Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

The Lightning Network: Turning Bitcoin into Money

papers.ssrn.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

401–410 of 448 posts

Re: The Lightning Network: Turning Bitcoin into Money

#401

Post by CrazyPyroLinux »

aliqot wrote: post #106
teekert wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Chris indeed pushes it hard, I think indeed too hard, I agree. But it's reducing and moving to other shows (like OfficeHours.hair). To him this is the response to centralization of podcasting and I see that. As a member (I do 8$ a month, supporting 1 show but listen to all) I also see the imbalance in the attention that 2ct boosts get. It will go 1 of 2 ways I guess: 1) Boosts become the main income and keep getting…

I stopped listening out of guilt bc I didn't want to use it.

You're free to do what you want of course, but that's a shame. So many great shows.

Re: The Lightning Network: Turning Bitcoin into Money

#402

Post by ftlio »

imtringued wrote: post #369
ftlio wrote: post #346

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What was money's killer app? Bitcoin is money from the ground up. It's going fantastically fast. As for smart contracts, these are the basis of Bitcoin. A permissionless ledger inherently requires smart contracts. Their killer app is a a distributed ledger. There are already a few different contracts that can be made on Bitcoin that allow for different custodial schemes. What people are selling as far as DAOs, NFTs,…

>What was money's killer app? Medium of exchange or rather the division of labor. Bitcoin doesn't do it. In fact, most people who like Bitcoin want it to be a terrible medium of exchange. Everytime you hear people talk about Bitcoin on Reddit there are HODL memes, aka people openly proclaim that they don't want to use the money for anything other than speculating that it goes up in value.

The speculation is on that the alignment of central banks globally is towards savings debasement and non-custodial property. HODL is a rallying call to exit the current monetary infrastructure into the next one, one that specifically allows for a free market for money. Bitcoin is a bet on that transacting with bitcoins will ultimately be cheaper and with a vastly better security model than all existing infrastructure, from the concerns of a nation state down to microtransactions.

They're not speculating that it will go up for no reason. The investment thesis is that it solves real world problems, and that everyone who thinks it doesn't sounds like someone comparing fax machines to the internet in the 90s.

Re: The Lightning Network: Turning Bitcoin into Money

#403

Post by exabyte »

bubersson wrote: post #284
exabyte wrote: post #73

I run a lightning node at a cafe and we receive a few orders a day. Record had been 8 orders in one day.

If you post ln address, I can send you some sats so you can have a coffee on me :)

i think this post is old enough that i can post the page without worrying about the hug of death. if you wanna buy me a coffee you can go to https://emporium.atitlan.io :D in the comments just write "solo una prueba, no hagas este pedido"

Re: The Lightning Network: Turning Bitcoin into Money

#404

Post by dmitriid »

olalonde wrote: post #394
dmitriid wrote: post #379

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Do you extend the same reasoning to fiat? We are talking bout fiat? No. > So I guess your question is, what are the advantages of BTC over a fiat currency like USD. No. The question is: what does the trustless blockchain offer when you still have to rely on a centralised trusted entity. > BTC has a predictable money supply. Fiat currency doesn't: money supply can be arbitrarily inflated. Which immediately means tha…

> Do you extend the same reasoning to fiat? I was asking about fiat because many of your criticisms equally apply to fiat. > No. The question is: what does the trustless blockchain offer when you still have to rely on a centralised trusted entity. I answered that multiple times already. > Which immediately means that whoever got in early and got the first initial supply is at great advantage compared to anyone who go…

> I was asking about fiat because many of your criticisms equally apply to fiat.

They... don't.

> I answered that multiple times already.

You haven't. All you're saying "o let's have this centralised trusted entity that does something with blockchain because blockchain".

> That's, unfortunately, the case for almost anything of value.

If bitcoin is a currency as you would have us believe, then this is not what a currency should be.

> But it seems you are very emotionally invested in this for some reason...

Ah yes. There are only a few ways crypto discussions go: problems are dismissed out of hand and/or "have you had bad experience with crypto" (often in the form "you're just sad that you didn't get in on it early").

