Lightning doesn´t solve the scaling problem

[aliashraf]

It is truly sad, watching this thread being saturated by the same material rehashed again and again about block size even though poor op has explicitly expressed his concern about on-chain scaling as a general requirement and not the old debunked block-size debate.

It is more than obvious that block-size increase worsens  centralization because of propagation delay consequences, it has been discussed over and over and people who are not convinced about the path bitcoin core has taken can stick with BCH and put their money and hopes there, period.

But OP has brought up a legitimate concern here: LN is not an ultimate scaling solution while bitcoin adoption is an emerging situation and scaling is needed asap, as a person who has newly joined this community, OP has every right to ask whether there is such a vision at all or not.

@ETFbitcoin has made the best contribution so far but his classification of minor improvements like Schnorr as a scaling solution or proposing "mild" and conservative block size increase as such, is not satisfying enough, imo.

OP,
What you need to know about the situation with the most critical problems in the bitcoin sphere, topics like scaling and centralization and privacy is the fact that we suffer from a conservatist mindset that is only concerned about the security of bitcoin whales. It is an obvious divergence from the original revolutionary spirit that bitcoin was born with. Where there is no spirit, talent is a rare resource.

I'll share more on this thread soon.

[DooMAD]

OP,
What you need to know about the situation with the most critical problems in the bitcoin sphere, topics like scaling and centralization and privacy is the fact that we suffer from a conservatist mindset that is only concerned about the security of bitcoin whales. It is an obvious divergence from the original revolutionary spirit that bitcoin was born with. Where there is no spirit, talent is a rare resource.

Bottom line:  Individuals can be as revolutionary as they like, but aren't in a position to force their ideas on others.  The onus is on those with new ideas to make a compelling case and convince a sufficient proportion of those securing the network to implement any new proposals.

Some would say it's only a "problem" for those who want to implement half-baked ideas.

[NotATether]

But OP has brought up a legitimate concern here: LN is not an ultimate scaling solution while bitcoin adoption is an emerging situation and scaling is needed asap, as a person who has newly joined this community, OP has every right to ask whether there is such a vision at all or not.

Lightning Network's specification is not finished yet so if people want to they can go about proposing their modifications to the relevant mailing lists and make a reference client and those ideas that get enough support will also be added to it's specification. We aren't stuck with however LN has been defined now.

In fact the authors even say themselves that this is a work in progress:

Lightning Network In-Progress Specifications

The specifications are currently a work-in-progress and currently being drafted.

Pull requests and comments welcome, seeking input from community stakeholders.

Discussion available on the lighting-dev mailing list.

You're welcome to go to that mailing list and propose what you feel like should be changed (bringing code with you always makes you more welcomed in a room full of programmers).

[aliashraf]

OP,
What you need to know about the situation with the most critical problems in the bitcoin sphere, topics like scaling and centralization and privacy is the fact that we suffer from a conservatist mindset that is only concerned about the security of bitcoin whales. It is an obvious divergence from the original revolutionary spirit that bitcoin was born with. Where there is no spirit, talent is a rare resource.

Bottom line:  Individuals can be as revolutionary as they like, but aren't in a position to force their ideas on others.  The onus is on those with new ideas to make a compelling case and convince a sufficient proportion of those securing the network to implement any new proposals.

Some would say it's only a "problem" for those who want to implement half-baked ideas.

FYI:

In 2017, through our communication with Scaling Bitcoin sponsors and event participants about what problems they are experiencing that Scaling Bitcoin should focus on, we have received one message repeatedly - "Lack of talent".

[DooMAD]

FYI:

In 2017, through our communication with Scaling Bitcoin sponsors and event participants about what problems they are experiencing that Scaling Bitcoin should focus on, we have received one message repeatedly - "Lack of talent".

While I don't doubt that your belief in that nonsense probably helps soothe your own glaring inadequacies and astounding lack of success in this field, the point remains that however talented someone might be, they still can't force a change in Bitcoin that other participants aren't willing to accept.

[Chlotide]

All I have to say is this: Developer explains why the Lighting Network does scale BTC - Rene Pickhardt

[squatter]

How will the onboarding process look like? If a new person wants to buy BTC, they can't even send the BTC from the exchange to their own wallet because the mempool is always on his limit.

What limit is that?

Should exchanges also trade LBTC only in the future?

What they should do is support customer LN deposits and withdrawals. And more importantly, exchanges should open payment channels with one another since customers withdrawing from exchange to exchange is a huge source of network congestion. Take it all off chain!

