4 ms·

Like many, you’re not aware that the Lightning Network is on its way and will solve most of these issues. Moreover, transactions between Segwit-compatible wall

Like many, you’re not aware that the Lightning Network is on its way and will solve most of these issues. Moreover, transactions between Segwit-compatible wallets is pretty fast and cheap. I’m kind of tired to hear people complain about the fees while all they have to do is use a different wallet that supports Segwit. Edit: Ah, the downvotes. I was expecting them.

StavrosK 9y ago
My wallet does support Segwit. The recommended fee was $3 and it took ~15 minutes to confirm.
- tr4cefl0w 9y ago
  Segwit to Segwit? Because it’s less than a buck for me since beginning of november.
  - StavrosK 9y ago
    Hmm, good point, the recipient may not have been Segwit, I didn't notice. Hopefully Segwit transactions are cheaper, as you say, that would be very good news to me.
    - tr4cefl0w 9y ago
      They are and they will be even more. The bigger the Segwit adoption rate is, the lower the fees. The adoption still is under 50%, it was around 15-20% in October but it's getting there.
  - grapehut 9y ago
    It's irrelevant[1] what the receiver is using (for fees), segwit just makes it cheaper when sending a transaction. This is because it applies a discount to the signature data. [1] There's a few byte different depending on the output type (p2sh/p2wpkh/p2pkh) but it's pretty much negligible.
ufo 9y ago
Lightning network has been "around the corner" for as long as I remember... And even if it reduced people's needs to one bitcoin transaction per month (say, to deposit their paycheck), it would still reach full capacity with just 8 million users.
- tr4cefl0w 9y ago
  The alpha has been published in January. You can use it if you want, at your own risk. The devs are working hard and the beta is likely to come in 2018. People think naively than increasing the block size will change something. It will in the short or mid term, but not in the long term and you can't keep increasing the blocksize. There needs to be a permanent, well implemented solution and that's what's coming and why it's taking so long. Blocksize increase alone is not sustainable.
root_axis 9y ago
So the proposed solution for scaling bitcoin is to avoid use of the blockchain whenever possible.
- StavrosK 9y ago
  Sure, why not? The objective is "trustless, scalable, secure", not "using the blockchain at all costs".
Joeboy 9y ago
Maybe I don't fully understand it but from what I've gathered, the Lightning Network is a plan to enable people to do transactions outside of the main blockchain and eventually sync them back. It seems to get touted as a magical plan to solve Bitcoin's scaling problems, but unless I'm missing something (which tbf is very possible) it seems more like a plan for bitcoin to abrogate its primary original purpose of handling end-user transactions.
- tr4cefl0w 9y ago
  https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/7h1v54/comment/dqnj8r2?st=JAPLEMAO&sh=51f82bf4 https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/7h1v54/comment/dqn... This sums it up pretty well.
- em3rgent0rdr 9y ago
  Lightning Network seems to me to be a hybrid solution that uses the best of both worlds: the security and stability of the main block chain for the overall holding and occasional transfer of large amounts of wealth between large organizations, while having offchain networks to experiment with different solutions for handling lots of small transactions quickly, while address still bring compatible with the main block chain.
- prance 9y ago
  The thing you're missing is that in order to achieve scaling, Lightning Network sacrifices one of Bitcoin's main advantages, decentralization: https://medium.com/@jonaldfyookball/mathematical-proof-that-the-lightning-network-cannot-be-a-decentralized-bitcoin-scaling-solution-1b8147650800 https://medium.com/@jonaldfyookball/mathematical-proof-that-...

StavrosK 9y ago

My wallet does support Segwit. The recommended fee was $3 and it took ~15 minutes to confirm.

tr4cefl0w 9y ago
Segwit to Segwit? Because it’s less than a buck for me since beginning of november.
- StavrosK 9y ago
  Hmm, good point, the recipient may not have been Segwit, I didn't notice. Hopefully Segwit transactions are cheaper, as you say, that would be very good news to me.
  - tr4cefl0w 9y ago
    They are and they will be even more. The bigger the Segwit adoption rate is, the lower the fees. The adoption still is under 50%, it was around 15-20% in October but it's getting there.
- grapehut 9y ago
  It's irrelevant[1] what the receiver is using (for fees), segwit just makes it cheaper when sending a transaction. This is because it applies a discount to the signature data. [1] There's a few byte different depending on the output type (p2sh/p2wpkh/p2pkh) but it's pretty much negligible.

ufo 9y ago

Lightning network has been "around the corner" for as long as I remember... And even if it reduced people's needs to one bitcoin transaction per month (say, to deposit their paycheck), it would still reach full capacity with just 8 million users.

tr4cefl0w 9y ago
The alpha has been published in January. You can use it if you want, at your own risk. The devs are working hard and the beta is likely to come in 2018. People think naively than increasing the block size will change something. It will in the short or mid term, but not in the long term and you can't keep increasing the blocksize. There needs to be a permanent, well implemented solution and that's what's coming and why it's taking so long. Blocksize increase alone is not sustainable.

root_axis 9y ago

So the proposed solution for scaling bitcoin is to avoid use of the blockchain whenever possible.

StavrosK 9y ago
Sure, why not? The objective is "trustless, scalable, secure", not "using the blockchain at all costs".

Joeboy 9y ago

Maybe I don't fully understand it but from what I've gathered, the Lightning Network is a plan to enable people to do transactions outside of the main blockchain and eventually sync them back. It seems to get touted as a magical plan to solve Bitcoin's scaling problems, but unless I'm missing something (which tbf is very possible) it seems more like a plan for bitcoin to abrogate its primary original purpose of handling end-user transactions.

tr4cefl0w 9y ago
https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/7h1v54/comment/dqnj8r2?st=JAPLEMAO&sh=51f82bf4 https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/7h1v54/comment/dqn... This sums it up pretty well.
em3rgent0rdr 9y ago
Lightning Network seems to me to be a hybrid solution that uses the best of both worlds: the security and stability of the main block chain for the overall holding and occasional transfer of large amounts of wealth between large organizations, while having offchain networks to experiment with different solutions for handling lots of small transactions quickly, while address still bring compatible with the main block chain.
prance 9y ago
The thing you're missing is that in order to achieve scaling, Lightning Network sacrifices one of Bitcoin's main advantages, decentralization: https://medium.com/@jonaldfyookball/mathematical-proof-that-the-lightning-network-cannot-be-a-decentralized-bitcoin-scaling-solution-1b8147650800 https://medium.com/@jonaldfyookball/mathematical-proof-that-...