No, the Lightning Network is a free and open payment network on top of the Bitcoin Network. It's a so called "layer 2" network (Bitcoin network being the layer

No, the Lightning Network is a free and open payment network on top of the Bitcoin Network. It's a so called "layer 2" network (Bitcoin network being the layer 1). Everyone can run a Lightning Network Node on e.g. a RaspberryPi. One opens "Channels" to other Nodes. Multiple nodes and channels build a network and can transfer Bitcoin/Satoshis for relatively little costs from A to B. Network nodes can charge a fee for routing payments (or data more generally speaking). There are different implementations of a Lightning Network node. LND is probably the most used one today. But there is also C-Lightning.