3 ms·
Lightning Network is a system that merges a collection of transactions over so called payment channels to an LN hub into one on-chain transaction. It is designe
by Natanael_L 11y ago
Lightning Network is a system that merges a collection of transactions over so called payment channels to an LN hub into one on-chain transaction. It is designed to add as few trust requirements as possible vs using standard transactions (a multisignature model is used with the hub to prevent any possibility of direct theft, as one example of a security mechanism).
The idea is that your wallet commits a number of coins to a payment channel at one hub, and then payments to and from other LN users are routed along payment channels across hubs. This means less blockchain bloat, faster verification (you trust the hub to not sign conflicting transactions, because doing so is proud of fraud valid in court and kills their reputation in 5 seconds) and cheap transactions.
It still needs larger blocks, because adding funds to payment channels and taking funds out of then requires on-chain transactions. With millions of users, 1MB isn't enough.
- javert 11y agoThis is quite helpful, but it does not answer the question of why they don't switch to larger blocks now if most of the devs are in favor of it. You also have to get the users to switch, in particular miners and exchanges, so therein may lie part of the answer. But I suspect those people will generally follow what the devs recommend. I thought some of the big Chinese miners had said they would accept switching to 8MB blocks. So why hasn't the switch been made?
- maaku 11y agoEveryone is in favor of increasing the block size at some point. One side is simply being more conservative / less reckless and trying to make sure that the right proposal is accepted, rather than the first implemented. They are organizing a series of workshops on this topic: http://scalingbitcoin.org/ http://scalingbitcoin.org/