Re: The Lightning Network: Turning Bitcoin into Money

#405

Post by freeAgent »

CraigRood wrote: post #361
freeAgent wrote: post #347

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a way around huge storage requirements. Pruning, UTXO commitments, and things like Utreexo are all solutions for different aspects of that problem.

Still need to be able to transmit and verify the blockchain, so network capacity and CPU. You also need decent IO to maintain an index. There are benefits to scaling on chain, but as above, its not sustainable. Encouraging transactions that don't need to be stored on-chain forever and a day would be better batched up. You can then at least still verify your address balances.

Based on your reply, I don't believe you researched the technologies I just listed. UTXO checkpoints, for example, will enable one to trustlessly bootstrap a node nearly instantly (from the last UTXO checkpoint). Even 1MB (+SegWit) block size Bitcoin has an "infinite storage" problem that will continue to make running and bootstrapping nodes increasingly difficult. Should we decrease the block size cap to stave that off rather than look for solutions? I would say no. Instead, it's probably worth considering whether we need 100% of historic transaction data to be stored across all nodes, or even required to be directly checked by new nodes as they bootstrap from genesis block. It makes a ton of sense to me that if you trust PoW (which you probably do if you're using Bitcoin), you can set a threshold for UTXO checkpoint depth and simply bootstrap from there.

Verification of larger blocks scales quite well. Testers have proven this: https://read.cash/@mtrycz/how-my-rpi4-handles-mining-256mb-b...

What seems lost in this discussion is the idea that there can be (and maybe should be) a middle ground. Scale on-chain to the extent that technology allows and enables it. Surely, computers today are able to handle much more than Satoshi's computer in 2009, right? Simultaneously, building out off-chain scaling methods should also be encouraged. We don't need to put all our eggs in one basket.

Re: The Lightning Network: Turning Bitcoin into Money

#406

Post by TrapLord_Rhodo »

ETH_start wrote: post #344
TrapLord_Rhodo wrote: post #213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Market Cap and volume don't need to correlate. Your line of reasoning is a red herring. BTC as a store of value can have a very low volume and those LN could be responsible for an inordinant amount of volume, with low collateral depending on how fast the trades are. With OTC, Wrapped versions, and leverage through sythetix its also an impossible task to be able to claim for certainty anyways.

>>and those LN could be responsible for an inordinant amount of volume Theoretically yes, in practice no. Routing complexity increases as usage increases without a commensurate increase in channel collateral, because increased usage leads to more channels using up the collateral for one direction of transmissions, which eliminates the transmissibility of one of the two routes in the channel. The network would thus na…

>Theoretically yes, in practice no.

...?

1.) I have a direct disincentive to include more collateral than would be absolutely required.

2.) Most of the time LN's only need to go one way.

3.) The only thing your original graph shows is that the price of bitcoin has fallen.

4.) I anecedotely know there has been more use in LN among all my crypto friends and in South/ central America where i have seen increased use in Cafe's and hotels.

5.) The total amount of BTC being used as collateral in LN has grown. (Even though this means absolutely nothing and your graph of 'TVL' Also means nothing when compared is USD).

6.) It's annoying to see someone spitting FUD on BTC/ LN with ETH in their name.

Re: The Lightning Network: Turning Bitcoin into Money

#407

Post by jimsmart »

eldenwrong wrote: post #288
stonogo wrote: post #240

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Scaling is not a goal of the OSI model, and TCP/IP predates (and does not adhere to) the OSI model anyway. For insight into how and why this came about, I recommend Padlipsky's "The Elements of Networking Style."

But TCP/IP does have layers that help it to scale... https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_protocol_suite

No, those layers are not to help it scale.

Those layers are different levels of abstraction that actually sit on top of one another, but encompass the lower layers.

e.g. HTTP, SMTP, POP3, etc., all sit on top of TCP — that is to say: all of those protocols actually use TCP, they are TCP, they are all made from TCP packets/communications.

TCP sits on top of IP, that is to say: all TCP packets are in fact IP packets.

