Just looked at the Bolt card website. That seems pretty nice. Ideally that is the sort of thing everyone will be using in the future. Basically just a debit card but uses LN.
And for sure when block starts allowing LN payments, combine that with stuff like the Bolt card, and paying with Bitcoin will be as easy as paying through other standard means today, except with BTC and cheaper and the merchant will get the money right away. Win, win, win, win.
Though I imagine the vast majority of merchants are going to want to get fiat not Bitcoin. So they'll just have to use some automated thing, no doubt built into the PoS system, that exchanges the bitcoin for fiat.
OP, you said this:
"As far as I understand, Lighting Network only helps you if you and 2nd person send coins often between each-other, otherwise, if it's only for one-time payment, you can't really save on fees because you have to close channel and that's the moment when you are pushed to pay fees."
Just wanted to clarify that LN doesn't only help if you and a 2nd person want to make transactions between each other. LN is a network. It's not just for paying a single person, you can pay anyone on the network. So no, it doesn't only help if you want to transact often with one other person, it helps if you want to transact with anyone. The idea is you onboard once to LN (pay the onchain fee) and then you transact many times (dozens, hundreds, thousands...) of times over the LN with anyone else on the network, not just with one person. What you are describing would be a private channel, which you can do as well, but that would be a LN channel you open up with someone else in which you aren't connected to the rest of the network and you only plan on transacting with that one person as many times as you want. That would be a niche use case for LN.
As for the discussion between Wind_fury and others, about not minding 10+ minute transactions times...buying things online you could do on-chain, cuz if something has to be processed and shipped out over the next day or two, it doesn't matter if it takes an hour to confirm the transaction. But any normal purchases done in person on-chain wait times would be completely infeasible. LN is needed for those. And also you're gonna want to use LN for online payments as well just because its cheaper. Why pay a $1 or $5 or whatever fee when you can pay a 1 cent fee.
With point of sale systems set up to use LN and payment options like that Bolt card paying with bitcoin is as easy UX as using google/apple pay or credit/debit card. Whether or not LN is the most used L2, only time will tell. Right now it is the only major L2 as far as I know. It certainly has tradeoffs (mostly the fact that your ingoing and outgoing transactions need to be roughly equal, but if people are getting paid in Bitcoin one day that pretty much works itself out ie you open up a LN node with a couple months worth of expenses or whatever, you spend money and satohis are sent to the outgoing side, and then you get a paycheck over the LN and you get satoshis sent back to the ingoing side. balance). LN tradeoffs are based on the limitations of its design with regard to how bitcoin works. It is possible we'll see future L2 concepts with fewer tradeoffs, though I haven't really heard of any. LN I think is good enough to work for everyone, with some people using their own nodes while others (probably most people) use hosted LN wallets. But it would be cool to see if people can try to develop alternate L2 ideas and see how they might compare to LN.
Topic: Are Bitcoin LN POS terminals the future of bitcoin payments? (Read 313 times)
We're currently in an era when mixers are getting seized, and with tools like WasabiWallet filtering incoming transactions, shouldn't there be an open network that welcomes all UTXOs to enter, and makes them untraceable when they exit? Some users might find that useful.
CMIIW, I believe people can still use coinjoin without relying on Wasabi no? Although I don't think they are suitable for small payments unless the seller allows unconfirmed transactions to be accepted. I can see they sell this as a feature for their customers though.
Everything in context. You're right that users can still use CoinJoin without Wasabi, but I'm debating for Lightning as a privacy layer to increase network usage and demand, IF it's not going to be the future of Bitcoin payments. Kindly include BlackHatCoiner's post in the quote.
I think node operators would like such a pivot because that means they profit from routing fees for locking capital in network, which will also help lessen the opportunity cost.
