I've been dealing with Bitcoin since pre-2013, and I've gotta say I've never seen it feel as powerful as it does on Nostr. The instant, effectively-free transactions that spring from having so many people on Lightning Addresses is like arriving on a different planet.
Most people's experience with Bitcoin payments -- if they even have it -- is a 30-60 minute wait for mining + two-plus block confirmations, and a fee that made it feel dumb to send less than $20. Most people don't want that. They don't need that. They will never care about that. Some do -- I did -- but it's a permanent minority. This is what makes lightning-fast settlements a big deal.
When normal people and businesses realize that global money transfers can be borderless, instant, free, and only take like two clicks, I think things are going to get very interesting. Still need to cover a lot of road on the privacy problem, but this already feels better than everything naked on-chain.
The hardest problem has always been making it easy for people who don't care about Bitcoin to accept Bitcoin (tender resistance) -- without requiring them to start caring about Bitcoin.
The way you do that is by making it "better than money." We're not there yet for everybody, but for the first time in many years, I caught a glimpse of how it might be possible.
Thread
Login to reply
Replies (99)
I've said over the past month that the "killer feature" of Nostr will be **Lightning**. The fact that Lightning is so tightly integrated on various aspects of clients and soon relays, it makes using Lightning so effortless and frictionless. Beyond that, people tip each other and post invoices and show that it's fun! I've had a couple dozen people DM me and tell me that they had never used Lightning before. Nostr changed all of that for them. They downloaded their first wallet. They setup their first Lightning node. They opened their first Lightning channels. Nostr will help fuel Lightning and Bitcoin's adoption.
Had used bitcoin before, but until nostr, I had never used lightning.
Fast forward a week and I'm setting up my own lightning and bitcoin nodes!
I hope what happened to me happens to everyone that experiences nostr.
My first Lightning transaction occurred only once I joined Damus.
That's fantastic :) I really do love to hear that.
Hell yeah! Love it! π€
Thatβs the way π§‘β‘οΈ
I'd like to list more lightning enabled projects in the 'bitcoin nostr' category at btcdir.org. Would really welcome any suggestions for anything I'm missing π
This I can concur with, it wasnβt til Nostr I actually saw lightning in use and wanted to contribute to both on chain and off chain networks π«‘
To be clear, is nostr integrated with lightning, or is it just the clients?
Is there something in the protocol?
Yeah, and if there were polls here I bet weβd find a substantial percentage of us are in that boat.
And I must say itβs a nice feeling to get started on #LN and #bitcoin with the help and the energy of everyone here!
This will go far!
π€
how many more decades do you think it will be before this tender resistance is behind us?
100% agree but we need to make it easier to use lightning without custodians otherwise we are going to regret it in the future
Celebration time again π very true though! π Run your own Node, folks!
Is there an easy way to get a LNURL without going through a KYC custodian?
Also agree. For whatever reason is see a lot of people think non custodial bitcoin wallet is needed but custodial lightning wallet is fine. Not sure why that is the sentiment for many using lightning
You can set one up with your domain using BTCPayServer
Agreed. Iβm not sure how we do so without people running their own nodes. Even then, channel management is not something most people will be willing to do and without proper channel management your ability to send and receive payments to your node is vastly diminished.
Lightning will always require someone elseβs infrastructure, unless your wiz of course
False! Get an Embassy and connect real lightning wallets like Zeus or Spark.
This is easy and much cheaper than using custodial solutions.
π
Do you run your own ISP? Do you connect to your own cell towers when you travel? Are you on your own power grid?
This is what the State will go after and regulate more.
Not very excited about the catch me if you can games that are coming, but hereβs to freedom π»
You are still bullish on the fediment aka Uncle Jim model though right? Realistically it will never be 1-to-1 with custody, having a heuristic for being adequately decentralized is difficult but necessary for us to answer βhave we made it?β
yea I think fedimint is a solid tradeoff balance in the near term, better privacy and less trust then the custodial wallets that are popular today, still would like to see fully sovereign usage get easier
Cashu <=
Running your own node is definitely a friction point but with lightning the bigger friction point seems to be liquidity management, particularly inbound liquidity.
Many of the people using βnon custodial mobile walletsβ such as phoenix still have to trust the company that is running the node and providing them liquidity.
The concern I have is that we are onboarding a ton of people via custodial wallets and standardizing LNURL which has incentives pushing people toward custodial wallets.
Eventually these custodians will rug pull or shotgun kyc. It is difficult to reverse this course after the fact.