They are layers of abstraction, and each layer of abstraction is not just 'related' to the lower layer(s), or 'referencing' the lower layer(s) once in a while, each of those upper layers is in fact an instance of the lower layer.

At the bottom, it's all IP. The higher layers aren't substitutes for IP that get turned into IP when necessary, they are all IP.

If your comparison was valid, then protocols such as e.g. HTTP wouldn't actually be valid TCP packets and valid IP packets, instead HTTP would be completely separate to the lower levels it is built upon, and at some point it would be converted back and forth to the other protocols. Which is not what happens.

If your comparison was valid, then all L2 cryptotoken transactions would actually simultaneously /be/ blockchain transactions — and not just written back to it periodically.

Edit:

Here's an analogy: it's like IP protocol is letters, those letters can be grouped into words, which is the next layer up, e.g. TCP, UDP, etc., and those words can be grouped into sentences, which are like the higher level protocols, such as HTTP, SMTP, POP3, etc.

Granted, the OSI model also includes lower levels, and I'm only discussing three higher layers, but the principle is the same. The higher levels /encompass/ the lower ones, they are actually built /with/ or /from/ the lower-level components. This isn't how Lighting works. It's a separate distinct network to the main blockchain, and it then writes back to blockchain.

Re: The Lightning Network: Turning Bitcoin into Money

#408

Post by rafaelero »

imtringued wrote: post #364
rafaelero wrote: post #322

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't you want a money that people can't fuck with by printing according to politicians will?

Honestly why would anyone care about that? I am genuinely curious to hear what reason you have to want that other than rent seeking e.g increasing personal wealth without having to create more wealth. From what I can tell people who want a fixed supply currency basically just want to sit on it, wait for idiots who actually create wealth to do so and then take an undeserved cut. In other words they want to take the ec…

What do you do with your salary in the end of month? I bet you invest part of it. Why do you do that? Are you an investor? Do you think you have enough information to beat the market?

I imagine you don't. You probably invest because you don't want to lose your purchasing power. That's all. This is what fiat system makes us do.

I just want a currency that doesn't push me to have to invest my money all the time only to keep my monetary power. That's it. Simple as that.

Re: The Lightning Network: Turning Bitcoin into Money

#409

Post by aaaaaaaaata »

imtringued wrote: post #365
smoldesu wrote: post #278

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's only tired and copypasta-like because it can't be refuted. He's right. Cryptocurrency had it's shot, here's what we got out of it: 1. People trying to make a currency or interoperable token that they can directly or indirectly profit from 2. People trying to replace traditional object-relational databases or P2P networking with the Blockchain Neither of those are particularly meaningful to the average person. Th…

It was obvious the moment Freicoin died. That currency quite literally couldn't be used for speculation. It's only potential use case was as a medium of exchange and that didn't happen.

Right, only that one proved this theory of yours — not the other 3000 competitors just like it, by your metric

Re: The Lightning Network: Turning Bitcoin into Money

#410

Post by olalonde »

dmitriid wrote: post #404
olalonde wrote: post #394

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Do you extend the same reasoning to fiat? I was asking about fiat because many of your criticisms equally apply to fiat. > No. The question is: what does the trustless blockchain offer when you still have to rely on a centralised trusted entity. I answered that multiple times already. > Which immediately means that whoever got in early and got the first initial supply is at great advantage compared to anyone who go…

> I was asking about fiat because many of your criticisms equally apply to fiat. They... don't. > I answered that multiple times already. You haven't. All you're saying "o let's have this centralised trusted entity that does something with blockchain because blockchain". > That's, unfortunately, the case for almost anything of value. If bitcoin is a currency as you would have us believe, then this is not what a curre…

I didn't dismiss anything out of hand, I replied to all your questions as objectively as possible, but you just pretend that I didn't. I also would not have you believe anything, I am not trying to sell you anything here. I just answered your questions because I believed they were genuine questions. I am now starting to question that...

My question to you: what is your alternative? USD has many of the problems you mentioned and more. Transactions happen "off-chain", monetary inflation largely benefits the wealthy, etc.

Post reply on HN