I like to tell this story when I talk about the Nostr Plebs humble beginnings and how my eyes were opened with where Bitcoin is at when it comes to Lightning adoption.
The amount of Bitcoiners that message me asking how to pay the Lightning invoice to register their Nostr address, that they never used lightning before, that they had a Lightning node, but never opened up any channels, or that they had channels opened, but never made a transaction, or that they were unfamiliar with Lightning completely. I was shocked. How could Bitcoiners not know about or even use Lightning? 👀
Lightning has a bit of a marketing problem or maybe it has an adoption problem or a combination of both. 🤯
When it comes to managing your Lightning, node, liquidity management and channel management is hard. It's not fun. It's kind of a pain in the ass. I believe this will get better over time. It's already gotten better in the two and a half years that I've been running a Lightning node. 🤝
Custodial solutions are getting much easier as well. While many people may not be fans of custodial solutions, it's a misconception to believe that every person in the world will do this on their own. Do you maintain every single aspect of your house? Your car? Your electronics? No. Service providers exist for dozens of industries. Bitcoin will be no different. Stop custody shaming.
Is Lightning adoption where I wish it was at? Nope. However, we're working on it here. We're making Lightning fun and easy to use with zaps. We're making Lightning easy and frictionless.
I also truly believe that the Bitcoin communities around the world will push Lightning adoption. From Africa to Latin America to Southeast Asia, Lightning transactions are how they use Bitcoin. They don't use on-chain.
Keep building. Keep educating. It's a slow process, but we're on the right path.
