Replying to Avatar Cyph3rp9nk

My vision of reality is uncomfortable for many, I do not know if I have the truth or not, nobody knows that and truth is often subjective, especially in social facts.

But that discomfort that my opinions create for some, is the clue that brings me closer to a truth as objective as possible.

I'll give you an example, every day I have more and more clear that custody solutions are not bad, since we have no way to scale Bitcoin to everyone, you must accept this type of solutions if or if, the alternative to this is the Fiat that besides being counterfeitable is custody if you use banks.

Now the followers of Monero will come to say that Monero solves this, but they are not able to understand that Monero has sacrificed the decentralization of the base layer in order to be scalable, so everything is already destroyed. If Monero ever becomes popular, no one will be able to run their own nodes, so you will no longer be able to verify transactions by yourself and Monero will end up being a trust system with the old Fiat since there will be no possibility of consensus by the common man.

Also, so-called maximalists will come to criticize escrow solutions, when in fact they are not maximalist because all they want to do is to decide on the people who will not be able to opt for a Lightning channel or to pay for a blockchain transaction if Bitcoin is massively adopted.

Do you want more controversial examples? Because I have many, especially from the second world war 😂

Bitcoin daily TX volume has increased dramatically & yet still I can put a 1sat/vb TX through.

What makes you think it's not scalable?

What makes you think LN isn't scaling?

What makes you think cashu isn't gonna work?

What about the layered protocols that haven't been created yet?

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On-chain daily TX volume has skyrocketed.

Fee market doing its thing...

We are assuming with current technology to scale to the total world population.

For everyone to have a lightning channel it would take decades to open all the channels in the network.

Lightning is not scalable unless you give up custody.

Cashu is custodial.

We don't have that protocol yet, so in the current state of things we have to assume that one day we will need custodial in one form or another, in which case my favorite protocol is Liquid and Lightning over Liquid.

You have to compare apples to apples.

Bitcoin adoption to the whole world population will also take decades.

Development is never stagnant, so lightning can scale over that same time frame according to you - with solutions coming to fruition.

Cashu is not custodial in the laymen sense, it's not good to mislabel things within this conversation.

& again, just because all the solutions don't exist yet - doesn't mean we should waive the white flag & say custodial options will win out - that's just probabilistically untrue - I'll take the field.

But...

Since on-chain scaling is the issue at hand, please tell me - what's the daily TX count that makes it not possible for it to scale any further?

This conversation has ceased to make sense, Merry Christmas.

Yeah I thought you'd tap out.

Here's some information on how Bitcoin transactions are weighted within a block.

https://learnmeabitcoin.com/technical/transaction/size/

Upgrades to Bitcoin have seen TX weights go down - allowing TX counts to go up.

I see further developments in this area taking hold as necessary - which today it is not.

Today Bitcoin blocks have space & layers around Bitcoin are improving & catalyzing.

If we're talking Bitcoin terms then Cashu is very much custodial. The mint is the custodian of all sats and can refuse to back them at any time. You might be self-custodial with your Cashu tokens but the underlying value is held by the mint.

That being said I agree that we'll continue to see improvements to base layer that allow TX to scale to the global level. There's so many proposals that can bring advancements to Bitcoin for this that will eventually make it to base that I have no worries we'll be good.

So you use the same word to compare Wallet of Satoshi or coinbase custodial vs cashu mints that could technically be created by anyone?

Yeah because it's the same risk if it's a pleb or Coinbase. Both can make a mistake or intentionally rug you and all the sats be gone.

I disagree that it's the same obviously,

Can't you run your own mint?

You can but why would you unless you plan to have others accept the tokens minted for something. If you give your tokens to someone else in exchange for any value now you're their custodian and we're back to the custodial nature.

Tbh I actually disagree with my argument here. I don't believe ecash is custodial; I believe it's a shitcoin akin to the dollar being backed by BTC. The issuer can determine how much they back the token or make any rules for how they'll give out Bitcoin against it. There's also nothing that ties your original deposit to the ecash you receive. It has no tie to Bitcoin anymore than something like liquid.

I actually made this argument in an unsent opinion letter to the Kentucky Department of Financial Institutions when we were planning to launch a Fedimint. I believe that when someone gives you money that they're actually performing an economic transaction of buying a totally different asset. The asset has no ties to Bitcoin and as long as the mint doesn't make claims to be backing or custodying then they shouldn't be regulated as such.

I don't think this is necessary a bad thing as long as it's an understood element. I think there's a lot of value to mints in our current base layer situation. The tech could still allow scaling for a wide range of new functions that aren't possible/feasible on base BTC. That being said I look forward to more advancement that doesn't necessitate us living in an ecash world.

Okay now we're on the same page.

Further on the topic of custodianship differences;

Can't I redeem my cashu tokens with another mint?

It seems like also being able to choose a mint or run your own mint is a major key difference between classical custodianship in Bitcoin land.

Peep this disclaimer,

You can't redeem on another mint directly. You have to redeem on the first mint and then it forwards a lightning payment to the next mint that then issues them to you on it. If the first mint rugs you then your mint/next mint wouldn't credit you. This disclaimer is excellent as far as trust goes though.

Yes that part is clear to me, but you can swap mints if you feel like it - I think this is a major difference to traditional custodial options and why I prefer if we don't conflate the word with invariably different things.

1. A custodial exchange/wallet when you're banked by a single entity.

2. A protocol that has custody tradeoffs that can be chosen based on voluntary market forces.

Both Cashu mints and custodial exchange wallets are backed/banked by a single entity. I can slightly see the point of part two though because the protocol could be easier to swap from due to the mint not having as much information to limit redemption. They could still limit redemption by other methods like where the withdrawal is set to go. Similarly you can usually move via lightning based on very similar voluntary market forces if you realize the custodian isn't reliable.