Is there any way to let similar virtual Cryptocurrency enter the market? For example, entering a supermarket for goods trading？
We're currently in an era when mixers are getting seized, and with tools like WasabiWallet filtering incoming transactions, shouldn't there be an open network that welcomes all UTXOs to enter, and makes them untraceable when they exit? Some users might find that useful.
CMIIW, I believe people can still use coinjoin without relying on Wasabi no? Although I don't think they are suitable for small payments unless the seller allows unconfirmed transactions to be accepted. I can see they sell this as a feature for their customers though. My point was, under normal circumstances, many users don't mind waiting for their onchain transactions to confirm.
From OP's post, I'd assume we are talking about users who want fast payment confirmation. I don't think those who visit stores and buy stuff with Bitcoin would like to wait more than a few minutes just to get their payment confirmed by the seller. If it's not going to be the "future of Bitcoin payments", make it function more privately and be a kind of privacy layer built on top of Bitcoin.
And how do you propose this will happen more effectively?
I don't know to be honest. I was merely suggesting that if it isn't going to be the future of Bitcoin payments like you said, then it's probably better for it to be built also as a privacy layer?
We're currently in an era when mixers are getting seized, and with tools like WasabiWallet filtering incoming transactions, shouldn't there be an open network that welcomes all UTXOs to enter, and makes them untraceable when they exit? Some users might find that useful.
Most of the users don't really mind the 10 minute confirm times in onchain transactions.
Confirmation doesn't take 10 minutes, unless you're having the highest priority. Hundreds of thousands of transactions don't have that, especially recently with the rise of Ordinals we had to wait for like hours --if not days-- to have our transactions confirmed.
There is no future where merchants accept it as point-of-sale based payment method without going off-chain.
My point was, under normal circumstances, many users don't mind waiting for their onchain transactions to confirm.
Payment for supermarkets, restaurants, and daily needs is the problem, and I see that the lightning network is doing it well as long as the payment is done online and not offline, and the fees in general are better and faster than cash, as most of us use the phone to make these payments.
I'm talking about these. Obviously, you won't (and shouldn't) ever buy a car via lightning. The problem comes with transactions we make once a day, once a week etc., like buying groceries, renewing your Spotify subscription, and the like. You can't expect millions of people to wait days for these, and it's exactly what will happen if we all paid them on-chain. What I also see happening (and this is just a guess) is a change back to the way we did some things back years ago. Once again this is US based so the rest of the world might have acted differently. But here you if you wanted to pay by check some places took it and just took the risk, others like a lot of supermarkets, took down some information and gave you a card so the cashier knew they could take a check from you without getting more info.
Changing the way wallets work a bit would solve this. Instead of RBF we call it 'Unchangeable Transaction' when you make it, you have to check that box so the store knows that no matter what you can't do anything about the TX going through.
Also, you can make it so POS terminal generates a QR code that the wallet understands that makes sure the fee should get you into the next block or 2. No sending a 3 sat/vb transaction when fees are where they are now (7x that amount)
And so on.
Honestly, and although you are giving up a lot of privacy I think it's going to wind up with what I see now which is places like Coinbase issuing debit cards that pull from your crypto balance.
Because, people are cheap, why send your crypto to whoever for free and pay a fee when you do it, when you can use your debit card and not pay the tx fee AND get 1% to 4% back. https://www.coinbase.com/card
-Dave
Payment for supermarkets, restaurants, and daily needs is the problem, and I see that the lightning network is doing it well as long as the payment is done online and not offline, and the fees in general are better and faster than cash, as most of us use the phone to make these payments.
I'm talking about these. Obviously, you won't (and shouldn't) ever buy a car via lightning. The problem comes with transactions we make once a day, once a week etc., like buying groceries, renewing your Spotify subscription, and the like. You can't expect millions of people to wait days for these, and it's exactly what will happen if we all paid them on-chain. 
There is no future where merchants accept it as point-of-sale based payment method without going off-chain.
