s fucked it’s come a long way but it’s still fucked.
Zeus, Mutiny, Dunder, etc are killing it with nodes in da phone & I see the LN being just one of many "L2" used.


Agreed!

I love the new mantra. "Get your coins out of the custodian exchanges... and put them into custodian LN wallets!" YAY


Are we going to have Ark?

😅😅😅


How about we do ecash zaps first?

nostr:npub12262qa4uhw7u8gdwlgmntqtv7aye8vdcmvszkqwgs0zchel6mz7s6cgrkj have tou had some time to work on it?


Does it have to be normie approachable? Some of the coolest things on the internet remain hard to use. LN is fun.


I think yes if we actually want the world to use Bitcoin for payments.


Agree. Most users won't even know what Putty is, open port 22, use a pem to login, have secured sudoer users, check top and deamons...
It's a nightmare 😞


Wat


I thought ark was the only non-custodial "ecash" solution, but if we can do non-custodial e-cash, zaps over that do make a lot of sense.


I know...


I'm looking forward to see how nostr:npub1ajlrwgfj4yerhqf7ady03h7wmtk2qr3gs7h3sxcx83k05yld36sswpzx3q might be able to provide some solutions.


As a node runner for a couple years now I generally agree with your sentiment. However you aren't doing yourself any favors running LND. Switch to Core Lightning and be happy (or happier at least).


I still see a lot of headroom for lightning personally. I believe 1-1 channels are currently the biggest limitation, so if or when we get multi-party channels, lightning could really take off.


Self custody your lightning bitcoin in your own node and send it to a lightning custodian when you need to spend. What is so difficult with that? 🤷🏻♂


You have no privacy from your custodian and risk getting rugged.


The LSP model could be the best trade off for self sovereign pleb users IMO
A bit of of splicing to be able to quickly change of LSP in case of censoring and it's fine. A middle size LSP or even bigger could be unregulated, kind of like the Samourai coordinator, so no mandantory KYC.

I'm a total noob and have been running a node for 2 years now, it takes time but with tools like RTL, and Thunderhub and others it's totally doable and it's obviously going to continue to improve in the coming years.

Plus you underestimate the improvement that could still come in this field. We are way better now than 3 years ago.
Lightning is maybe not the perfect solution (yet), but it already works well. As a dev you are blinded by the amount of difficulties you encounter but the ratio (results we already achieved in the LN space)/(money spent on the dev) is enormous

Give it more time


Why sent from self custody to custodial?


Build using the right tools. Greenlight solves your concern: infrastructure in the cloud, keys on your device. I think Breez SDK combines that with an LSP. A wonderful all-in-one lightning solution.


No hate here, agree completely


Lightning is better for banks than plebs tbh, that's one of the biggest lessons I learned this year. Running Lightning in a sovereign way is a huge mental burden and highly favors custodians, with all of the counterparty risk that comes with them. Really hope people are giving more thought to this instead of yeeting their entire business platform on Lightning

We ABSOLUTELY need more L2s and I'm glad they're being built out as we speak. What are your thoughts on an ecash settlement layer? AFAIK it sounds more like what I thought Lightning would be


Ecash is a good idea as long as the redemption is hard to rig, looks like fedimint can do it, we shall see


+1 I Definitely agree with this considering the current state of lightning. Not to mention the hub and spoke model tends to lead to centralization. It's risky as hell for a pleb to put up multiple Bitcoin just for routing.

Granted I'm not really sure what will replace it. I'm not really a big fan of liquid I think you can run your own liquid node. But that also seems to be going down a custodial route. Should probably play with it a bit. Ark sounded interesting, but there's also no code to look at yet as far as I know.


Maybe this is a LND thing? How is electrum able to avoid forced closes in high fee environment?


I agree. I don’t see how the plebs is going to adopt lightning as a non-custodial method of payment when many folks are still reluctant to use the base layer which is magnitude easier to use. Also, lightning doesn’t seem a scaling solution either. I’m afraid Bitcoin will remain stuck with the “digital gold” use case which has its pros and cons. Non-custodial payment has to happen on L1 or it won’t happen. L2s have too many tradeoffs whether on the UX, security or non-custodial nature. I hope that #eCash / #XEC (BitcoinCash fork) can succeed in this mission. They seem to be the only project aiming to scale fast payments on L1. They have an interesting approach by mixing Nakamoto and Avalanche consensus.