But OP has brought up a legitimate concern here: LN is not an ultimate scaling solution while bitcoin adoption is an emerging situation and scaling is needed asap, as a person who has newly joined this community, OP has every right to ask whether there is such a vision at all or not.

I fail to see the urgency. Many people will complain that Bitcoin is somewhat inefficient and expensive to use -- but that's by design.

we suffer from a conservatist mindset that is only concerned about the security of bitcoin whales.

It's not about protecting Bitcoin whales. It's about exercising duty of care.

[Wind_FURY]

It is truly sad, watching this thread being saturated by the same material rehashed again and again about block size even though poor op has explicitly expressed his concern about on-chain scaling as a general requirement and not the old debunked block-size debate.

OP criticizes LN. Fair. But doesn't bring on a debate about on-chain scaling/block size increase. What is his solution.

It is more than obvious that block-size increase worsens  centralization because of propagation delay consequences, it has been discussed over and over and people who are not convinced about the path bitcoin core has taken can stick with BCH and put their money and hopes there, period.

Or Dogecoin.

But OP has brought up a legitimate concern here: LN is not an ultimate scaling solution while bitcoin adoption is an emerging situation and scaling is needed asap, as a person who has newly joined this community, OP has every right to ask whether there is such a vision at all or not.

Would you want Bitcoin to, be secure and robust, and to run as a multi-generational protocol without downtime for many years, OR, let the Core developers take risks to increase transaction throughput amd accept the security tradeoffs?

[aliashraf]

But OP has brought up a legitimate concern here: LN is not an ultimate scaling solution while bitcoin adoption is an emerging situation and scaling is needed asap, as a person who has newly joined this community, OP has every right to ask whether there is such a vision at all or not.

Would you want Bitcoin to, be secure and robust, and to run as a multi-generational protocol without downtime for many years, OR, let the Core developers take risks to increase transaction throughput amd accept the security tradeoffs?

I think it is an artificial trade-off made-up by PoS advocates for denouncing bitcoin scalability potentials the infamous Trilemma suggested by Vitalik Buterin is an example of such false claims. There is no reason to give-up with bitcoin as a promising technology for the future of monetary systems.

Some people try to make it look better by suggesting weird ideas such as "bitcoin as the world reserve currency" which is the worst stupid claim ever. It is not even a technical term, reserve currency! Absolute BS!

Bitcoin is designed to be a "p2p electronic cash", anybody who claims otherwise does not belong to this movement. Holding bitcoin or not, having contributed to bitcoin development or not, being old hand or brand new, ... people have no right to redefine bitcoin, it has been defined already by its founder as a p2p electronic cash system.

I've been working on it for a long time and I think before any further technical debates we need hope and commitment to the cause (check my signature). Once there is enough spirit, I assure you, there are lots of ideas and proposals to start with, I got a few myself, others may have more and better proposals to put forward, but as long as there are negative attitude and reckless accusations in favor of blind conservatism, I personally prefer to do it privately on my own budget rather than putting myself in the risk of being smeared or even accused of committing fraud, etc. by people who feel no responsibility other than covering up for fringe ideas and interpretations of bitcoin: World reserve currency! Digital gold! blah, blah, blah

Once we are strong enough to overcome this smear campaigns, proving our legitimacy and power bitcoin will find its way out of this stall situation and it will be crystal clear that PoW and bitcoin are far beyond a simple technology for producing and storing some kind of digital asset! The cheapest interpretation of bitcoin ever.

[PrimeNumber7]

LN can facilitate and is useful for micro-transactions, but this is not the only use case for LN. LN can be used for transactions of any size, provided there is sufficient LN network capacity.

True, but is it practical to send big amount of BTC through LN? I doubt many people would lock big amount of BTC on LN channel and finding routing would be near impossible.

Today it is unusual for large amounts of coin to be locked up in LN channels. I don't think this will be true forever, especially as more merchants/businesses start to accept payments via LN.

I would also hope that in the future, payments can be split up via multiple routes if there was insufficient capacity via any one route.

[Wind_FURY]

But OP has brought up a legitimate concern here: LN is not an ultimate scaling solution while bitcoin adoption is an emerging situation and scaling is needed asap, as a person who has newly joined this community, OP has every right to ask whether there is such a vision at all or not.

Would you want Bitcoin to, be secure and robust, and to run as a multi-generational protocol without downtime for many years, OR, let the Core developers take risks to increase transaction throughput amd accept the security tradeoffs?

I think it is an artificial trade-off made-up by PoS advocates for denouncing bitcoin scalability potentials the infamous Trilemma suggested by Vitalik Buterin is an example of such false claims. There is no reason to give-up with bitcoin as a promising technology for the future of monetary systems.

