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The Lightning Network: Turning Bitcoin into Money

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Re: The Lightning Network: Turning Bitcoin into Money

#51

Post by shp0ngle »

joosters wrote: post #46
once_inc wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is being actively used daily by a vast community of users. I don't understand what you are trying to imply with your statement.

The 'reference' implementation of the protocol, https://github.com/lightningnetwork/lnd is still in beta, with warnings about how users could lose all their money. AFAIK, there's no stable/reliable software out there. And don't forget, ordinary users need to monitor the blockchain 24/7 in order not to lose their money by a counterparty closing their channel fraudulently. It's far from ready for use.

> As of this writing, lnd is still in beta and it is considered #reckless to put any life altering amounts of BTC into the network.

Well I will take them by their word.

Re: The Lightning Network: Turning Bitcoin into Money

#52

Post by ooaa »

arcticbull wrote: post #21
lumannnn wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Look into Taproot. Once adoption and implementation spreads, you'll realize you can open multiple channels with one on-chain transaction. This is an evolving space and scaling happens already. But sure, you can stick to the traditional monetary system where only a select few control the rules. You are free to adopt Bitcoin. No one will force you :)

Again, please specify exact quantities, I did, it's the least you can do. > But sure, you can stick to the traditional monetary system where only a select few control the rules. No, a body accountable to Congress (the Fed) which publishes quarterly audits is responsible for the currency. They act on behalf of the American people. As opposed to an un-elected, un-accountable cluster of core contributors and mining pool…

[dead]

Re: The Lightning Network: Turning Bitcoin into Money

#53

Post by ooaa »

plankers wrote: post #45
alchemist1e9 wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You seem to have a very US centric worldview. Maybe ask some Turkish savers how they feel, or any number of endless examples worldwide where saving in their own government fiat isn’t a good idea.

you can bet your bottom dollar there are some nerds in Sri Lanka who are very happy to own bitcoin right now. they'll be able to spend it as soon as the electricity comes back up.

Either lose all/most your money to inflation or risk not being able to spend money temporarily.

Re: The Lightning Network: Turning Bitcoin into Money

#54

Post by [deleted] »

TekMol wrote: post #32
teekert wrote: post #5

A cool use of the Lightning network is the podcast 2.0 initative. Currently, as I listen to podcasts, I stream back satoshis (sats), value for value (I use Castamatic on iOS, fountain.fm is also an option on Android). You can also send messages with sats attached, called “boosts”. Creators can transparantly split the sats they receive over various goals (i.e. FOSS projects [opensats], or guests on shows). There are n…

How do you handle the tax implications of streaming sats? As far as I know, every payment with Bitcoin triggers a taxable event? Do you record a gazillion log entrys "Paid $0.0000145 for listening podcasts, Paid $0.000142 for listening podcasts ...", crunch all the numbers and then at the end of the year put that gigantic list into your tax declaration?

[deleted]

Re: The Lightning Network: Turning Bitcoin into Money

#55

Post by alchemist1e9 »

arcticbull wrote: post #36
once_inc wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Please re-read my post. I specifically speak of people using money without being aware of all the specifics. Noting that the dollar is not backed by gold. That ended in 1971 by the way, when Nixon ended the gold standard for the US dollar because the government needed money to pay for the war in Vietnam.

Double-check what happened in 1971. FDR took the US off the gold standard in 1933. From this point forward until present, there was never again domestic convertibility of notes for gold. Nixon ended Bretton Woods (which started in 1944) - but that pertained solely to international convertibility of notes for gold in foreign exchange. It was not the gold standard. It was occasionally referred to as the 'gold exchange…

> Money is already digital.

We know, which being in a centralized MySQL database at the Fed made bailing out all the US elites in 2008 very easy.

Re: The Lightning Network: Turning Bitcoin into Money

#56

Post by FabHK »

teekert wrote: post #35
TekMol wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you handle the tax implications of streaming sats? As far as I know, every payment with Bitcoin triggers a taxable event? Do you record a gazillion log entrys "Paid $0.0000145 for listening podcasts, Paid $0.000142 for listening podcasts ...", crunch all the numbers and then at the end of the year put that gigantic list into your tax declaration?