This pretty well sums it up. For mass adoption to work, we're going to need a non-custodial solution. Fees are already at a point that this isn't practical for anyone that's not already running a node.

There are so many developers out there working on so many awesome tools to solve these problems. If a sound solution doesn't already exist, it's only a matter of time.

nostr:nevent1qqs04zwza60a8dlmxnyujakae965esunnd0mu0asc4w3e4zyhjq9grgpz3mhxue69uhhyetvv9ujuerpd46hxtnfdupzpckv7l8jqspl8u4y54dn9rcduwlrs4v2040nxce0m2h0cunvrj8tqvzqqqqqqysxwvqs


Looks like I’m in the minority here, but my Lightning experience has been really positive and fun.

I installed LND on the same AWS VM that runs my Bitcoin Core node, set up two outbound channels, one with BitRefill and one with Kraken, and use them routinely to purchase goods and services from various vendors. It's truly a thing of beauty. There was a learning curve and a couple hiccups along the way, but nothing that couldn't be resolved via a quick Reddit post.

People might respond, “Good for you, but Aunt Mildred doesn’t have the technical expertise to deploy something like that.”

That may be true, but Aunt Mildred won’t have to do things the hard way and go through the early adopter curve like we did. I imagine she’ll just have a little box, the size of an AppleTV or Roku, that plugs into her WiFi network. With that, and a companion app for her phone, she can be using non-custodial Lightning within an hour. Well ok, maybe longer if she has to wait for the entire Bitcoin blockchain to download to the Bitcoin Core node that runs on her little box.

I think people are severely underestimating the ingenuity of developers who'll be creating these sorts of all-in-one dedicated devices that wrap up all the nastiness and complexity of Bitcoin and Lightning. Aunt Mildred won't even have to know what a UTXO or channel is.

I betcha it'll look a lot like media consumption does today. A few us will download a 4K torrent, place it on our NAS, and watch the content using the Infuse app on our big-screen televisions. But the other 99% of consumers say, “That’s too hard. I’ll just get an AppleTV box with a Netflix subscription, plug it in to a wall socket, and watch Ozark.” I think that's how it's going to be with Lightning, or whatever L2 tech we settle on. Plug-N-Play, baby!


I agree man but clearly you're a huge nerd just like me, but can we expect everyday people to spin up vms on AWS?


Exactly! That’s what I’m trying to say in my post. They won’t have to. They’ll just plug a little dedicated box into their own WiFi network and be good to go. No AWS, no channel management, no understanding of UTXOs, force closes vs cooperative closes, etc.


I've had so much faith in lightning for so many years it really kills me to agree with you, but today I think I finally can.

The way I see it, there are 4 _Bad_ Problems with Lightning that stop adoption:

1. Inbound liquidity is needed - In practice this requires custodial wallets. (& autobalancing costs money!)

2. Bad UX - (Not UI, but the difference to users in applepay and ensuring channels are liquid.) This will likely requires AI to fix! (But then that would be a security problem)

3. Lower security than on-chain (no hardware wallets for lightning) How can we move to the 2nd layer if we only think of the base chain as a safe place to store our wealth?

4. Possibility of being forced to pay channel open/close fees. Imagine having a bank account that regularly debited you for fees for what they do on the backend. Ain't nobody gonna put up with that in the long run!

There are certainly other problems but these four are biggies because they seem impossible to crack. Man I hope I'm wrong but that's how it looks today.


💯
As sad as it is, after my adventure with my node, I have to share this opinion 🐶🐾🫂😭


Ark requires a soft fork we may never get and liquid isn't a real scaling solution.

I don't know why you think lightning is ossified, the protocol is moving very fast.