Cashu is a cool project but is not going with the federated model. You get improved privacy over a traditional lightning custodian such as Wallet of Satoshi but you have the same custodial risk.
With fedimint the custodial risk is minimized since it is a multi sig custodian.
does having multiple custodial wallets mitigate this risk?
Wallets with multiple mints?
Use my wallet < use my wallet and i cant see what you do < use my wallet and i cant see what you do and i have to collude rug you
Whatβs the best solution to manage liquidity? Any interesting projects to support there?
Then you have to manage different pools of liquidity. You shouldnt have to say βoh, let me get my other walletβ all the time
Most people just want low cost frictionless money, and if they are being onboarded by buying $30 of BTC experimental spending money with their Debit Card via the getalby top up, they really don't even have to care about deeper issues.
Don't make perfection be the enemy of the good enough.
π―
LNURL pushes people towards hosted/custodial wallets. Itβs better than the alternative. I just wish bolt12 was more widely adopted. I dont hold lnurl against anyone. Its a tool that exists today and works. But the reliance on a clearnet webserver comes with tradeoffs.
If you have WoS and Muun, you pay from the one that hasnβt bent yet knee. When one goes down, you learn about how to open a channel real quickly.
Leaving KYC issue aside, since *all* my coins are KYC π , am I right in interpreting a hot custodial wallet greatest risk is simply losing the coins in it? So a balance risk management problem.
because it is lightning, its all hot wallet riskΒ π
might i suggest doing some homework on Liquid? It offers a tradeoff to keep off-chain funds offline without an on-chain footprint,Β it could help you wrap your head around what federation risk is as people explore fedimint
If fees are zero and transactions are instant, what prevents users from jumping ship? Is it just a race at that point?
yes, and thereβs that
Why do you think a custodial Lightning wallet is more popular than a Liquid wallet?
Iβve never used Liquid or even seen it in action. Part of it could just be network effect and the proliferation and improving UX of Lightning wallets. What is Liquid currently used for that would make it appealing to new users?
Sadly I think that most people will use lightning integration on their already kyc payment app when it is integrated. Most people won't care until something bad happen
I use it to swap for outbound/inbound liquidity on my lightning node using things like CoinOS, SideSwap, and Peerswap (p2p) .Β
to be honest, it makes no economic sense to do it (which is why no one uses it) but after using lightning for a long time one tends to look for ways to mitigate hot wallet risk -- Liquid offers a solution to that
I believe the use case is still confidential transactions for large transactions
Soβ¦mainly for institutional use, whale traders, and exchanges?
CLBOSS fixes this.
That was who they were trying to market to I believe so. There were some efforts made for everyday use, but it just didnβt catch on.
Is there a way to like this tweet?
Bolt12 is a step in that direction.
What do you think about Phoenix Walletβs solution?
it seems to me the major risk is that all your transactions are eventually linked to you pretty much publicly through chainalysis. This doesnβt leave aside KYC though, and since all your coins are KYC π managing the data sharing and trusting custodians not to give away, sell or leak your data is the major issue for security in the future. Otherwise, yeah, losing your stack isnβt fun either.
Damn was just going to say that... Every non kyc lightning wallet is a pain in the ass, because all the good ones like Samurai and WoS have gone away. You gotta be techie to run the others.
Hell yeah β‘οΈ
We're on our way to ubiquity.
dergigi.com/vew


i guess we didn't zap enough to keep him around?
Lightning is awesome and it fits really well into the nostr based stack!
If you knew the number of people in developing countries who are using #Bitcoin to stabilize their personal economies, you would be surprised how they manage to use it through Lightning. #Nostr is definitely a way that we need to take as a society.
I've found wallets like Strike, Bitnob, CashApp, Pouch.ph best to get people who don't care about bitcoin to accept it. Auto convert to their local currency. This is how I pay my landlord.
i want to believe in this but am having a hard time getting around the value volatility. how can something this volatile catch on as a global currency?
Lightning Network is empowering the decentralized normie movement.
So glad you are here.
Let the prophecy unfold. A decentralized, censorship-resistant future for all.
This is the tipping point for sure! Party on
Making people use bitcoin without caring about it is slowly happening. Apps like fountain already let people people fund their custodial wallets with fiat and send sats to support podcast. This is only the beginning. Music and e-commerce will likely be impacted in a major way too. I could even see it take over the SaaS world with sats streaming per usage. No need for subscriptions anymore.
