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Topic: The Lightning Network FAQ - page 47. (Read 33235 times)

legendary
Activity: 3500
Merit: 6320
Crypto Swap Exchange
March 20, 2021, 07:52:59 AM
I would not overly pay a fee for a feel good feeling.
If I believe a service is overcharging me for a transaction fee, I use another service.
That's why I stopped using Bitpay Wink My favourite nowadays is Coinpayments.net, which gives a bunch of options including LN and doesn't add an additional fee. But most services use something else.
If, however, a service offers LN payment, I prefer that service over anything else Smiley

Nominally OT here but coinpayments.net can at times have really crappy conversion rates.

I too use LN whenever possible. Do a lot of GC purchases at bitrefill.com and fold for stuff I need in the real world.
Have some channels pending open at the moment I just opened them with a low fee figuring they will open in the next few hours or overnight.
Then I can spend the next few weeks, or months if I keep the 'add to shopping cart' to a minimum.

The problem still is getting people to use it.
I even setup my own BTCPay server to take payments ( https://paydave.lightning.ninja/ ) and almost nobody used it so I stopped posting it when selling stuff here.
I thought that when I was doing some $1 raffles people would hop in and buy a ticket or two for a buck with lightning with the low fees but nope.

-Dave
legendary
Activity: 3290
Merit: 16489
Thick-Skinned Gang Leader and Golden Feather 2021
March 18, 2021, 01:47:04 PM
I would not overly pay a fee for a feel good feeling.
If I believe a service is overcharging me for a transaction fee, I use another service.
That's why I stopped using Bitpay Wink My favourite nowadays is Coinpayments.net, which gives a bunch of options including LN and doesn't add an additional fee. But most services use something else.
If, however, a service offers LN payment, I prefer that service over anything else Smiley
member
Activity: 266
Merit: 20
March 18, 2021, 12:53:15 PM
imagine the average product bought via LN was $2.
if someone has 4 channels with say $1650 per channel ($6600 total(average node/channel cap:1ml)
thats only 825 transactions possible per session per channel

with closing/reopening channels being ~$2x2. thats a $4 cost to run a channel.
to break even LN payment fees need to be $0.0049
Now imagine you buy the same $2 product using on-chain Bitcoin. You'll pay $12 in fees, and the payment service will charge you 0.0002 BTC (or more) because of their own consolidation costs. That's $24 in fees for a $2 product, and the transaction takes much longer.

I'll gladly pay whatever fees LN charges me. It's negligible compared to on-chain transactions.


I would not overly pay a fee for a feel good feeling.
If I believe a service is overcharging me for a transaction fee, I use another service.

For a $2 product, the only economic options in crypto for me are either
using coinbase offchain transaction to another coinbase user without being charged any transaction fees.
Speed is Instant
or
using an altcoin like Dogecoin where the transaction fee is less than 5 cents.
Speed is 1 minute
legendary
Activity: 2898
Merit: 1823
March 18, 2021, 09:11:14 AM

and so the hop model fails and the hub-spoke banker model prevails


I have already mentioned, and have always thought that it might have been better for the Lightning Network if it was to be boot-strapped, and started off under a hub and spoke model, than chase the decentralized route. They point here is to increase funcionality for Bitcoin, but without sacrificing decentralization.
legendary
Activity: 3290
Merit: 16489
Thick-Skinned Gang Leader and Golden Feather 2021
March 18, 2021, 05:14:37 AM
imagine the average product bought via LN was $2.
if someone has 4 channels with say $1650 per channel ($6600 total(average node/channel cap:1ml)
thats only 825 transactions possible per session per channel

with closing/reopening channels being ~$2x2. thats a $4 cost to run a channel.
to break even LN payment fees need to be $0.0049
Now imagine you buy the same $2 product using on-chain Bitcoin. You'll pay $12 in fees, and the payment service will charge you 0.0002 BTC (or more) because of their own consolidation costs. That's $24 in fees for a $2 product, and the transaction takes much longer.

I'll gladly pay whatever fees LN charges me. It's negligible compared to on-chain transactions.

Why do you hate LN so much? The existence of LN doesn't stop you from using on-chain Bitcoin at high fees.