This is a question i grapple with...if you build for the world do you just end up with lowest common denominator dogshit ? Or do you build the tool that are robust and can allow some people to opt out and create economies outside the dogshit.  I dunno the answer


Did you recovered your funds cute doggo?


Most of them, I think. I may have lost some but “fuck it” 🐶🐾🤣😭


I like that you are positive..in the end 😂🫂


Thank you! 🐶🐾🙏🏻🙏🏻🙏🏻⚡


So perhaps a bit of a contrarian here...but...Strike seems to have a viable solution. Essentially seamless (download the app, fund it, and send via lighning or BTC address or Strike account).

Downside? Sure there's some fees Strike charges for providing the service - but it solves the problem of setting up and maintaining your own node. But other than that--all the convenience of Lightning with none of the technical hassles for a small fee.

Seems (frankly) worth it to me...and perhaps I'm missing something (so would very much welcome the thoughts of others to help educate me if I am).

In summary--kind of like Starbucks--you can brew a darn good latte at home, but most of us pay Starbucks for the convenience and saving of the hassle.

For me, it seems Strike is doing the same thing for Lightning users....


we've normalized a piece of hardware called a router to access the internet from your home. i don't understand this argument that we can't normalize running your bank from your home as well.


As much as I believe in Bitcoin, this is why I have also always believed in DigiByte as well. The world needs a coin that can scale on chain and Bitcoin can’t do that in its current form. Lightning has a lot of problems to overcome and is struggling to deliver.


Love my node and running one.  Yes, it is hard but who said bitcoin and lightning - being your own bank will be easy.  Noderunning is a team sport.  Join a community like Plebnet at plebnet.org so you give/get help running a node with like minded plebs.  It is a new technology so there will be pains.  But, someone has to run the nodes for payments!  Install auto node management tool like LNDg to auto-manage day to day node running.


Yeah I think lightning will be the universal language of value exchange between L3 solutions.


My guess is that the future of bitcoin is more centralized than people are comfortable with. As long as we have the optionality to self custody our savings on chain, does it really matter if we’re trusting someone temporarily with our spending change?


Liquid alone is just another dumb blockchain. It does not scale.
You have to deploy Lightning over Liquid.

Therefore Lightning is gonna make it.


Like, if you've ever installed and received cashu/eNuts whatever, you are like "o shit. I just RECEIVE it? I don't have to make an invoice or manage channels or get raped on fees to just start using it?" Cashing out or depositing via lightning makes it click into place.


Another one bites the dust.


We can't call it a solution for bitcoin because it's custodial, you don't own the funds, and because it's a business which means they can deny you service.


The worst thing about Lightning is the hopium effect it creates in people: "Bitcoin doesn't need anything, we already have Lightning!"


I came to a similar conclusion in about August time. I now believe BIP300 sidechains are our best bet for maximising the user experience for self custody. i.e. low fees, better privacy, and easy onboarding, no liquidity constraints like with lightning.

Maybe it won’t catch on, but I think Rootstock, RGB, FediMint and Liquid will  have the similar problems as it will lead to federated custodians.

Ark may be better than sidechains but honestly I dont understand it works technically.


What is wrong with Cashu? Is it the base64 JSON token format?


It pains me to say it after 3 years of building on it but I think lightning is ngmi, at least for non custodial pleb payments.

I think ark and liquid are fundamentally a more sound approach to L2 for end users.

If it REQUIRES the end user to run infrastructure, even if that is just a phone, it's going to be too janky to actually scale.

Not to mention that somehow lightning is already more ossified than L1...

If we continue down the custodian route people will get rugged or KYC d

I am ready for your hate, but this is my current take. Also would be happy to be proven wrong.

Now back to sshing into my node and working on chantools to recover a force closed channel utxo that lnd didn't report.

Totally easy for everyday users to solve if they run into this problem...


People always underestimate human ingenuity.


i am confusion


Biggest bottleneck for me in terms of Lightning: You have to pay to participate. And quite a lot, too. The UX is also ... questionable.
It's fun as a "Twitch Bits but open source and free" - but if the easiest solution is a custodial one, how different is it, really?

