First Lightning mainnet release • Hacker News Board

Re: First Lightning mainnet release

#191

Post by Geee » Fri, Mar 16, 2018, 4:35 AM UTC

__blockcipher__ wrote: post #136

tboyd47 wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I tend to think raising the block size to improve throughput is like adding another lane to a busy highway. It's an expensive road upgrade that won't relieve congestion, but just add more commuters by increasing the number of cars. Along that analogy, LN is more like carpooling. More commuters, same number of cars, no changes required to the roads. It's a cheaper upgrade that achieves the same effect in a different w…

False analogy. In terms of throughput the analogy is good, but you neglected that lightning breaks how bitcoin works. You need to get permission from a centralized lightning hub to transact. Also, high fees (which blockstream vocally is in favor of) increase UTXO bloat by preventing consolidation

Not true. You can still use normal permissionless transactions, and start a hub without a permission. I was also worried about hubs getting too much power, but Lightning just takes all 'busy' paths (such as exchanges and payment providers) to their own roads. If a path is getting busier on mainnet, it is more economical to move it to Lightning. It doesn't favor centralization beyond what naturally happens (some places are busier). If there's someone with too much power, it's always possible to make another hub. It's kind of natural path-finding. I think hubs will be strongly geographical when people start using Bitcoin on their local purchases. Big stores don't also want to give Lightning fees to anyone so they set up their own hub.

Also, when the bulk of transactions moves to Lightning, the mainnet fees will become much lower.

Re: First Lightning mainnet release

#192

Post by nosuchthing » Fri, Mar 16, 2018, 5:10 AM UTC

def_true_false wrote: post #183

nosuchthing wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Only for early adopters who know they'll be able to exploit late adopters. Users clearly become incentivized to market their free tokens as an opportunity at wealth, as they exit and sell them to late bag holders. Satoshi could easily have designed the PoW to distribute more slowly, and favor long term growth as more users join the network. Instead only early adopters control the supply. The risk of this is catastrop…

On the other hand, late adopters will benefit from the stronger network effects.

Due to the Gini coefficient being so high, the network effect is severely constrained.

The systemic risk is outlined in the comment above.

Re: First Lightning mainnet release

#193

Post by raulvbrito1705 » Fri, Mar 16, 2018, 5:27 AM UTC

XR0CSWV3h3kZWg wrote: post #45

gruez wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I was excited for Lightning until I've learned about Nano (formerly Raiblocks). It promised and actually delivered totally free AND near-instant transactions. Worth checking out if you didn't knew about it. It's worth nothing that lattice/DAG based cryptocurrencies offer different security guarantees compared to blockchain based ones, so it's not fair to compare them on transaction fee/volume alone. Sort of like it'…

It's fair to compare them in terms of tx fee/volume, but excluding the different security guarantees is pretty bs. It's also interesting to note that Nano doesn't incentives miners.

Nano has no miners ;)

Re: First Lightning mainnet release

#194

Post by dfhdr446543 » Fri, Mar 16, 2018, 8:18 AM UTC

polyomino wrote: post #48

brendanw wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It exists. It is called nano: no fees and instant transactions through the block lattice. https://nano.org/en/whitepaper I am surprised more folks on HN are not familiar with nano considering it is one of the few teams in crypto with endorsements from familiar faces: Zack Shapiro on the core team (ex-Product Hunt), Garry Tan (YC, angel investor in Coinbase), and Charlie Lee (former director of engineering @ Coinbase)…

Because these altcoins are default scams. Nano is basically iota + proof of stake. None of which have been shown to work in a decentralized fashion.

Your description of Nano as "iota plus PoS" reveals how informed you really are.

I suggest you actually read the Nano and IOTA white papers. They're very different.

Re: First Lightning mainnet release

#195

Post by Cypher » Fri, Mar 16, 2018, 9:07 AM UTC

The tech is great and it's still very early but it lacks any community consensus mechanism regarding important events.

Recently there was a hack and a petition was created to ask the devs to allow the community to vote on how it should be resolved:

https://www.change.org/p/colin-lemahieu-lets-ask-the-nano-de...