Quote
but for emphasis. the reality is the hop ideal of utopian freedom wont flourish. the hub/spoke banker model will
I don't mind Smiley
legendary
Activity: 2898
Merit: 1823
March 17, 2021, 11:25:10 PM
I theory there shouldn't be any net loss as the inbound/outbound values should tally up to the same values.

In saying that, I like the abacus analogy where one/some of the counters are shifted from one side of the rod to the other.


using a abacus idea..
the issue is

before: A|ooo-----| D |ooo-----| B
after:   A|-----ooo| D |-----ooo| B

although D has 'ooo'.. somewhere
D cant then spend his own funds to B direct anymore..
so other people have now locked him out of D->B
and if he wanted to pay B he has to go back through A and hope A has another path around to reach B
A-Z-Y-X-W-V-U-T-S-R-Q-P-O-N-M-L-K-J-I-H-G-F-E-C-B

well if A had to go through D then chances are A hasnt got another path. or if they do its obviously going to cost more, else A woulda used it in the first place

so now D has to close channels and re-aggregate the 2 channels back in his favour of the path D prefers.

so its not the fantasy promotion that 'it dont matter' or 'there shouldnt be any net loss' because it will actually now cost D more to do anything either round-routing backwards or re-aggregating channels onchain

i know i know some fangirls will sat D just has to man up and reroute backwards at the higher fee(IF A had alternative route) and send 'ooo' to B and then get B to send 'ooo' back to D via that reroute.. saying doing that will still be cheaper than onchain re-aggregating..

but thats the hope method. not the guarantee method. you hope A has a back way round to B

so again. might be best you dont allow big players route through you too much.
and yea think about your own investment. and not the wishes of other players hoping they can abuse your path
or it will cost you in the long run.

many fangirls dont care about your own situation they just want people to put in high liquidity so that THEY can take advantage.


That’s why I believe, besides the limited capital consideration, with the specialization that comes in running a Lightning node, and maintaining channels, the node operators will be requiring higher fees if LN is adopted as one of the main payment systems for Bitcoin. It would be very debatable if the fees will always be lower than centralized altcoins.
legendary
Activity: 3290
Merit: 16489
Thick-Skinned Gang Leader and Golden Feather 2021
March 17, 2021, 02:54:11 AM
so other people have now locked him out of D->B
and if he wanted to pay B he has to go back through A and hope A has another path around to reach B
Or it could be the other way around, and routing other transaction created liquidity right where the node owner needed it. If a node doesn't want to route transactions in a certain direction, they can simply raise routing fees up to the point that makes it worth their while again.

Quote
but thats the hope method. not the guarantee method. you hope A has a back way round to B
I'm not running a node, but I gladly pay a small fee to nodes who provide me the routing I need to make a payment. I also hope LN improves in the future.
I've had transactions that couldn't instantly be sent, but it always worked a bit later again. I consider this LN growing pains, and I hope it will go away eventually.

Quote
many fangirls
You're not helping your credibility by talking about "fangirls".
legendary
Activity: 1568
Merit: 6660
bitcoincleanup.com / bitmixlist.org
March 17, 2021, 02:13:52 AM
I'm trying to understand what's happening in this:

before: A|ooo-----| D |ooo-----| B
after:   A|-----ooo| D |-----ooo| B

According to that diagram "D" has routed funds to "B" do technically they aren't his anymore, right? Or am I missing something?

I can't seem to find where D is locked out of his "ooo" funds since it looks like they are at B already.

The "after" funds that A sent to D are locked in (according to my understanding) but they aren't to be sent to B.
legendary
Activity: 3696
Merit: 2219
💲🏎️💨🚓
March 16, 2021, 06:35:38 AM
I theory there shouldn't be any net loss as the inbound/outbound values should tally up to the same values.

In saying that, I like the abacus analogy where one/some of the counters are shifted from one side of the rod to the other.
member
Activity: 266
Merit: 20
March 15, 2021, 11:10:14 PM
Not complaining just trying to understand why people are doing some things and if what I am doing to facilitate them doing it is the proper way.

-Dave


Question,
does the big players using your hub as part of their hops drain your funds or require you to add more locked BTC to keep your hub running?

legendary
Activity: 3934
Merit: 3190
Leave no FUD unchallenged
March 15, 2021, 07:13:30 AM
im guessing this tactic means DaveF has to close his channels and reaggregate his funds into new channels quite often if they are pushing payments via him so often. (well more often than he likes as he seems to be complaining that he is being used as a middleman)

maybe he should up his fees.. to take advantage of his predicament.. or sway them away from using him as a middleman

Not complaining just trying to understand why people are doing some things and if what I am doing to facilitate them doing it is the proper way.