I still run my CLN node, I had a lot of fun with it, but I won't exactly miss it. A little while after spent my sats via Bitrefill, I lost my channel due to an LND bug force-closing the one that Fishcake had gifted me.

Ripped me straight out of the network and... yeah, that was that. Now it's just ideling.


lightning will be the interconnect between different systems like ecash, custodians, ark nodes, businesses, other big stuff.

people will use lightning and not be aware of it.

companies will manage nodes and users will retain control over signatures with lightning validating signers. I think they can do that. But individual people will probably get priced out of this like everything else.


Why not build & integrate NOSTR coin?


so u mean u receive ur bitcoin on chain or is it stuck between address ?


Starbucks sucks. And i still dont understand how people stand to eat garbage.

u missing something. With bitcoin u transact w people without anybody else with minimum fee (to serve as protection against double spend and as a service to be include on a ledger).

if you have to pay like 50$ or 100$ to be include on a ledger u become more expensive than paypal or other middleman systems. Bitcoin become another fail project that need a middleman to transact.

By the way are u dr banjo ?


:big eyes:
u installed on aws vm and go on kraken channel and bitrefill (those two wont hold anymore more, they are gonna get capture any month now).

u are too deep of u own stuff to see around u. Bitcoin just work, it will take a lot to get this system down. If fees get high on the mainchain, lightning should take the relay and isnt that his main purpose. To reduce the fee.
But noOO u need to lock coin and if ur a good boy maybe...maybe u get ur coin back. That a middleman shat right here. That not the principle that bitcoin stand for.

On my opinion lightning is another project like cumrocket

https://youtu.be/H6eWvx3OyKw


No the bitcoin is secured by a funding transaction on layer 1, layer 2 operates with some concessions, but allows movement of liquidity for lower fees with high confidence that you will not be cheated, and an array of layer 3 solutions have various other tradeoffs and benefits. Layer 3 is where we will select our bitcoin-secured financial products and Layer 2 will be the common commodity rails allowing interoperability between layer 3s, and layer 1 will be the exit to final settlement.


cumrocket


electrum use a third party. If im not mistaken they use phoenix aka acinq to do that.

ps: my radar activate when i see no info on that. There are a few note here and there. But they really use that.


So its just talk.


its another permision layer aka middleman layer on bitcoin.


I think the trampoline routing jumps to either async or electrum.

I would also like to know more details, but Thomas has created an amazing wallet. It wouldn't surprise me if he built it himself


ecash doesnt have code to look at.
And since its another vc project it will go on the drain. You know vc money return and all those bullshat.

Its opensource but not free
*people will learn it again and again, that happen in the past.


no code its just talk. They walk on hope now.


ecash ideas doesnt go well w a central entity. Fediment is a central entity and like in liquid will try to copy that centrality. Nothing less nothing more.


There's also a physical limit to it, as it stands, in order to have a completely non-custodial future in LN, everyone needs to be able to have their own channel. The cost of opening and closing channels will prohibit this as there are just not enough sats to do so.
That's why I think it's impossible, but we should strive to be as self-custodial and trustless or trust minimized as possible in all the layers we build.


Wrong. They doesn't require 11 keys to rugpool, because there is a BACKDOOR.

nostr:note1u25r5kvmxtcn30cjjuek4dfaajvws36jd2n80w8p8mdpmcw3dlqssgtnu2


I was thinking the way liquid was coming along we'd end up with LN wallets with liquid that would auto rebalance channels for plebs using non custodial LN. Is that a pipedream?


It's time to actually use liquid


Are you paid like samson mow?
nostr:note1kpffp3xr48szuh7jventmfwac789menesecat49et4pyq8ph8wvqklrjad


I fkin wish I am negative paid I just lose money


I think I'd have to agree. I'm simply a pleb utilizing all these awesome tools that people like you are building but these high-fees on chain have magnified the limitations of Lightning. Ever since fees spiked I have been running into constant hiccups with my non-custodial LN wallets.

I personally love using Liquid. I think newbies should start there because you get the exact same experience/flow of operating on-chain but without the enormous fees. Get some reps in before pegging out. eCash will be sweet too once it's integrated further.