Re: First Lightning mainnet release

#196

Post by Cypher » Fri, Mar 16, 2018, 9:08 AM UTC

SnowProblem wrote: post #140

osteele wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> then there will be more demands to make the blocks bigger again, eventually leading to centralization Because having a bigger block size raises the barrier to being a miner. (CapEx and OpEx are both greater.) Imagine the other extreme: mining is so cheap that every phone, watch, and — oh let's just throw in every mouse and pigeon cortex — can be a miner. This is near one extreme of decentralization. That's unattain…

If anyone can be a miner, then malware can be used to do a 51% attack. Something like that happened with Monero recently [1]. [1] https://www.investopedia.com/news/sites-are-using-your-brows...

Did you know just 5 Nano nodes control over 51% of the network?

https://www.nanode.co/representatives

Re: First Lightning mainnet release

#197

Post by nosuchthing » Fri, Mar 16, 2018, 10:38 AM UTC

brendanw wrote: post #185

nosuchthing wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because most of the cryptocoin projects are designed as way to scam other users. Why doesn't Nano Raiblocks allow more users to generate new Nano/Raiblocks? Would that hurt your investment if every user had equal access to the production of the supply? Why are you so emotionally invested in trying to sell these beanie babies to other people? Is it because you need to profit off other buying into your scam? Still no l…

I am excited about the technology. I had taken a light look at the space 4-5 years ago and did not form a strong impression. I didn't take a look at the technology again until last September. One of the topics I enjoyed deep diving on the most was the lightning network. The two pain points I observed for lightning were: (1) It takes a non-trivial amount of energy to understand hashed time lock contracts well enough t…

Thanks for explaining where you're coming from.

It's a weird space. I see the general concept behind cryptocurrencies as bringing the same benefits you've outlined and from a technology and software perspective these projects are fascinating.

My contention with most of these projects and users is that in these specific implementations nearly every single one of the cryptocoin projects are designed to enable oligarchical wealth extraction from downstream investors - especially in the case of uninformed users/speculators who join the network later.

The question becomes of sustainability - if there's no underlying value to the asset and it relies on speculation and the supply is heavily centralized among a small pool of early adopters than there will likely be a point where buy pressure runs dry and most of the late adopters will be unable to exchange the same amount of wealth they traded into the system.

Re: First Lightning mainnet release

#198

Post by nosuchthing » Fri, Mar 16, 2018, 10:55 AM UTC

clarky07 wrote: post #190

nosuchthing wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because most of the cryptocoin projects are designed as way to scam other users. Why doesn't Nano Raiblocks allow more users to generate new Nano/Raiblocks? Would that hurt your investment if every user had equal access to the production of the supply? Why are you so emotionally invested in trying to sell these beanie babies to other people? Is it because you need to profit off other buying into your scam? Still no l…

There is no new generation of nano. All of it is already created. There is no new production of supply. https://usenano.org/

The point being made is, new users shouldn't opt into the system.

Old users can simply horde the supply, do nothing, and wash trade to manipulate the spot price.

Classic penny stock scam.

Re: First Lightning mainnet release

#199

Post by blattimwind » Fri, Mar 16, 2018, 10:59 AM UTC

def_true_false wrote: post #139

blattimwind wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wire transfers don't have chargebacks.

From the SEPA Credit Transfer Scheme Rulebook[1]: A Recall occurs when the Originator Bank requests to cancel a SEPA Credit Transfer. The Recall procedure must be initiated by the Originator Bank within 10 Banking Business Days after execution date of the SCT subject to the Recall. ... A bank may initiate a Recall procedure for following reasons only: • Duplicate sending • Technical problems resulting in erroneous SC…

Fraudulent payments mean things like e.g. a bank itself was hacked.

As an account holder you cannot recall a transfer. It is not possible.

In the past it was sometimes possible to cancel a transfer before it was processed by your bank (so the transfer was not booked yet), but nowadays transfers are processed essentially immediately. Some banks have never permitted this.

Re: First Lightning mainnet release

#200

Post by M4v3R » Fri, Mar 16, 2018, 3:49 PM UTC

mbrock wrote: post #115

M4v3R wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was excited for Lightning until I've learned about Nano (formerly Raiblocks). It promised and actually delivered totally free AND near-instant transactions. Worth checking out if you didn't knew about it.

Every comment I see like this makes me less interested in looking into "Raiblocks" because it sounds exactly like vested interest shilling. Low content promotion of semi-obscure altcoins repeated in every single cryptocurrency discussion thread...

If you browse my history you'll see I'm not a shill for Nano. This is the first time I ever brought it up in a comment on HN. I genuinely just like the technology - while it has some small drawbacks, the benefits (free, fast and no-mining) far outweigh them in my opinion.