It depends on the definition of the point of sale. Some contracts can wait for (average) 10 minutes, such as paying for a new car, real estate, bicycle, smart phone, or other services whose average is more than a thousand dollars, and then the fees are not considered a problem, and the delay can be acceptable because these contracts It takes an average of half an hour in total.Payment for supermarkets, restaurants, and daily needs is the problem, and I see that the lightning network is doing it well as long as the payment is done online and not offline, and the fees in general are better and faster than cash, as most of us use the phone to make these payments.
make it function more privately and be a kind of privacy layer built on top of Bitcoin. I believe that would be more in-demand than faster transactions.
TumbleBit's off-blockchain payments is an example of a way to enhance privacy outside of the Bitcoin network. They have a good idea here, but I haven't heard of an actual implementation of this protocol.https://github.com/BUSEC/TumbleBit
If it's not going to be the "future of Bitcoin payments", make it function more privately and be a kind of privacy layer built on top of Bitcoin.
And how do you propose this will happen more effectively? It is already functioning quite privately. More privacy can emerge with BOLT12 and of course with greater liquidity.Most of the users don't really mind the 10 minute confirm times in onchain transactions.
Confirmation doesn't take 10 minutes, unless you're having the highest priority. Hundreds of thousands of transactions don't have that, especially recently with the rise of Ordinals we had to wait for like hours --if not days-- to have our transactions confirmed. There is no future where merchants accept it as point-of-sale based payment method without going off-chain.
Depends on whether the lightning network is the future of Bitcoin payments. I genuinely doubt. It's pretty limited unfortunately. Sure, it helps as fuck at the moment (especially at the moment), but technically and economically speaking, it isn't worth it for the vast majority of merchants which can be paid alternatively in cash or credit / debit POS. Visa might cost a lot, but it's questionably more than the maintenance of a lightning node.
We need more work on second layers.
We need more work on second layers.
Shower thought. What the developers of the Lightning Network should do - make all participants of the network emit less data to make everyone and their transactions more anonymous. If it's not going to be the "future of Bitcoin payments", make it function more privately and be a kind of privacy layer built on top of Bitcoin. I believe that would be more in-demand than faster transactions. Most of the users don't really mind the 10 minute confirm times in onchain transactions.
I think, hot hardware wallet, this term describes the mixture of hot wallet and hardware wallet. You can't call an NFC bitcoin card a hardware wallet because it's not as secure as hardware wallet but you can keep it in hardware that looks like a card. Google coolwallet and you'll understand what I mean.
For this reason, I believe that such services scam users, they give new descriptions of services that are not real, I searched for https://www.coolwallet.io and the least that can be described is garbage, it is a closed source wallet, there is no real explanation of what they are trying to provide Just collect as many terms as possible and name them with a new name, and the price is $149.
There is a hot wallet and a cold storage. Any service that mixes these two terms is scam unless proven otherwise.
Below I find a claim that charlie lee described as a good wallet and I can't find any corroboration of that claim, and a quote from changelly's CEO, changelly is scam enough to be an unreliable company, who is citing their statement?
They are actually the present in some parts of the world, like Germany.
Here you can see a Bitcoin LN POS terminal with a built-in thermal printer for the receipt, basically the same as fiat POS terminals.
source: https://twitter.com/SatoshiStoreio/status/1655855726928052224
As others have mentioned, the Bolt Cards are great for this. You don't need to have an account with the company, you can just buy them and they ship worldwide: https://www.coincorner.com/TheBoltCard
And you can setup your own Bolt Card Server since it's open source: https://github.com/boltcard/boltcard
Once you have the card (or similar device) and you setup your own server, you are ready to tap with lightning anywhere they have a compatible POS such as BTCPayServer, which supports NFC payments.