-Dave

It's probably not worth the effort providing justification for your choices to the resident LN Troll-in-Chief there.  They won't accept it anyway, it contradicts the voices in their head who tell them what to do.  He's a headcase. 
There are some who just despise the fact that people are free to use LN if they choose to, so they feel the need to seize every opportunity to attack it.  Nothing will placate them.  

It certainly looks as though you're doing things properly.  You simply happened to be the most economical route available on this occasion.  It's possible, if they've been sending lots of payments recently, that some of the other channels they've used previously are now unbalanced and don't have sufficient capacity to route anything else at the moment.
 
Keep doing what you're doing.  Your very existence proves franky1's false narratives wrong.  You don't have to be one of the "big players" to contribute.  Individuals are just as important to the overall utility and usability of the network.
legendary
Activity: 3290
Merit: 16489
Thick-Skinned Gang Leader and Golden Feather 2021
March 15, 2021, 06:51:29 AM
maybe he should up his fees.. to take advantage of his predicament.. or sway them away from using him as a middleman
It didn't strike me as if DaveF has a problem with this, he's just curious why it happens. I'd say this is exactly how LN is supposed to work, so let them! They pay a 1 sat fee for each transaction, I don't see a problem there Smiley

if what I am doing to facilitate them doing it is the proper way.
Seems okay to me. If they didn't appreciate your service, they wouldn't use it.
legendary
Activity: 3500
Merit: 6320
Crypto Swap Exchange
March 15, 2021, 06:31:27 AM
and there was the LN naive community thinking that middlemen were not suppose to know the sender/receiver of long routes. or of any route (promotion:private untracable untrackable network)
strange because he seems to be able to see and log all payments not meant for him personally(he not intended final destination)
That's how it works I know this provider paid that provider.
I have no idea if coingate was the 1st hop or the 7th hop
I have no idea if WoS is the final destination or it goes past that.
I also know nothing about the payment other than the amount.

im guessing DaveF has a direct channel with coingate and a direct channel with walletsofsatoshi. and thus he is their direct route to each other.
im guessing DaveF didnt turn off his autopilot or didnt turn off his 'routing' to not allow them to abuse him

Yes to the 1st
No autopilot I setup all my channels myself and routing payments is no big deal, just odd that 2 of the larger providers would need me.

im guessing this tactic means DaveF has to close his channels and reaggregate his funds into new channels quite often if they are pushing payments via him so often. (well more often than he likes as he seems to be complaining that he is being used as a middleman)

maybe he should up his fees.. to take advantage of his predicament.. or sway them away from using him as a middleman

Not complaining just trying to understand why people are doing some things and if what I am doing to facilitate them doing it is the proper way.

-Dave
legendary
Activity: 3500
Merit: 6320
Crypto Swap Exchange
March 14, 2021, 09:26:02 PM
OK, this is just really odd now.
Back in January I posted about a bunch of small repeated transactions being routed though my node from walletofsatoshi.com to opennode.com
https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/m.56082955
Just a bit of oddness.
Earlier this month I had a bunch going from coingate to walletofsatoshi.com


Now all 3 of these node are major players in the lightning world. All are in the top 20 nodes in terms of capacity.
They are all also fairly well connected.

Why would they be routing through me #3700+ in terms of capacity and worse then that for just about every other lightning ranking too?

Just really odd. From Bob's home node to Alice's home node fine. But big players? Weird.

-Dave

legendary
Activity: 3500
Merit: 6320
Crypto Swap Exchange
February 22, 2021, 07:14:05 AM
I keep getting a "bandwidth exhausted" notice every time I try to open a channel via Zap to this node:

Code:
0331f80652fb840239df8dc99205792bba2e559a05469915804c08420230e23c7c@34.200.181.109:9735

It's a fresh install of the latest Zap (and my bandwidth is OK) so there shouldn't be any issues.