It pains me to say it after 3 years of building on it but I think lightning is ngmi, at least for non custodial pleb payments.

I think ark and liquid are fundamentally a more sound approach to L2 for end users.

If it REQUIRES the end user to run infrastructure, even if that is just a phone, it's going to be too janky to actually scale.

Not to mention that somehow lightning is already more ossified than L1...

If we continue down the custodian route people will get rugged or KYC d

I am ready for your hate, but this is my current take. Also would be happy to be proven wrong.

Now back to sshing into my node and working on chantools to recover a force closed channel utxo that lnd didn't report.

Totally easy for everyday users to solve if they run into this problem...


Been  there for awhile now.


You have my endorsement for your use of the term "janky"


"there" as in liquid? what are you doing there, what's over there?


Did you ever tey Nodless Sommerfeld?


chantools is great though isn't it?
shoutout to guggero


i think lightning will make it and i think liquid will help...  on chain: zero trust, low scalability.  liquid; medium trust, medium scalability, lightning; high trust(sometimes), high scalability.  they all have their purpose.  too much good things have been built on lightning.

remember, good thing comes in threes.  in the bible its the father the son and the holy spirit.  in freud its ego, id and superego.  in platos republic its the guardians the auxiliaris and the producers.


There is code, just not ready for end users yet


Maybe an unpopular opinion but simply going on a #bitcoin standard even with centralised intermediaries facilitating daily transactions is a win for humanity. It's far from ideal but at least theft through inflation becomes impossible and productivity gains flow more to society, etc


nostr:note1l2yu9m5l6wmlkdxfe9mdmjt4fnpe8x6lhclmp32arn2yf0yq2sxsxxhkdu Dumbest quote I've seen in quite a while..... GG


Temporary... Patience is the 🔑


its all talk no code here.

For thing to work people need a minimum of code to run. All in here a writeup. i write it a lot but its an open source not a free source code.

In benefit of the dout, i will wait. But here in this git there are not code to run.


So there no code. Just talk.

People can talk and say a lot. if there arent any code to run its just talk. And no wrong in a project if it just talk.


No dout about that, that make the wallet relable if he use it.

For the bitcoin part is flawless success for the wallet but on lightning part its a mess. I look in it for some times now and its acincq servers and code. By the way its buggy and force close for anything. So  i think its a "scam" = u put money in a channel and ur coins are gone. All u can do is contact electrum dev to complain and they reverse it  :big eyes: yeah u read this part.

So like i say multiple times already lightning is like eth casino show.


So are u writing eth bridges and L3 solutions and trust ?


Fedimint and cashu already do this, but they are still in early development


I mean they interoperate with lightning as the entry into and exit from their chaumian ecash solutions


I fully understand the pain.. I've always said it, always been a foot behind when it came to L2.

This didn't stop me from getting into Lightning, running nodes and joining in the fun of experimenting with channels (when the fees weren't this high).

But Bitcoin's whitepaper, coupled with the accessibility of running verification plug&play nodes, and the investment/PoW necessity for  mining is a simple game overall.

Lightning has a scalability problem, and it not one down to the tech, but to its accessibility. I think developers like nostr:npub1xnf02f60r9v0e5kty33a404dm79zr7z2eepyrk5gsq3m7pwvsz2sazlpr5 have been monumental over the past year showing an embedded node is well possible. Whether it's feasible is something that's currently being battle-tested.

I've always thought of Bitcoin nodes running in households like people buy Wifi Routers, this seems really feasible to me. But having to deal with channels is a whole other game.

Personally, for an L2 proponent to succeed, it needs to find a way to be as straight-forward as MAC addresses and Ethernet frames are talking to both L1 and whatever else.


I still havent sucessfully recovered millions of sats from my node going down and syncing a new node to recover


nothing will go wrong XD.


It sounds like you like to complain a lot. Have you tried Twitter?


have you tried north korea?
i think you like it there


It sounds like you mistake calling out bullshit for oppression. Have you tried BlueSky?