I'm not on the receiving end, but to me this seems like the law is behind reality. Micropayments are coming, perhaps using blockchain, perhaps not, probably in a number of different ways. I guess this is a good question for the hosts of the podcasts that use these features (Like Linux Unplugged, and other shows from Jupiter Broadcasting or the No Agenda show by Adam Curry and John Dvorak.) Perhaps this is not answere…

> Micropayments are coming, perhaps using blockchain

Blockchain is remarkably ill-suited for micropayments.

Re: The Lightning Network: Turning Bitcoin into Money

#57

Post by knocte »

DennisP wrote: post #44

One drawback of Lightning is that if you want to receive funds, and you don't have a direct channel to the payer, then you have to be online. It's an interactive protocol, you can't just publish an address and check it later. Since most people don't run their own servers, LN is pretty much going to be a custodial system.

> if you want to receive funds, and you don't have a direct channel to the payer, then you have to be online

Receiver of funds are normally merchants, and merchants normally already have payment systems that require some kind of connection anyway.

Re: The Lightning Network: Turning Bitcoin into Money

#58

Post by RileyJames »

Hamuko wrote: post #47
once_inc wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What do you think is being exchanged on the Lightning Network? LN transactions are simply 2-of-2 multisig transactions made on-chain, where both parties can change the balance amongst themselves, and where settlement is possible at any moment. Bitcoin isn't being used as money on-chain. Why is this controversial? Bitcoin is the equivalent of gold, which was the hardest form of money that is accepted worldwide, before…

> Bitcoin is the equivalent of gold That definitely wasn't the original goal of Bitcoin though.

And surveillance capitalism wasn’t the original goal of the internet, yet here we are.

What’s your point?

A technology should achieve its founding goal or GTFO?

Re: The Lightning Network: Turning Bitcoin into Money

#59

Post by 4kimov »

wanderingbort wrote: post #38
TekMol wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you handle the tax implications of streaming sats? As far as I know, every payment with Bitcoin triggers a taxable event? Do you record a gazillion log entrys "Paid $0.0000145 for listening podcasts, Paid $0.000142 for listening podcasts ...", crunch all the numbers and then at the end of the year put that gigantic list into your tax declaration?

Not a lawyer or accountant here but I think it would be reasonable to only treat the eventual on-chain withdraw as a taxable event. Until then, you have deposited some value in a number of lightening network nodes and have been negotiating a set of pairwise IOUs with them for later. DeFi/staking has a similar problem and I believe waiting until gains and losses are realized will be the way it goes down. For now, make…

That's right, moving sats via LN is done off-chain. Once the channel closes, that's when it settles to L1, at which point tools like Rotki can help you figure it out.

Re: The Lightning Network: Turning Bitcoin into Money

#60

Post by samatman »

TekMol wrote: post #32
teekert wrote: post #5

A cool use of the Lightning network is the podcast 2.0 initative. Currently, as I listen to podcasts, I stream back satoshis (sats), value for value (I use Castamatic on iOS, fountain.fm is also an option on Android). You can also send messages with sats attached, called “boosts”. Creators can transparantly split the sats they receive over various goals (i.e. FOSS projects [opensats], or guests on shows). There are n…

How do you handle the tax implications of streaming sats? As far as I know, every payment with Bitcoin triggers a taxable event? Do you record a gazillion log entrys "Paid $0.0000145 for listening podcasts, Paid $0.000142 for listening podcasts ...", crunch all the numbers and then at the end of the year put that gigantic list into your tax declaration?

I'm of the opinion that the rules are behind the law when it comes to BTC. I am deeply uninterested in being anywhere near the legal case that challenges this!

But currency exchange for 'ordinary purposes' is not taxed, if my company bought some Euros to pay for foreign goods and the Euro rallied against the dollar before the purchase, no tax is owed.

Well, BTC is legal tender in El Salvador, and there's no rule that the (in the above) Euros in question have to be paid to a country where the Euro is legal tender: perhaps they're a Singaporean business which mostly exports to Europe, so their prices are in Euros and it shouldn't matter.

The US might not like that El Salvator made BTC official, but that shouldn't matter either.

Better keep your books very carefully though, because buying currency with the intention of selling it later (aka exchanging it for another currency) is investment purposes.

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