Topic: Is Lightning going to ensure Bitcoin dominance? (Read 386 times)

using LN you are in a contract with another entity. meaning they need to be online and in agreement just to authorise your IOU
using LN to pay random outsiders you rely on other entities that need to be online, in agreement, and funded

LN is not a push to destination. LN is a get parties to hot-potato their balances on your behalf


bitcoin is/was a digital cash source to destination one transfer.
LN  is like banking. where funds flow through the reserves of a local 'bank' then regional 'bank' the head office 'bank' then the destinations head bank, regional then local.. its why banks are identified by their 'routing/sort codes' so they can identify th path the funds need to route/sort through

LN is not new business idea/tech. its actually a very old business model. lock in gold make it sound like gold is expensive/slow to handle, offer some paper fast mthod of transfer but still try to persuade users not to settle back to real assets. if anything offer them other cheaper assets to exit via, such as nickel, copper coins

bitcoin's dominance has always came from the utilities that it offers people all around the world without needing any kind of third party or middlemen. and also the fact that bitcoin has always been one of a kind. and this will continue to be the case. things like lightning network that are added to bitcoin are always going to help improve it even further. so yes but it is more like saying in a race that the first person is far far ahead that others don't see him anymore, what can ensure his win!

The world is full of predictions! Especially in crypto there is a need to refrain the excitement because usually noyhing is rarely what it seems to be...
All crypto is on an experimental phase, and there is so much speculation and exageration that we are constantly building scenarios in our heads, some of them turn to be right, others don't. For me the LN is something more of a mith until is useable and working...
Then we'll be able to discuss... (besides, other projects are also developing, so who knows how crypto will look when LN is ready?)

I do not think so, I guess it solves the scalability of Bitcoin off chain but it can also be implemented to other Altcoin which can also do the same effect.  Aside from that LN as stated is still in development stage so a lot of experimentation and testing is require.  I won't rely on it for the dominance, probably a more in built blockchain accelerators will be created or proposed even before LN is fully tested.


Sounds discouraging to the point that it implores a total ignore on the blockchain technology.

Actually lightning technology has improved the transaction speed of bitcoin and hope to see far more developments to see a much more higher speed than present. Bitcoin will surely dominate but that is far fetch from now. We can only hope that in future if bitcoin is accepted by many countries lightning technology would have advanced to speed bitcoin transactions.

1. it still doesn't make what i said wrong!
2. same as 1 although it is a very questionable decision to create msat in my opinion.
3-4-5-6. it sounds like you are saying if there is a multi-coin wallet like Jaxx for example then since that wallet supports more coins then there is no difference between those coins! when you have bitcoin in your LN channel you have bitcoin in your LN channel not litecoin or vertcoin or... if you want those you have to exchange them with someone else who wants bitcoin in return.

the  code was written for bitcoin then LTC and a dozen other small altcoins pulled the code in their client from bitcoin and activated it because they were small and had no drama like bitcoin had.

wrong
1. LN uses HTLC's for payment not bitcoin CLTV's
2. the denomination(unit of account) of LN is Msat which is something bitcoin does not accept
3. LN can function with just swapping(hot potato) msats using lite wallets that do not api/RPC a blockchain
4. if you were to API/RPC a blockchain your node can use the chainhash of litecoin, vertcoin or others. not just btc

5. refer to point 4 above
6. LN is a single network where multiple nodes can communicate where ach node can designate a different chainhash, to allow swapping on the same network

LN was built and then bitcoin had to change and get a new tx format to be LN compatible. also litecoin added this tx format before bitcoin did, thus technically bitcoin copied litecoin

have a nice day

Lightning may ensure merchant acceptance for bitcoin and support other cryptocurrencies as well Lightening network pilot project with Amazon  will be major success

Dash and litecoin are in no way a threat to Bitcoin anyway. They don't have more or even the same amount of users even if they are combined. Moreover, like was rightly noted before in the thread, the Lightning Network is not exclusively built for Bitcoin. It can work with other Blockchains, and I have recently seen an article on LN application to Monero or something like that.
LN does not necessarily mean more Bitcoin followers, and bitcoiners don't widely recognize LN. This project is pretty interesting and successful, but it's not even a long-term solution to Bitcoin's problems.

it is second "layer" as in a layer that only works on top of another (main) layer which is the on chain bitcoin transactions. it is not for "many blockchains" instead it is designed and is working on top of bitcoin. but like many other things that bitcoin starts, other altcoins copy and run their own as they are doing now. that  doesn't change the fact that LN is a network built for and on top of bitcoin.