Continuing with testing, all L2 solutions aim for a definitive victor.
However, if it's not Core (BTC), it's fundamentally exploitable.


2024: ordinals, ETF, halving, change in accounting rules for Bitcoin held in treasury, countries starting to mine and hold Bitcoin,...

The demand for block space will increase.


Really?

Well, you're the first one that I've seen saying this. I've never had a forced close on electrum, but I have on a bunch of LND wallets.

Where can I read more about this?


begin here :
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5352784.0

 then here:
 https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5352784.0

And i you don't want to read all social, you can go here :
https://github.com/spesmilo/electrum/security/advisories/GHSA-9gpc-prj9-89x7

my exp was like this one :
https://github.com/spesmilo/electrum/issues/8419


test it already. And u know the chaos of twitter, there nothing here for me,
 But the subject was lightning solution. Use or not?


100% agree. But the problem originates higher upstream to Bitcoin itself.

The whole reason Lightning exists is because of flawed slow BTC block time.

Fork it. Reduce block time to 2 sec. Make block size unlimited. Mint all 21m instantly.

TPS goes to the moon. Layer 2 is unneeded. Fees plummet. Energy efficiency soars. And security is virtually unaffected.


What are your thoughts on drivechain?


It pains me to say it after 3 years of building on it but I think lightning is ngmi, at least for non custodial pleb payments.

I think ark and liquid are fundamentally a more sound approach to L2 for end users.

If it REQUIRES the end user to run infrastructure, even if that is just a phone, it's going to be too janky to actually scale.

Not to mention that somehow lightning is already more ossified than L1...

If we continue down the custodian route people will get rugged or KYC d

I am ready for your hate, but this is my current take. Also would be happy to be proven wrong.

Now back to sshing into my node and working on chantools to recover a force closed channel utxo that lnd didn't report.

Totally easy for everyday users to solve if they run into this problem...


Save in Bitcoin, spend Monero.


What is the main reason Gold doesn’t scale? Because it’s expensive and difficult to transact.

What would be one of the cheapest ways for a nation state to kill Bitcoin in the crib? To make it expensive and difficult to transact, just like Gold.

1. Scoop up a material amount of Bitcoin for a trivial price(from the government’s perspective)
2. Flood the network with senseless and wasteful transactions to drive up the cost for everyone.
3. Implement trusted custodians everywhere and force KYC and regulatory compliance.
4. Integrate the same failed monetary policies (fractional reserve banking, etc.) on top of Bitcoin.

One of the main reasons Bitcoin is better than Gold is because it is possible for anyone, anywhere, to take possession of their assets instantly and with very low cost. That is what is at stake today.

nostr:note1l2yu9m5l6wmlkdxfe9mdmjt4fnpe8x6lhclmp32arn2yf0yq2sxsxxhkdu


Who wrote that message along the lines of "Craig Wright is a lier lighting is a significant development blah blah blah" why did they co sign lightning like this?


ark and liquid are all the same thing as paypal why bother? 3rd party controllers.


I don't think these examples are sufficient evidence that electrum is using Async on the back end.

One is a bug specific to Android. The other had a very small LN channel so it's not surprising that it got forced closed.


I believe a tight integration of lightning with liquid is something to explore.


Echoing what I've been saying for half a year.
nostr:nevent1qqs04zwza60a8dlmxnyujakae965esunnd0mu0asc4w3e4zyhjq9grgpp4mhxue69uhkummn9ekx7mqzyr3vea70ypqr70e2ff2mx28smca78p2c5l2lxd3jlk4wl3exc8ywkqcyqqqqqqggz008s


"When I tried updating the computer it said my suppositories were missing. I just want to go back to Windows! At least it works!"


Encouraging to me that there are people who can see more than one step ahead. Not many of us really lol. Lightning is a cryptographically sound value transfer network. It's not going anywhere. It's only going to get better. and our vision for it will have to change in a similar way to how we've had to learn the limitations of the trade-offs in the base chain. When people apply black and white frameworks to complex systems they fool themselves into thinking the systems are broken but in reality it's their thinking that is broken.