Well tbh I don't really care sbout zaps. Moving zaps back & forth between users on Nostr isn't a particularly great use-case imo though of course on the wider internet being able to zap on different sites would be good. Besides, Lightning has a LONG way to go before that can happen. Those channel closures are not cool at all.
Discussion
We find that Lightning works quite well, as long as your node is online 24/7. Doesn't work well if your computer goes offline a lot.
I always feel like the “lightning doesn’t work” posts always come from people who have never run a node, or else it’s been a while since they have interacted with the network.
Things have come a really long way in the last few years, and they are improving rapidly! I have not seen a forced closure on my node in many months, routings are picking up constantly, and some of the biggest payments I have ever seen moving through.
Current implementations are now very stable. Bugs still pop up from time to time, and UX is far from perfect. But it’s pretty amazing for what it is right now, and where it’s headed IMO.
There's no way Lightning is going to be used by the masses. It's fine for Nostr and bitcoiners buying coffee but it just isn't good enough for large scale which is a shame but I don't see that changing. Incremental improvements will continue no doubt but it's never going to be used widely.
Why are you so sure of that? Imagine you are a cattle dealer in Sumeria in 3000 B.C. You notice other cattle dealers start paying with gold, instead of bushels of grain. You say "There's no way this gold thing will catch on, why would anyone accept gold for payment instead of grain?"
It isn't as if I am opposed to it. It's the same as self-custody with base layer btc, most people are just not going to do it. They want payments at least as easy as credit cards. They arent going to leave X for Nostr either, people don't want to deal with private/public keys & relays. They don't want to generate seeds and make transactions with a hardware device, they'd much rather have a bank or custodian do it for them. They don't want the hassle of opening Lightning channels either. I just don't see Lightning being used widely beyond a small percentage of people that self custody their own btc. Maybe I will be proven wrong, who knows, I just don't see it beyond a niche payment system.
"It's 1995, and I’m not against the internet, but most folks won’t use it. Why bother when newspapers deliver news to your door? No need for video calls when you’ve got a phone. Email? Letters work fine. I doubt it’ll catch on beyond tech geeks. Maybe I’m wrong, but it seems like a niche thing."
Meh. This is my third bitcoi bullrun. I'm btc through and through. If Lightning gains mass adoption I'll be truly happy I really will, I just don't see it but hopefully another Layer 2 will be better. Until then you can fuck off with your condescending comments. See ya.
Also, many of us operating bigger Lightning nodes can tell you that we are routing many thousands or hundreds of thousands of payments per week...
People thought the same about credit cards