Some people try to make it look better by suggesting weird ideas such as "bitcoin as the world reserve currency" which is the worst stupid claim ever. It is not even a technical term, reserve currency! Absolute BS!

Bitcoin is designed to be a "p2p electronic cash", anybody who claims otherwise does not belong to this movement. Holding bitcoin or not, having contributed to bitcoin development or not, being old hand or brand new, ... people have no right to redefine bitcoin, it has been defined already by its founder as a p2p electronic cash system.

I've been working on it for a long time and I think before any further technical debates we need hope and commitment to the cause (check my signature). Once there is enough spirit, I assure you, there are lots of ideas and proposals to start with, I got a few myself, others may have more and better proposals to put forward, but as long as there are negative attitude and reckless accusations in favor of blind conservatism, I personally prefer to do it privately on my own budget rather than putting myself in the risk of being smeared or even accused of committing fraud, etc. by people who feel no responsibility other than covering up for fringe ideas and interpretations of bitcoin: World reserve currency! Digital gold! blah, blah, blah

Once we are strong enough to overcome this smear campaigns, proving our legitimacy and power bitcoin will find its way out of this stall situation and it will be crystal clear that PoW and bitcoin are far beyond a simple technology for producing and storing some kind of digital asset! The cheapest interpretation of bitcoin ever.

I'm confused. You're not in agreement with the idea that larger blocks will centralize the validators? Using that question as the premise, so an unlimited block size, and leaving the decision of "how large" to the miners, would be OK?

[aliashraf]

I'm confused. You're not in agreement with the idea that larger blocks will centralize the validators? Using that question as the premise, so an unlimited block size, and leaving the decision of "how large" to the miners, would be OK?

It is generally true that any scaling solution eventually needs the network to be capable of processing orders of magnitude more transactions, hence a larger block capacity, but it doesn't mean that a simple block size increase should be counted as such a solution, actually it is not for the same reason that putting a "trusted" entity in charge of validating blocks is not a scaling solution for bitcoin although both could help with throughput.

I've been insisting on it for a long time: scaling bitcoin and decentralization of mining are different presentations of a same problem. To have a more convincing picture of my reasoning behind this claim, just take another look at what you wrote above: In the same sentence that you are legitimately expressing doubts about block size increase as a scaling solution, you raise alarms about putting miners in charge of the bitcoin. But why should anybody be concerned about it? As of the original design principles of bitcoin, miners are the ones that should be in charge, aren't they?  

Isn't it all about the current situation with pools and the infamous centralized mining scene of bitcoin that boosts this (legitimate) concern about putting miners in charge?
Sure it is.
Suppose, in a hypothetical parallel world we have bitcoin being directly mined by tens of thousands of people with a flat pyramid of distribution of power, now imagine that we have a mysterious solution for increasing the throughput without disrupting such a mining scene (i.e. not sharpening the pyramid), now would there be any concern about whether miners are in charge or not? Sure not.

So, a true solution for the scaling problem in bitcoin is/should-be a decentralization of mining solution at the same time and vice versa.

[hv_]

So we raise the block size to 8mb and then what do we do whenever that isn't enough? I am not against reducing or limiting the scaling problem by increasing block size but it doesn't really solve anything, no matter what you do, you can never beat the ordinary system in terms of speed and cost, blockchain is slow and expensive, this isn't exactly an issue it's more like some of its main characteristics, Paypal payments that are done on one server or a few at most will always outperform blockchain at its main layer, this isn't my opinion it's just how things are, saving a transaction on tens of thousands of computers isn't suppose to be faster and cheaper than visa or PayPal.


The second point which I feel the need to explain since you mentioned that you are from Germany which also goes to folks in the U.S and the other first-world countries, the internet is decades behind in most other places, where I live even with the current block size only a few people can run a full node or directly mine to their own node, 1MB of bandwidth is a big deal here, it's hard to believe because you just pay a fraction of your salary for a 100mbps or even 500mbps connection with unlimited quota, but elsewhere, you can hardly get a 1mbps line with very limited monthly quota, as it stands now, I can't even propagate a 1MB block in a timely manner. By increasing the block size you simply send many players out of the game.

Another point is the fact that your transaction will be saved on tens of thousands of computers and it would take years and billions of dollars to re-do the blockchain, it really has to come at a cost, getting your transaction on the blockchain is more secured than saving your money in the safety deposit boxes at your local bank, it is worth a lot, and someone has got to pay for it,  and at the end of the day, why would you want your 1$ transaction to be saved on the main layer?

