100% agree but we need to make it easier to use lightning without custodians otherwise we are going to regret it in the future
Discussion
Celebration time again 😜 very true though! 👍 Run your own Node, folks!
Running your own node is definitely a friction point but with lightning the bigger friction point seems to be liquidity management, particularly inbound liquidity.
Many of the people using ‘non custodial mobile wallets’ such as phoenix still have to trust the company that is running the node and providing them liquidity.
The concern I have is that we are onboarding a ton of people via custodial wallets and standardizing LNURL which has incentives pushing people toward custodial wallets.
Eventually these custodians will rug pull or shotgun kyc. It is difficult to reverse this course after the fact.
does having multiple custodial wallets mitigate this risk?
Then you have to manage different pools of liquidity. You shouldnt have to say “oh, let me get my other wallet” all the time
If you have WoS and Muun, you pay from the one that hasn’t bent yet knee. When one goes down, you learn about how to open a channel real quickly.
because it is lightning, its all hot wallet risk 😅
might i suggest doing some homework on Liquid? It offers a tradeoff to keep off-chain funds offline without an on-chain footprint, it could help you wrap your head around what federation risk is as people explore fedimint
yes, and there’s that
Why do you think a custodial Lightning wallet is more popular than a Liquid wallet?
I’ve never used Liquid or even seen it in action. Part of it could just be network effect and the proliferation and improving UX of Lightning wallets. What is Liquid currently used for that would make it appealing to new users?
I use it to swap for outbound/inbound liquidity on my lightning node using things like CoinOS, SideSwap, and Peerswap (p2p) .
to be honest, it makes no economic sense to do it (which is why no one uses it) but after using lightning for a long time one tends to look for ways to mitigate hot wallet risk -- Liquid offers a solution to that
Most people just want low cost frictionless money, and if they are being onboarded by buying $30 of BTC experimental spending money with their Debit Card via the getalby top up, they really don't even have to care about deeper issues.
Don't make perfection be the enemy of the good enough.
💯
LNURL pushes people towards hosted/custodial wallets. It’s better than the alternative. I just wish bolt12 was more widely adopted. I dont hold lnurl against anyone. Its a tool that exists today and works. But the reliance on a clearnet webserver comes with tradeoffs.
Leaving KYC issue aside, since *all* my coins are KYC 😉 , am I right in interpreting a hot custodial wallet greatest risk is simply losing the coins in it? So a balance risk management problem.
it seems to me the major risk is that all your transactions are eventually linked to you pretty much publicly through chainalysis. This doesn’t leave aside KYC though, and since all your coins are KYC 😉 managing the data sharing and trusting custodians not to give away, sell or leak your data is the major issue for security in the future. Otherwise, yeah, losing your stack isn’t fun either.
If fees are zero and transactions are instant, what prevents users from jumping ship? Is it just a race at that point?
Sadly I think that most people will use lightning integration on their already kyc payment app when it is integrated. Most people won't care until something bad happen
CLBOSS fixes this.
Also agree. For whatever reason is see a lot of people think non custodial bitcoin wallet is needed but custodial lightning wallet is fine. Not sure why that is the sentiment for many using lightning
Agreed. I’m not sure how we do so without people running their own nodes. Even then, channel management is not something most people will be willing to do and without proper channel management your ability to send and receive payments to your node is vastly diminished.
Lightning will always require someone else’s infrastructure, unless your wiz of course
False! Get an Embassy and connect real lightning wallets like Zeus or Spark.
This is easy and much cheaper than using custodial solutions.
Do you run your own ISP? Do you connect to your own cell towers when you travel? Are you on your own power grid?
This is what the State will go after and regulate more.
Not very excited about the catch me if you can games that are coming, but here’s to freedom 🍻
You are still bullish on the fediment aka Uncle Jim model though right? Realistically it will never be 1-to-1 with custody, having a heuristic for being adequately decentralized is difficult but necessary for us to answer “have we made it?”
yea I think fedimint is a solid tradeoff balance in the near term, better privacy and less trust then the custodial wallets that are popular today, still would like to see fully sovereign usage get easier
Cashu <=
Cashu is a cool project but is not going with the federated model. You get improved privacy over a traditional lightning custodian such as Wallet of Satoshi but you have the same custodial risk.
With fedimint the custodial risk is minimized since it is a multi sig custodian.
Bolt12 is a step in that direction.
What do you think about Phoenix Wallet’s solution?
Damn was just going to say that... Every non kyc lightning wallet is a pain in the ass, because all the good ones like Samurai and WoS have gone away. You gotta be techie to run the others.