The Lightning Network: A failure?

[Abiky]

It's been years since the Lightning Network was launched, yet adoption has been quite slow. Most people are still transacting on-chain, despite the fact that sometimes network fees increase to undesirable levels due to the Ordinals hype. The L2 scaling solution promised to boost mainstream adoption for BTC with its ultra-low fees and blazing-fast speeds. It's still flawed, despite being established for a few years now.

What do you think? Is the LN a failure? If not, why? Should we give it more time to mature? What is the main reason most exchanges, merchants and/or businesses haven't adopted it yet?

Your input would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

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[franky1]

many merchants did try it, seen it fail and stopped using it
heck even many 3rd world countries who had issues with bitcoin fee's being more then peoples daily salary tried LN direct or indirect or bamboozled into using it thinking they were using 'bitcoin but cheaper' and they also seen the problems and hundreds-thousands of merchants of these coutries seen the issues and decided to ditch it, within months of trying it..

LN devs then seen the failure and asked for sponsorship for new work-arounds like the latest large sponsorships to develop BTCPayserver
.. yet still problems present itself even when using BTCPayserver

yet devs are still within their sponsor contract so yet to reveal(admit) publicly the flaws of this latest "please be patient" development. but yep we will learn like we have already, all roads lead to "flaws have been found"

LN is not a scaling solution its a bitcoin abandonment scheme
LN is not a solution its a flawed niche network for people to syphon funds from each other using IOU

LN is not even a sole network that majority should use. (one world currency dystopia)

what will/should happen is scale BITCOIN
and have subnetworks(plural) as NICHE services for small service offerings of multiple feature/functions.. but using subnetworks yet to even be made from scratch(learning from LN mistakes)

right now we are in the same economic joke punchline as "why is there no cure for cancer". where the punch line is "why would scientists cure cancer and then do themselves out of a job, when they can instead keep developing new problems to keep asking for fresh sets of investment funding pots.

the "please be patient" and years later flaws get public, is just the advert they use to ask for more R&D funding for the next project repeating the same flaws

[adaseb]

When I first heard about lightning it was almost 10 years ago. I thought it was going to be amazing. However it never really caught on and I am surprised.

I think that most people just stopped using bitcoin for micro payments and which Switched to stablecoins on l2 networks like ETH, ARB, Polygon, etc.

ETH fees are high now but they weren’t when USDT launched on it many years back. I think many people utilized it. Then they switched to maybe Tron or Solana for near free transactions.

Hence why lightning never became larger.

[ajaxtempest]

I had posted about this last year
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5399689.msg60194703#msg60194703

[SquirrelJulietGarden]

It's been years since the Lightning Network was launched, yet adoption has been quite slow.

Lightning Network started with very low adoption rate but it increased a lot since 2019 till 2022. Since early 2023, it started to fall dramatically and I remembered about a report on weakness and security hole in Lightning Network. Don't remember publishing time of that news but from the chart, it can be some time from July to September 2023.
https://txstats.com/d/000000012/lightning-network?orgId=1&from=now-7y&to=now

Most people are still transacting on-chain, despite the fact that sometimes network fees increase to undesirable levels due to the Ordinals hype. The L2 scaling solution promised to boost mainstream adoption for BTC with its ultra-low fees and blazing-fast speeds. It's still flawed, despite being established for a few years now.

Biggest challenge from Lightning Network for users is they have to spend on-chain fee to open a Lightning Network channel, before they can use LN off-chain.

What do you think? Is the LN a failure? If not, why?

I don't consider LN is a failure. It actually has good adoption and not only for Lightning Network but look back, news about LN in 2017, 2018 and after actually helped Bitcoin adoption too.

It is not perfect, not great success but not a failure for LN or for Bitcoin.

[Poker Player]

I think that most people just stopped using bitcoin for micro payments and which Switched to stablecoins on l2 networks like ETH, ARB, Polygon, etc.

Or fiat currency, simply. Cryptocurrencies are mostly used as an investment, and if you have an investment, which you therefore expect to be worth more in the future, and a fiat currency, which you know depreciates, which one are you going to spend to pay for a coffee? Leaving aside the scalability problems that in a hypothetical future in which everyone would want to pay for coffees with Bitcoin there would be, since the channels have to be opened in the main chain.