One last thing, let's assume we solved the issue of block size, what about confirmation time? say the transaction fee is zero due to unlimited block size, will you be able to pay for coffee when relying only on the main layer? will the shop wait for 10 or 20 minutes until the transaction is confrimed before serving you coffee?

Plus the big blockers have lost the idea of Bitcoin's main value proposition, not speed, but Censorship-resistance. Which requires the network to scale out to be more secure. And it is better to go for more security than less security.

Just all those claims stay unproven

Regulation helps to stay secure over long time

not try to hide - that is proven

[DooMAD]

Isn't it all about the current situation with pools and the infamous centralized mining scene of bitcoin that boosts this (legitimate) concern about putting miners in charge?
Sure it is.
Suppose, in a hypothetical parallel world we have bitcoin being directly mined by tens of thousands of people with a flat pyramid of distribution of power, now imagine that we have a mysterious solution for increasing the throughput without disrupting such a mining scene (i.e. not sharpening the pyramid), now would there be any concern about whether miners are in charge or not? Sure not.

So, a true solution for the scaling problem in bitcoin is/should-be a decentralization of mining solution at the same time and vice versa.

Yes, we're familiar with your elaborate and well-devised solution of closing the gate after the horse has bolted.  You've mentioned it enough times already.  I assume the reason you keep bringing it up is due to the part where you're still no closer to making it happen?  How long do you envision it will take before you actually manage to get the ball rolling on this distant pipe dream?

This is not a recent occurrence.  It didn't suddenly sneak up on us over the last couple of weeks.  The reliance on full non-mining nodes to offset mining centralisation happened years ago.  This is simply how the network evolved to deal with the circumstances of the introduction of pools, GPU mining, ASICs, etc.  A vast majority of the people involved in Bitcoin today joined long after all this was set in motion.  Whether you're happy with the level of mining centralisation or not, this is the value proposition lots of people have signed up for.  Which would appear to indicate that people are generally satisfied with the "current situation".  To believe you can just step in and course-correct at such a fundamental level (while also assuming that everyone who is currently involved in Bitcoin will trust such an enormous shift in network governance and happily go along with it when no one can make any guarantees about the outcome) is just blind egotism on your part.  

You talk about it as though it's such a simple and minor tweak.  It just sounds delusional.  Not to mention the part where the fact that the network did evolve this way should serve as proof enough that economic pressures dictate equal distribution of mining in PoW doesn't work.  It was a reasonable assumption at the time the whitepaper was written.  But we now know the theory was flawed.  We tried it already.  It failed.  The subsequent adaptation proved more resilient.  Nothing since then, in any coin, has come close to matching the level of resilience Bitcoin has achieved.  Why do you enjoy pretending you know better and that jeopardising it all by reverting back to that flawed assumption about the security model would somehow prove to be resilient if we just slap a fresh coat of paint on it? 

Get real.

[aliashraf]

@DooMAD,
With all due respects, I don't think you are in the position required for denouncing PoW as being doomed to centralization, nobody is, and more importantly, it is a false assertion.

Firstly, your assessment of both the cause of the problem and the way bitcoin network has adopted, is wrong and misleading:
Unlike what you claim it isn't "economic pressure" that made pools inevitable, it is a vague and fruitless expression, "economic pressure" doesn't say a word about the technical and real factors behind the phenomenon, you use this expression deliberately to deny the technical nature of the flaw and the same nature of any hypothetical cure. I've published a thorough technical analysis of pooling pressure in bitcoin in this forum, it has very limited mathematical prerequisites to read and understand, check it out, and you'll realize that pooling pressure in bitcoin is a technical problem.

As of your understanding of the current situation as the network is considered to be in equilibrium because of "full nodes", although this idea is not totally false or irrelevant but is not accurate and descriptive enough because the mere existence of full nodes do not help bitcoin as long as they are not economically important, and it is an open question that how many of such full nodes are active right now? Remember: economically important nodes.
It is why putting all the burden of keeping the network secure and balanced on the shoulders of full-nodes is not a reasonable argument and one should consider other factors as well, most importantly the role of game theoretical factors such as the incentives and rational cost/benefit analysis from the pool operators perspective.

The sophisticated balance of divergent factors is exactly what that needs to be addressed, leaving issues unresolved because people say there are full-nodes that fork-off in critical situations, is the most naive technical choice because most of these nodes have no role in the socioeconomic equations and nobody cares about their choice of the branch and to count too much on the reputation and similar psychological factors is not how a bitcoiner takes care of jobs.

Now, we come to the most disappointing part of your discourse where you announce the problem as being incurable and asking me and other people like me to be humble and understand if there was a cure, GM and others have already adopted it!