I wrote about this in the forum a while back: https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/native-lightning-bitcoin-payments-by-card-are-faster-than-visamastercard-5411251
Here you can see a Bitcoin LN POS terminal with a built-in thermal printer for the receipt, basically the same as fiat POS terminals.
source: https://twitter.com/SatoshiStoreio/status/1655855726928052224
As others have mentioned, the Bolt Cards are great for this. You don't need to have an account with the company, you can just buy them and they ship worldwide: https://www.coincorner.com/TheBoltCard
And you can setup your own Bolt Card Server since it's open source: https://github.com/boltcard/boltcard
Once you have the card (or similar device) and you setup your own server, you are ready to tap with lightning anywhere they have a compatible POS such as BTCPayServer, which supports NFC payments.
I wrote about this in the forum a while back: https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/native-lightning-bitcoin-payments-by-card-are-faster-than-visamastercard-5411251
I'm not exactly sure what mean, but The Bolt Card[2] roughly match what you described.
Bolt card is used in this video.Depends on whether the lightning network is the future of Bitcoin payments. I genuinely doubt. It's pretty limited unfortunately. Sure, it helps as fuck at the moment (especially at the moment), but technically and economically speaking, it isn't worth it for the vast majority of merchants which can be paid alternatively in cash or credit / debit POS. Visa might cost a lot, but it's questionably more than the maintenance of a lightning node.
We need more work on second layers.
As far as I understand, Lighting Network only helps you if you and 2nd person send coins often between each-other, otherwise, if it's only for one-time payment, you can't really save on fees because you have to close channel and that's the moment when you are pushed to pay fees.We need more work on second layers.
Just imagine, you have a hot hardware wallet that looks & functions like a contactless card and uses NFC technology to be able to pay with your hot wallet/card on Bitcoin POS terminal. And it's done though Lighting Network channel. Doesn't it sound cool?
Using the word hot hardware wallet is not correct, the idea of hardware wallet is that your seed is not connected to the internet, and the word hot wallet comes from the fact that the wallet is connected to the internet and is used over and over again.
Then hardware wallets are designed to be kept in a safe place, but you can use the lightning network on your phone and pay using the lightning network for your daily payments.
I really want to summon @o_e_l_e_o here, his opinion will be very interesting for everyone. I feel a little bit sad that you ignored this thread.
Obviously no. Anyone who research LN extensively or already use it would know LN limitation such as it's not really suitable if you rarely make/receive payment.
Isn't that with any method of payment. Like I said above.
Eliminating everything else, if you don't see a need for something or doing think it's going to improve your business, you are not going to do it. That really is where all these places like Square that process payments for credit cards come into play. If all a merchant has to do it click 'I Agree' a few times on the portal they already go to daily to check credit card processing things and be able to take BTC / LN / Crypto whatever then they are more likely to do it then jump though a bunch of hoops.
Bring it back to credit cards. Most legitimate places CAN get better rates then these terminal in a box services. But it's a lot of time and effort and paperwork and so on. Or you can pay the extra percentage and just get a terminal shipped to you. It dies, they ship another one, no jumping though hoops. Have a different issue, no having to deal with the CC processor, the bank, whoever else. It's 1 point of contact and done. So yes LN is going to benefit as these services start to put it in their terminals and let more merchants accept it with no other work needed.
-Dave
Just imagine, you have a hot hardware wallet that looks & functions like a contactless card and uses NFC technology to be able to pay with your hot wallet/card on Bitcoin POS terminal. And it's done though Lighting Network channel. Doesn't it sound cool?
Using the word hot hardware wallet is not correct, the idea of hardware wallet is that your seed is not connected to the internet, and the word hot wallet comes from the fact that the wallet is connected to the internet and is used over and over again.
Then hardware wallets are designed to be kept in a safe place, but you can use the lightning network on your phone and pay using the lightning network for your daily payments.
BTCPay Server works well as a Bitcoin POS terminal and all you need is a wallet in your phone that supports the Lightning Network and a QR code scan.