And stablecoins have come to be used instead of paying for coffees to lock in profits and/or avoid volatility. So you buy a shitcoin that makes you a 50x and pass it to stable coin just in case the price goes down as fast as it has risen.

[mk4]

I wouldn't call it "failed" just yet, but it's definitely is having trouble in getting adoption because if it still being complicated(correct me if I'm wrong) and clunky that you can't really expect the masses to use it just yet.

Like I said in a previous post though, I wish there was something else that Bitcoiners would bet on, not just Lightning alone.

[NeuroticFish]

What do you think? Is the LN a failure? If not, why? Should we give it more time to mature? What is the main reason most exchanges, merchants and/or businesses haven't adopted it yet?

I think that we are simply just too early.
Crypto exchanges are just slowly starting to adopt LN (of course, it's a balance between earning some extra money as withdrawal fees and making withdrawals - and deposits - smoother).
Afaik LN is still labeled beta. This also doesn't help, but, since LN is still not out of problems... yeah...

The point is that a solution is necessary if we want bitcoin used as a currency by everybody. One path would be to fix LN and help it get mature. Another path would be finding/inventing other alternatives (on and off chain).

LN is not a scaling solution its a bitcoin abandonment scheme
LN is not a solution its a flawed niche network for people to syphon funds from each other using IOU

You are anti-LN and extremely harsh. You are not so far from truth, yet, not actually true either.
All service providers tried and try to offer IOUs. See PayPal and Revolut. Or remember that people kept Xapo wallets because "sending money" to each other (off chain, Xapo to Xapo) was free. I think that's now the same with Binance (and Binance Pay).

But LN needs actual Bitcoin locked for the channel. Yes, LN uses it's own units, the fact they are called Bitcoin is only convenience, and easy math because the channels are built with bitcoins.
On the other hand, it's far better than sending the bitcoins to an exchange then spend whatever odd wrapped bitcoin (i.e. IOUs on a completely unrelated blockchain).



All in all, my opinion is that LN just needs more time.
Maybe forum tips or signature campaigns offering LN payments could get LN used more at least in our community, as a form of support. Maybe...

[Plaguedeath]

Not yet failure, it just that most people don't care with lightning network.

We need to know if most people hold their coins in centralized exchanges, if they want to withdraw Bitcoin, they will use the cheapest network to send. They could use BSC chain, Kucoin chain, Lightning network etc, they don't care it's real coins or fake coins.

The rise of Lightning network will begin when people can't afford to pay on chain fees and one of those centralized chains (BSC, KCC etc) hacked/ruined, this will make people to carefully to hold their coins.

[franky1]

LN is not a scaling solution its a bitcoin abandonment scheme
LN is not a solution its a flawed niche network for people to syphon funds from each other using IOU

You are anti-LN and extremely harsh. You are not so far from truth, yet, not actually true either.
All service providers tried and try to offer IOUs. See PayPal and Revolut. Or remember that people kept Xapo wallets because "sending money" to each other (off chain, Xapo to Xapo) was free. I think that's now the same with Binance (and Binance Pay).

But LN needs actual Bitcoin locked for the channel. Yes, LN uses it's own units, the fact they are called Bitcoin is only convenience, and easy math because the channels are built with bitcoins.
On the other hand, it's far better than sending the bitcoins to an exchange then spend whatever odd wrapped bitcoin (i.e. IOUs on a completely unrelated blockchain).

All in all, my opinion is that LN just needs more time.
Maybe forum tips or signature campaigns offering LN payments could get LN used more at least in our community, as a form of support. Maybe...

just needs time? nah LN wont function better even if you plugged in an alarm clock or patiently waited 1,2,4,8,16,1000 more years.. it needs to go back to scratch and start again learning from its own mistakes.. i guess you mean "time machine" not just "time"

as for the other issues you dont understand:
their own units are called Msats.. which are several more decimals deeper per unit than a sat/bitcoin. thus not the same as bitcoin

LN does not need actual bitcoin locked.. even thor turbo(bitrefills) proudly presents its instant channel creations. this is done by opening channels with msat balance which is NOT using real UTXO references, but instead uses a different channel policy of 'temp-id'
many people can open channels with no balance just so they can be connected with another partner who offers inbound balance.. inbound balance that has not been locked at the channel creation side of the inbound balance provider..