The maximum credit I would give to such claims is admitting that there are some technical complexities and additionally the general atmosphere in the community is not encouraging enough, but good news is that I've managed to figure out a technical framework for the problem that does not disrupt bitcoin radically, and I don't expect to raise too much negative reactions. The negativity thing is improving with bitcoin community becoming more and more confident after bch proved itself as a weak project and Faketoshi propaganda machine failed to do any harm to bitcoin.

I think we are in a good shape, fortunately the strong incentive mechanism behind bitcoin has done well, keeping bitcoin safe and secure and everybody is happy in-spite of flaws and shortcomings, now it is time to be back behind our keyboards and do something appropriate for crucial problems like scaling and centralization of mining. For it to happen we need to go beyond extreme conservatism and pacifism by supporting out-of-the-box thinking and giving a chance for new voices to be heared.

[xmready]

I think we are in a good shape, fortunately the strong incentive mechanism behind bitcoin has done well, keeping bitcoin safe and secure and everybody is happy in-spite of flaws and shortcomings, now it is time to be back behind our keyboards and do something appropriate for crucial problems like scaling and centralization of mining. For it to happen we need to go beyond extreme conservatism and pacifism by supporting out-of-the-box thinking and giving a chance for new voices to be heard.

I second your optimism. I agree that resigning a problem to being unsolvable is unhelpful and unnecessarily negative. Adoption will hopefully bring talent.

Fermat’s Last Theorem was unsolved for 350 years. Bitcoin hasn't been around that long. I'm sure with enough brain power focused on scalability we will succeed without compromise.

[Wind_FURY]

I'm confused. You're not in agreement with the idea that larger blocks will centralize the validators? Using that question as the premise, so an unlimited block size, and leaving the decision of "how large" to the miners, would be OK?

It is generally true that any scaling solution eventually needs the network to be capable of processing orders of magnitude more transactions, hence a larger block capacity, but it doesn't mean that a simple block size increase should be counted as such a solution, actually it is not for the same reason that putting a "trusted" entity in charge of validating blocks is not a scaling solution for bitcoin although both could help with throughput.

I believe you are dodging the question, by making a post that's deliberately hard-to-understand/confusing, but to look like you also answered the question.

I've been insisting on it for a long time: scaling bitcoin and decentralization of mining are different presentations of a same problem. To have a more convincing picture of my reasoning behind this claim, just take another look at what you wrote above: In the same sentence that you are legitimately expressing doubts about block size increase as a scaling solution, you raise alarms about putting miners in charge of the bitcoin. But why should anybody be concerned about it? As of the original design principles of bitcoin, miners are the ones that should be in charge, aren't they?  

Your Bitcoin perhaps, not mine.

Isn't it all about the current situation with pools and the infamous centralized mining scene of bitcoin that boosts this (legitimate) concern about putting miners in charge?

Are the miners in charge? I believe the UASF showed that they are not, the security thanks to the design-desicions made by the Core developers.

[Apollo Avanis]

Bitcoin has been infiltrated a long time ago and the plan was to cripple it. BCH is what bitcoin was meant to be.
BTC is disgusting to me at this point, blockstream wanting people to use their centralized solutions. You actually have retards like Luke Jr saying the block size should be smaller. Its insane that people here are saying block size need to be small for people in 3rd world countries that cant afford hardware...Well I'm sure people in 3rd world countries like paying $10 for a transaction which is more than they make in a day. At this point btc is a cult and bitcoin subreddit is extremely censored.

I sold all my bitcoin awhile back and I am only holding bch and eth.

[pooya87]

BCH is what bitcoin was meant to be.

Keep dreaming
At the end of the day bcash remains the same shitcoin that nobody cares about and that is evident from its blocks that have always been 0.1 bitcoin block size due to lack of transactions to put into them!
It is also centralized and mutable, 2 big principles that nobody interested in cryptocurrencies would ever want.

This is how useless bcash has been:

I sold all my bitcoin awhile back and I am only holding bch and eth.

Now that explains your initial statement, you are a bag holder of shitcoins

[hv_]

BCH is what bitcoin was meant to be.

Keep dreaming
At the end of the day bcash remains the same shitcoin that nobody cares about and that is evident from its blocks that have always been 0.1 bitcoin block size due to lack of transactions to put into them!
It is also centralized and mutable, 2 big principles that nobody interested in cryptocurrencies would ever want.

This is how useless bcash has been:

I sold all my bitcoin awhile back and I am only holding bch and eth.

Now that explains your initial statement, you are a bag holder of shitcoins

The future is not written - but args that LN solves anything except increase complexity / attack vectors (also for regulators) .... rare as true Bitcoin