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There are many things the author didn't think about. With Segregated Witness, the signatures don't need to be part of the 1MB block. Also for multi-sig we will

There are many things the author didn't think about. With Segregated Witness, the signatures don't need to be part of the 1MB block. Also for multi-sig we will be using aggregatable Schnorr signatures, so multi-sig won't take that much space. Still, the cost of an on-blockchain transaction will probably go up to $1000-10000 in current US dollars, so I believe even having an on-chain transaction will get too expensive for most people. For the short term lightning should be a relief though until the community can come up with the next scaling solutions (after implementing Mimblewimble as well)

the_stc 9y ago
>short term lightning Can you clarify what this means? Last I read, Lightning was 18 months out. But not really, that's just a number tossed to a crowd. The preview tech published a month ago is nowhere near being ready for use.
- xiphias 9y ago
  As far as I see from the github activity, now that SegWit is activated, the developers are putting much more effort to finishing. Anyways you're right that maybe I was a bit too optimistic. Bitcoin is getting popular as a store of value faster than it can handle the scale of being an easy-to-use currency. The blocksize drama will probably keep on going :(
  - the_stc 9y ago
    What does SW activation have to do with it? Why not have it ready to go, wait for the flip, enable. Or deploy it on a testnet. Or on LTC?
    - AgentME 9y ago
      People weren't even sure if SW was going to activate. Who wants to do a lot of work on a system (LN) that might not ever be usable?
- shazow 9y ago
  Indeed. The "18 months out" timeline has been around since the first draft of the Lightning Network paper, well over two years ago.
- rothbardrand 9y ago
  LN is actively being worked on, looking pretty good, and is estimated to be about a year from production. And that's just simple LN. Over the next 5 years LN has the potential to really explode in capability and capacity.
sordidasset 9y ago
>Still, the cost of an on-blockchain transaction will probably go up to $1000-10000 in current US dollars I have a btc holding in cold storage of ~$350. I value the security and control of controlling my private keys+being on the main, trustless, chain. I suspect many people have a similar situation. What are we to do when txn costs rise as you describe? I know plenty about the Bitcoin protocol, but I havent had time to do DD on Segwit or LN.
- wereHamster 9y ago
  The tx cost will rise in proportion to the value of BTC. By the time the tx cost is 10k USD, your roughly 0.08BTC will have a value of hundreds of thousands USD.
  - sp527 9y ago
    Umm what? Did you stop and read over what you just wrote? If transaction costs hit $10K, 0.08 BTC will be worth the same as 21M BTC: $0.
- rothbardrand 9y ago
  Don't worry. Transaction costs will not rise. If you aren't in a hurry, even old style transactions are free today... and 100sat/byte for next couple of blocks clearing. The entire "transaction fees are high" narrative is a combination of profitable miner spamming the system (to support the big blocker takeover narrative) and wallets having terrible fee estimation programs so that the wallet makers don't have to deal with the tech support when a transaction isn't in the very next block.
  - Steko 9y ago
    > Transaction costs will not rise. History does not support this claim. > If you aren't in a hurry Unfortunately almost all commerce is in a hurry.
rothbardrand 9y ago
It's completely absurd to say that transactions will be $10,000 when they are currently free, and we are nowhere near capacity, and Segwit hasn't even fully been adopted yet. The entire "high transaction fee" narrative is due to miners profitably spamming the network to drive up transaction fees -- which they could only do with ASICBOOST and pre-segwit.

the_stc 9y ago

>short term lightning Can you clarify what this means? Last I read, Lightning was 18 months out. But not really, that's just a number tossed to a crowd. The preview tech published a month ago is nowhere near being ready for use.

xiphias 9y ago
As far as I see from the github activity, now that SegWit is activated, the developers are putting much more effort to finishing. Anyways you're right that maybe I was a bit too optimistic. Bitcoin is getting popular as a store of value faster than it can handle the scale of being an easy-to-use currency. The blocksize drama will probably keep on going :(
- the_stc 9y ago
  What does SW activation have to do with it? Why not have it ready to go, wait for the flip, enable. Or deploy it on a testnet. Or on LTC?
  - AgentME 9y ago
    People weren't even sure if SW was going to activate. Who wants to do a lot of work on a system (LN) that might not ever be usable?
shazow 9y ago
Indeed. The "18 months out" timeline has been around since the first draft of the Lightning Network paper, well over two years ago.
rothbardrand 9y ago
LN is actively being worked on, looking pretty good, and is estimated to be about a year from production. And that's just simple LN. Over the next 5 years LN has the potential to really explode in capability and capacity.

sordidasset 9y ago

>Still, the cost of an on-blockchain transaction will probably go up to $1000-10000 in current US dollars I have a btc holding in cold storage of ~$350. I value the security and control of controlling my private keys+being on the main, trustless, chain. I suspect many people have a similar situation. What are we to do when txn costs rise as you describe? I know plenty about the Bitcoin protocol, but I havent had time to do DD on Segwit or LN.

wereHamster 9y ago
The tx cost will rise in proportion to the value of BTC. By the time the tx cost is 10k USD, your roughly 0.08BTC will have a value of hundreds of thousands USD.
- sp527 9y ago
  Umm what? Did you stop and read over what you just wrote? If transaction costs hit $10K, 0.08 BTC will be worth the same as 21M BTC: $0.
rothbardrand 9y ago
Don't worry. Transaction costs will not rise. If you aren't in a hurry, even old style transactions are free today... and 100sat/byte for next couple of blocks clearing. The entire "transaction fees are high" narrative is a combination of profitable miner spamming the system (to support the big blocker takeover narrative) and wallets having terrible fee estimation programs so that the wallet makers don't have to deal with the tech support when a transaction isn't in the very next block.
- Steko 9y ago
  > Transaction costs will not rise. History does not support this claim. > If you aren't in a hurry Unfortunately almost all commerce is in a hurry.

rothbardrand 9y ago

It's completely absurd to say that transactions will be $10,000 when they are currently free, and we are nowhere near capacity, and Segwit hasn't even fully been adopted yet. The entire "high transaction fee" narrative is due to miners profitably spamming the network to drive up transaction fees -- which they could only do with ASICBOOST and pre-segwit.