even if they did us a UTXO peg reference:
there is no LN network wide audit to ensure channel users have balance thats actually pegged from bitcoin network UTXO and nothing stops channel creators using the same UTXO over multiple channels

LN is not even a network that requires the bitcoin network. LN can bridge/peg to different currencies, so dont pretend its a "bitcoin layer". its a completely separate network that is not locked to be a sole function advantage to bitcoin

the devs of those promoting their involvement of LN are highly funded/sponsored. so asking people to tip them/donate to them wont speed things up
if you look at how many millions things like bitfinex/river financial have sponsored devs purely for LN development. the answer is then not to ask people to pay devs. they are paid enough but have ADMITTED LN HAS FLAWS EVEN THEY CANT FIX

what needs to happen is BITCOIN needs to scale, and new (from scratch) subnetworks created that learn from LN mistakes

[pinggoki]

Failure seems to me a big word to describe what currently lightning network is, they haven't done any blunder yet and they're doing just fine with what they're currently doing, they seem alright to me though but I guess some people haven't used it or don't care what it is, I haven't tried using it but I've seen how to set it up and to me it feels a little too complicated to do so because I'm not the go-to guy when there's issues on the computer in my house or office so that's why I find setting up LN a bit difficult, maybe it's the same for other people too, they find it hard to set up. Or the obvious reason of them all, lightning network don't have enough visibility that people probably haven't heard of it.

[Uhwuchukwu53]

It's been years since the Lightning Network was launched, yet adoption has been quite slow. Most people are still transacting on-chain, despite the fact that sometimes network fees increase to undesirable levels due to the Ordinals hype. The L2 scaling solution promised to boost mainstream adoption for BTC with its ultra-low fees and blazing-fast speeds. It's still flawed, despite being established for a few years now.

What do you think? Is the LN a failure? If not, why? Should we give it more time to mature? What is the main reason most exchanges, merchants and/or businesses haven't adopted it yet?

Your input would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

Op you really pointed out good observation that need great attention, but I can't necessary tag it failure for now. my opinion towards it, is for the team to come up with more advert creating more awareness over the exchange, possibly check and see if there is any unfavorable condition in their platform that is coursing their initial plan of building the exchange not actualizing.

Alternatively given more time can be an option, but is tide down to first seen if they have time frame on how the exchange supposed to have gone which failed with that they can't restrategize by checking the actual course of not meeting their target at the specific time schedule.

[franky1]

Failure seems to me a big word to describe what currently lightning network is, they haven't done any blunder yet and they're doing just fine with what they're currently doing, they seem alright to me though but I guess some people haven't used it or don't care what it is, I haven't tried using it

when you do bother to use it and stop acting like an inexperienced PR guy of something you have not used. you will soon learn the real issues
all i see is you promoting something based on false promises you were told.. not based on experience

there are whole countries that tried it and dropped it in months (el salvador/nigeria) dont pretend those calling it flawed/failure are people who have not used it.. instead admit its those that have not used it FALSELY thinking it works perfectly due to them just reading false statements and then copying them as if false promises is experience..
try it and realise the problems, dont just promote something you have not experienced. we already have too many idiots that do that
if you dont want to try it. then dont falsely claim that it works fine. YOU DONT KNOW

even the people that have used it admit to its flaws. its those that sound like snake-oil salesmen* that are the only ones that say its works fine
*dont know the product, exaggerate the promises, havnt used it but just promote it

[nullama]

I don't think lightning is a failure at all.

Many people use it online for micropayments, and it is a really convenient way to spend sats in the real world.

It's a bit like carrying money in your wallet. You don't carry all your savings around, just a bit of cash. Same thing with lightning.

