Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by nikcub 3070 days ago
> You have to a) pay to open up a channel with each person you wish to use it

This simply isn't true. You open one channel and then payments are routed over channels to your destination. It's no different to TCP/IP in this way and the reason why that analogy is used a lot in describing the network

Having a one channel single destination can be done with Bitcoin alone and the new timelock transactions - the purpose of lightning is automating these transacations and the routing between channels

Opening a channel in lightning is no different to having a balance in a wallet or a bank account - you don't notice that it is "locked". Channels can also create other channels using channel factories[0]. This all happens under the hood much in the same way somebody accessing YouTube knows little about routing infrastructure.

There really is a lot of FUD about Lightning and they get repeated a lot by people who should know better. There is now a series of simple infographics that explain what Lightning is and how it works so there shouldn't be any more excuses for such simple misinformation being repeated[1][2][3][4][5]

Your specific claim about one channel = one receiver is addressed in [5]

I think the HN audience should go out and try it themselves and read the paper. It's the most eye-opening tech experience i've had since reading the Bitcoin white paper.

If you've been kicking yourself about not getting into Bitcoin early - you have a new opportunity with Lightning now. There are only hundreds of nodes at the moment and only a couple of vendors accepting payments on the testnet and a ton of opportunity to build an entirely new infrastructure around it.

[0] https://bitcoin.stackexchange.com/questions/67158/what-are-c...

[1] https://i.imgur.com/L10n4ET.png

[2] https://s3.amazonaws.com/bitcoindesigned-prod/media/what-are...

[3] https://s3.amazonaws.com/bitcoindesigned-prod/media/lightnin...

[4] https://s3.amazonaws.com/bitcoindesigned-prod/media/lightnin...

[5] https://s3.amazonaws.com/bitcoindesigned-prod/media/lightnin...

3 comments

> If you've been kicking yourself about not getting into Bitcoin early - you have a new opportunity with Lightning now.

Why not just delete the rest of your post and just leave this? This once sentence is what really drives all of the rest of your breathless hype. Naked greed. It's the only thing the entire crypto "space" has.

Lightning network is pure vaporware. It was "coming any day now" when Mt Gox collapsed. It's still coming soon. It will always be coming soon.

You'll be happy to hear then that a lot of progress has been made on Lightning since MtGox imploded

I probably should have linked to these from my original comment - rather than removing anything

Specifically with lnd the lightning daemon[0], BOLT's (the equivalent of Bitcoin BIP's) 1 through to 11 have been implemented in the core daemon[1]

There is also the Neutrino light client[2] (screenshot [3])

Far from being vaporware - you're only a few docker commands away from trying it out yourself[4]

[0] https://github.com/lightningnetwork/lnd

[1] https://github.com/lightningnetwork/lightning-rfc

[2] https://github.com/lightninglabs/neutrino

[3] https://blog.lightning.engineering/assets/images/app-chans-g...

[4] https://github.com/lightningnetwork/lnd/tree/master/docker#c...

This sounds just like a 15-year-old ad for Perl 6.
Bitcoin is the multi-level marketing of millennials.
Spot on!
Thanks for posting those infographics; they answer some lingering questions that have lain unanswered for years. I still see one problem, though, which is that the few on-chain transactions that are required (such as topping up a channel) will be far more expensive than in those other blockchains. Like $20 vs. 20 cents. So there are plenty of scenarios where LN fees will still be higher overall.
Other chains are cheaper because they have fewer users or higher trust/censorability.
With LN there are less transactions on-chain which reduces fees. Also, finally the temper-tantrum throwing core-supporters are quickly realizing that a block size increase is absolutely necessary going forward
"Getting into Lightning" won't make you money as you might think.

The network isn't a coin as such - merely a way of sending other kinds of coins. Hence it doesn't have a value which could skyrocket making one rich.

I worry that could hamper it's uptake.