Bitcoin has always been dominance and will stay dominance as long as cryptocurrency is concerned. Have never use LTC and DASH, I only use ETH when I needed to quickly buy a token in a strong FA, lightening network will send many coins to oblivion. Some wallet will likely implement LN in the future.

I am also a fan of the Lightning Network, but there will always be room for Litecoin, especially when atomic swaps become available. On-chain transactions on the Litecoin blockchain are secure and they will be much cheaper than those on bitcoin. I see Litecoin having a complementary role, just as Charlie Lee envisaged.

I have used lightning network and as moccacino pointed out it is for smaller transactions like payment for coffee shops.

People would still look for altcoins that has smaller fees but lightning network is truly promising.

Summary
I am the original poster (OP). I would like to thank everyone who responded. I have learnt that Lightning Network is a Level 2 protocol that can work with many blockchains. It reduces fees and transaction times at the expense of some security. It is also very early days in its development and there is no guarantee that it will work at scale as its inventors hope.

The majority view seems to be that if Lightning Network works, and it is a big 'if', then it would, to some degree make altcoins slightly less attractive for smaller transactions as suggested by the original article but if you were selling something of high value like a car you are unlikely to object to the slightly higher fee and block time of the Bitcoin network.

I agree with you  lightning network despite it high technicality stiil remains the answers to the retail problems of bitcoin long block confirmation process, I don't agree on the third party involvement in the amazon bitcoin lightening process due to the fact that it will go through another medium before arriving at it final destination which is one of the things bitcoin try to avoid. But the fact still remains that if bitcoin lightening network is well improve on and can answer to the long confirmation process of bitcoin transaction the retail shopping will be easier for both the shops owner and they client.

Dash and Litecoin ARE pointless with or without lightning network. Dash is a centralized premined coin that their developers have always been shady about it and litecoin is a copy of bitcoin with no innovations other than lower time between blocks and pointless algorithm change to scrypt which achieved nothing.

the real competition of bitcoin is a coin with different technology that is innovative and not just copies bitcoin. and no, in my opinion LN is not a guarantee to ensure bitcoin dominance. but you have to realize that 95% of the current coins have no innovation and are so poorly designed that they can't even begin to compete with bitcoin so bitcoin already has more than 98% dominance over the market with LN it will turn into 99%!

Never said I wasn't for LN, as I'm definitely for it. My point was just that there are no guarantees for it's success.

Pretty much. The amount of people who think LN is only bitcoin's solution to the scaling problem is staggering. It's just the very tip of the iceberg.

Suite yourself, if your under weight and dont care to much about custodial (we are talking under .2BTC here) LN is doing just fine from my experience.
I'm gonna advocate it no matter what really.


But honestly even if LN somehow fails, it will have a successor based on the same concept (Layer 2) I believe Layer 2 IS the answer to the scaling problem, how the final execution will happen is beyond me.

A friend of mine told me he just hope's its worked out in the long run and LN will be to BTC what TCP is to the internet.

Nope, not guaranteed at all. Though the LN team and the LN wallet makers are definitely doing great and that I'm definitely hoping for LN's success, it's success rate is definitely NOT 100%. We simply don't know yet.

its not a bitcoin layer. LN is its own network.. the N of LN stands for network.
LN is not acronym'd BL2

IF and im being strong emphatic here. IF LN was a utility thats only sole function was to tender to bitcoin and actually catered to bitcoin alone. that would be a start to a whole different story.
also
IF and again strongly emphatic here IF LN when you run scenarios actually done what it proposes then it would be of benefit
LN is for a small niche utility which has not been met and at the moment wont be met. thus over promoted as some mass solution to bitcoin woes, even though bitcoins woes are caused by devs stifling bitcoin just to promote LN

there are many stats around like bitcoin UTXO stats, coinage which reveal how often people 'spend' bitcoin. even Visacard have statistics of how often people spend fiat. and if you put these spending habits against LN's scenarios. such as opening a group of channels(for efficient chance of route success) for a month. and work out the cost/utility benefit of saving in LN and the onramp tx utilisd to get in and out on bitcoins network. LN is not so 'infinite/instant/cheap'

i think too many people throw around buzzwords like LN, layers, scaling, but never actually bother using the systems/running scenario's. they just want to jump on the promo band wagon without actually knowing the details


in short. did bank promissory notes increase the adoption of gold. or actually decrease the number of gold hoarders, and instead increase the adoption of cheaper options like nickel and copper coins once people wished to settle up