For Lightning NFC, this project is good because you can receive payments with a NFC tag and a Lightning Wallet https://github.com/theDavidCoen/LightningNFC/blob/main/README.md#send-payments-with-a-nfc-tag-and-a-btcpay-server-pos
NFC tag can be a card or a ring.
I still can't see how its better than using Mobile wallet since losing the card would allow any body make use of the card without been traced
If it occurs who would the person report to?
For the product mentioned above, it seems like you can disable the card if you lose it. You can also set a spending limit for each card[1], so somebody else won't be able to drain your money. If this becomes popular, I'm pretty sure other products will have more or less the same feature. The only upside of using cards like this is basically convenience. The target market is definitely the average joe instead of those who want more control over their money.If it occurs who would the person report to?
I still find having POS terminal for Bitcoin similar to traditional method of using third parties
Doesn't it depend on what payment gateway the merchant use? If they use a self-hosted and open-source payment gateway, I don't think you can say it is the same as a traditional fiat gateway. CMIIW.[1] https://support.coincorner.com/hc/en-us/articles/5749465410972-What-if-I-lose-my-Bolt-Card-
According to @ETFBitcoin a contactless card already exist the Bolt card by coincorner and the audience is pretty low
I still can't see how its better than using Mobile wallet since losing the card would allow any body make use of the card without been traced
If it occurs who would the person report to?
I still find having POS terminal for Bitcoin similar to traditional method of using third parties
This is like centralized exchanges acting like banks and issuing ATM's
The question should be are second layer network the future of Bitcoin payment? Lightning network won't be the only second layer network by then and besides by then the transactions made would be freaking high, can lightning network alone solve the scalability issue?
I still can't see how its better than using Mobile wallet since losing the card would allow any body make use of the card without been traced
If it occurs who would the person report to?
I still find having POS terminal for Bitcoin similar to traditional method of using third parties
This is like centralized exchanges acting like banks and issuing ATM's
The question should be are second layer network the future of Bitcoin payment? Lightning network won't be the only second layer network by then and besides by then the transactions made would be freaking high, can lightning network alone solve the scalability issue?
Depends on whether the lightning network is the future of Bitcoin payments. I genuinely doubt. It's pretty limited unfortunately. Sure, it helps as fuck at the moment (especially at the moment), but technically and economically speaking, it isn't worth it for the vast majority of merchants which can be paid alternatively in cash or credit / debit POS. Visa might cost a lot, but it's questionably more than the maintenance of a lightning node.
We need more work on second layers.
We need more work on second layers.
It could be good idea but after solving all the above stated intricacies one still need to achieve the marketing of these PoS machines. Plus who would be the authority to run these servers when these PoS machines are enforced in every shops and malls? Will there be a centralised authority who will provide the service for this. If yes, then how we can call it as decentralised way of paying things.
Idk, but let’s say PoS is being manufactured by one party, then all the set up and handling should be given in the hands of machine holder. Just like ASIC manufacturer in case of mining where miners is looking after all the set up and running.
Is this correct?
Idk, but let’s say PoS is being manufactured by one party, then all the set up and handling should be given in the hands of machine holder. Just like ASIC manufacturer in case of mining where miners is looking after all the set up and running.
Is this correct?
As block / others start deploying LN to their terminals it's probably going to be a done deal by just the amount of them that are out there.
Merchants are lazy, they just want to get paid they don't care how people pay.
So, if all they have to do is click 'I Agree' on the screen that pops up on their back end to and they can take LN, or any other form of payment they will probably do it.
Now, will they get crypto or just fiat transferred to them is a different story. And how much will said services charge. And so on.
Those going to be the main sticking points of adoption happening.
-Dave
Merchants are lazy, they just want to get paid they don't care how people pay.
So, if all they have to do is click 'I Agree' on the screen that pops up on their back end to and they can take LN, or any other form of payment they will probably do it.
Now, will they get crypto or just fiat transferred to them is a different story. And how much will said services charge. And so on.
Those going to be the main sticking points of adoption happening.
-Dave
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