You can see that most of the transactions are between the US and Europe, but it is used worldwide:



Here's the live map: https://mempool.space/graphs/lightning/nodes-channels-map

[mindrust]

If you don’t mind using custodial wallets, it works well but that’s one big if and I do mind it. I want to own my own private keys and I don’t want to depend on any centralized service so I am kind of moving away from LN lately. I’d like to use btc’s main layer for anything and If I can’t do that because of the high fees, I’ll be going to the next best project which has cheap and fast transactions. I think crypto loses its purpose if it loses its decentralization aspect. LN is fine if you don’t want to move away from btc but it is also like using centralized bank apps as long as you don’t own your own LN node and in my experience people who use LN usually don’t own a node. It is because they use LN for its low tx fees and creating a LN node ain’t come cheap. It is a paradox.

[Charles-Tim]

What do you think? Is the LN a failure? If not, why? Should we give it more time to mature? What is the main reason most exchanges, merchants and/or businesses haven't adopted it yet?

Lightning network adoption is increasing but just that is is slow. More exchanges have lightning network deposit and withdrawal already. Binance included lightning network last year, there are other exchanges like OKX that has lightning network also.

https://github.com/theDavidCoen/LightningExchanges

[fuguebtc]

It's been years since the Lightning Network was launched, yet adoption has been quite slow. Most people are still transacting on-chain, despite the fact that sometimes network fees increase to undesirable levels due to the Ordinals hype. The L2 scaling solution promised to boost mainstream adoption for BTC with its ultra-low fees and blazing-fast speeds. It's still flawed, despite being established for a few years now.

What do you think? Is the LN a failure? If not, why? Should we give it more time to mature? What is the main reason most exchanges, merchants and/or businesses haven't adopted it yet?

Your input would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

Most people think that LN is not a failure, but to me, something that has been around for a long time but is still not widely used is a failure. Until now, not many investors know and appreciate it, they are not even interested in it. If that's not failure, then what is?

In addition, talking about the development of L2 on the bitcoin blockchain, I think in the near future we will have more choices and LN is no longer the only choice. Many L2 projects are being invested by large funds and preparing to launch mainnet during this bull season. Let's wait and see which solution will be chosen and used by everyone.

[LoyceV]

I've always liked LN, and used to use it, but indeed, the lack of adoption is what gets me. I can use it at Kraken (exchange), but there's no point because I don't need to exchange micro transactions. And most micro transactions I do, don't accept LN.

I wouldn't call it a failure, but more of a problem in general: good tech doesn't mean people use it, and a hype gets more exposure. Compare the ICO/NFT BS with LN: LN is here to stay, the rest is a quick money maker until the guy who created it moves on to "the next big thing".
Another thing: many people still don't use Bitcoin for real payments, and many "Bitcoin users" only keep their funds on an exchange. As long as they don't use their own wallet, they won't use it for payments.

[ABCbits]

What do you think? Is the LN a failure? If not, why?

Not failure, but rather has limited practical usage. At it's best, LN is great option when you frequently make small payment or want perform daily trading while avoiding storing Bitcoin on the exchange. Outside of that, i find on-chain TX is more practical.

Should we give it more time to mature? What is the main reason most exchanges, merchants and/or businesses haven't adopted it yet?

Merchant or business whose customer doesn't make regular or frequent payment wouldn't see much LN usage. But exchange could see fair amount of LN usage.

[franky1]

I've always liked LN, and used to use it, but indeed, the lack of adoption is what gets me. I can use it at Kraken (exchange), but there's no point because I don't need to exchange micro transactions. And most micro transactions I do, don't accept LN.

I wouldn't call it a failure, but more of a problem in general: good tech doesn't mean people use it, and a hype gets more exposure. Compare the ICO/NFT BS with LN: LN is here to stay, the rest is a quick money maker until the guy who created it moves on to "the next big thing".
Another thing: many people still don't use Bitcoin for real payments, and many "Bitcoin users" only keep their funds on an exchange. As long as they don't use their own wallet, they won't use it for payments.

LN is not here to stay in the sense that its the default option.. it will find its niche, and when people finally wise up to the IOU truth of functionality i presume people will actually promote it as such EG as a visa credit system not a visa debit system. but the future of a proper subnetwork payment system of peoples value wont be LN it will be some other subnetworks yet to be built, but in the meantime bitcoin still needs to scale onchain even just to cater to the onramp/offramps. the idea of locking people into subnetworks and making it a headache/inconvenience/expense to re enter the bitcoin network is not the path to go. subnetworks will fill NICHE service functionality