(I'm trying to open a channel for BTC 0.0026 plus tx fees)

What LN node do you have Zap connected to?
The only time I have seen that error it was a node.js issue and had nothing to do with the actual problem.
Something else was causing an issue and node went into a loop, sorry I can't help more but you might want to take a look at your LN install more then the wallet.

-Dave
legendary
Activity: 3696
Merit: 2219
💲🏎️💨🚓
February 21, 2021, 10:28:49 PM
I keep getting a "bandwidth exhausted" notice every time I try to open a channel via Zap to this node:

Code:
0331f80652fb840239df8dc99205792bba2e559a05469915804c08420230e23c7c@34.200.181.109:9735

It's a fresh install of the latest Zap (and my bandwidth is OK) so there shouldn't be any issues.



(I'm trying to open a channel for BTC 0.0026 plus tx fees)
legendary
Activity: 1568
Merit: 6660
bitcoincleanup.com / bitmixlist.org
February 16, 2021, 08:16:24 AM
The lightning network whitepaper (the one you can download from lightning.network) says this, in chapter 5 page 41:

Quote
...
For instance, Alice pre-generates one million keys, each key being a child of the previous key. Alice allocates which keys to use according to some deterministic manner. For example, she starts with the child deepest in the tree to generate many sub-keys for day 1. This key is used as a master key for all keys generated on day 1. She gives Bob the address she wishes to use for the next transaction, and discloses the private key to Bob when it becomes invalidated. When Alice discloses to Bob all private keys derived from the day 1 master key and does not wish to continue using that master key, she can disclose the day 1 master key to Bob. At this point, Bob does not need to store all the keys derived from the day 1 master key. Bob does the same for Alice and gives her his day 1 key.
When all Day 2 private keys have been exchanged, for example by day 5, Alice discloses her Day 2 key...

Is there any particular reason why the keys used are grouped by day with no structure of the derivation path? Instead of several hundred keys that look like m/0, m/1, ... m/1000 and then having to store state about which keys were used in what days, wouldn't it be better to use different paths each time a new RSMC is made?

Giving an example using the whitepaper's terminology, C1a&b, and all HLTCs branching off of them, use path m'/1'/i', C2 uses m'/2'/i', and so on. The hardened derivation is so that keys used in other contracts cannot be guessed if one is leaked, or in this case, intentionally revealed (which is a flaw in using the first kind of paths above).

Do any LN clients actually follow the whitepaper and make contracts using keys grouped per day, or do they use different paths for different contracts as I described?
legendary
Activity: 1876
Merit: 3132
February 15, 2021, 04:47:21 PM
With all of that being said, it might not be you but the ACINQ channel itself. I have had several issues with them in the past, and actually stopped connecting to them. Fold, WalletofSatoshi, OpenNode, Coingate. No issues at all. ACINQ was....not fine.

I ended up closing my channel with ACINQ and opening a new one to LightningPowerUsers.com. I can't perform a loop out for that channel as well as for the CoinGate one. I will try opening a channel to one of the Loop's peers. I am also thinking about opening a large channel to Loop so that other people could balance their channels through me.
legendary
Activity: 2898
Merit: 1823
February 15, 2021, 01:31:40 AM
If found this website for explaining Channel Capacity in the Lightning Network, https://channelcapacity.io/

Post/share it around the forum, especially when there’s FUD that “Lightning transactions are IOUs”. Lightning is actually the REAL DeFi, once fully understood.

legendary
Activity: 3500
Merit: 6320
Crypto Swap Exchange
February 14, 2021, 06:21:33 PM
Has anyone here experimented with the Lightning Lab's Loop? It worked fine for a node with only a couple of channels, but it failed for my channel with ACINQ which is significantly better connected to the rest of the network. I recall having some routing problems in the past when my channel to them was the only one I had. I am about to open a few more channels since the transaction fees have decreased significantly. I will report back once I try "loop out" on them tomorrow.

Tried and failed with ACINQ too.
Did not put that much time into it as the one it was on was a somewhat wonky setup and figured it was just me.
Also, I am constantly tinkering with my channels to find what I think would be good, so automating swaps / loops was not high on my list to do.

With all of that being said, it might not be you but the ACINQ channel itself. I have had several issues with them in the past, and actually stopped connecting to them. Fold, WalletofSatoshi, OpenNode, Coingate. No issues at all. ACINQ was....not fine.

-Dave
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