I was against the Bitcoin since I've met Nostr ppl. I used to think Bitcoiners are bunch of ppl who make leverages to multiply their money. This place changed that perception for me.
WOW
Fully agree!
It's going to be a pretty interesting transition, pretty sure micropayments will unlock business models we have not yet thought of the same way app stores/cloud computing/gps/smartphones created new ones
As for nostr and LN, I think this is a fascinating competition between ad-driven models and those that have "got to the top"/become influencers and have growth hacked the algo feeds into getting more impressions and turning that into a business
I am sure saying outlandish things will still work to an extent on a service that has no algo curation but its impact will be limited, also with incentives not being centred around pleasing 1 or 2 brands and rather around keeping a loyal audience, it really could shift the way people interact online
π€’
#[2] is working very hard on addressing your last point with Strike!
ππΌ
β
#[0]
#[0]
Absolutely! Working in the Lightning space for me started with the feeling that this really is the change that we all need. Specifically all the new use cases!
But now with nostrβ¦these are the times to get on! Lightning and nostr is a perfect combination! β‘οΈπ¦β‘οΈ
lnbc55550n1p3as96kpp5rysnvrh5nc2c5xxyc440evmq8p94q03mjpy05cuw9x7dxrkaulhsdqqcqzzgxqyz5vqrzjqwnvuc0u4txn35cafc7w94gxvq5p3cu9dd95f7hlrh0fvs46wpvhd5wlqpye93c665qqqqryqqqqthqqpyrzjqw8c7yfutqqy3kz8662fxutjvef7q2ujsxtt45csu0k688lkzu3ld5wlqpye93c665qqqqryqqqqthqqpysp5czysmmgevhr2a9sqhrz5tjh9u8aegc4k4tgdm8l6jr9zwufpx40q9qypqsqddf3mgyktrmqs4w3vxne5c8fql826lz7hcnydwtjv283e0f7y695ckj5u2tdfnd5vk4uen5wmyjqsxeqwm4ysv4aukltzdgnt5f9gaqpkfqc2j
Thank you to the one who sends the sats.
Color me surprised that you support WEF lightning you antihuman spiteful garbage if you are not just a sim. https://xmrposter.club/objects/32e634bd-5151-4017-a10c-9bfb41db3448
https://leafposter.club/objects/3ecfae57-a7e1-42bf-8d75-c9f732216dc1
You are loosing. Stop lying snow faggot and playing dumbfuck.
Arenβt you worried about LN possible centralization? Honest question. I am trying it now for the first time.
So true
#[0]
Take this motherfuckers central bankers! We coming to eat your lunch!
View quoted note β
Bitcoin. Better than money. (Thanks to #nostr.)
View quoted note β
Frankly, it pales in comparison to the implementation on my Minecraft server. β‘ is amazing.
β‘ On a UX level sending a lightning payment is so much simpler than traditional finance, mitigating all those input hurdles such as address and bank numbers. Of course the most powerful bitcoin lightning feature is full sovereignry. Your bank can stop your payments for no reason and demand explanation for withdrawals. Your dollars are the bank's dollars.
I am, however, concerned that lots of people use custodial wallets like Alby or so-called "Wallet of Satoshi". Call me a maximalist, but that kinda defeats the purpose of cryptocurrencies...
Donβt disagree but would argue the point of Lightning is that itβs βeasyβ. If you treat it like a checking account it facilitates the international settlement benefits Ed describes above. Never to hold anything on lightning that you couldnβt afford to looseβ¦thatβs what cold storage is for.
Not there yet for everybody, but soon.
Give us another 7 months.
View quoted note β
When we solve for transaction fees, the friction to adopt goes away. Effectively free, bid spread fee, somethingβbut must be damn close to free before miners can focus on that problem in 2140
How this post only 22 zaps??
π―
Just gonna drop a meme
View quoted note β
Thanks for the insights... that is an awesome take!
Bru right there with you! I have bought all my drugs with bitcoin at a discount!
One day it will be the same with commodities, exp; your purchase at the supermarket will have cheaper options if you use bitcoin. Just imagine
@npub1sn0w...jdv9 It hurts both my brain and heart, that so many FOSS developers advocating for open protocols and open networks have given in to cynical anti-bitcoin FUD, and positioned themselves against a truly open-source, decentralized, permissionless, inclusive, fast, and cheap alternative to the utterly centralized, controlled, surveilled, exclusive, proprietary, corporate currencies and payment systems of the world.
Lightning works.