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This pretty much nails it. Here it is as a table in case it's easier to compare
featureecashcustodial lightning
can be ruggedyesyes
can recover from lost keysnoyes
can get your account closednoyes
can receive offlineyesyes
is illegal in US/EUyesyes
privacy from outside observersyesyes
privacy from mint/custodiankindano
The only nuance I would add is that since many of ecash wallets support use of multiple mints, it is easier to use multiple custodians at once (you can have a unified balance, while using ecash tokens from multiple different mints).
1202 sats \ 3 replies \ @pillar 17 Sep
On the can be rugged bit.
I think it's important to nuance the effect of ecash having no concept of identity.
A regular custodian, like Wallet of Satoshi, can decide to rug YOU specifically and intentionally. The cops can come over and say: "we don't like this john@doe.com, freeze him", and WoS would be able to do it.
On the other hand, while an ecash mint can rug you, it can only...
  • Rug EVERYONE (basically stop working).
  • Rug people randomly here and there. ... but they can't rug YOU specifically.
I think this changes the game theory around the custodian relationship quite a bit and has serious implications regarding how government may relate to a normal custodian vs an ecash mint.
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135 sats \ 0 replies \ @oomahq 17 Sep
What you describe doesn't sound really much different from old school bearer gold certificates, i.e. gold-backed paper money.
We know the game theory leads to EO 6102.
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210 sats \ 1 reply \ @ek 17 Sep
A mint can ask for KYC when you want to withdraw ("shotgun KYC") and then rug selectively
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That's true. But if they're going to ask that to everybody, it's pretty much the "rug EVERYONE" scenario, only with the fact that they forgive you if you surrender.
Having said that, it feels convoluted. Let's add an extra layer to our stack to avoid accounts... so we can then make accounts?
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302 sats \ 0 replies \ @k00b 18 Sep
The only nuance I would add is that since many of ecash wallets support use of multiple mints, it is easier to use multiple custodians at once (you can have a unified balance, while using ecash tokens from multiple different mints).
This interop is nice, but it's worth noting that this is not a quality of ecash specifically but a consequence of mints using a standard protocol. Someone could create an LNBits client that interacted with multiple LNBits instances for example. It's unlikely LNBits does this though because it's not designed assuming custodians will rug with high frequency.
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When you say 'illegal', I guess you mean that running a mint is likely illegal in much of the world? While simply being a user is legal in more places?
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Yes, running a mint or a custodial service without licensing and kyc is illegal in most western countries. Being a user is not (yet).
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102 sats \ 1 reply \ @ek 17 Sep
can recover from lost keys | no | yes
with that you mean you don't have keys you can lose when using custodial lightning?
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yes, i probably could have found a better way to put it, but I was trying to make the table look nice.
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Are there meaningful fee differences between the two? For example Wallet of Satoshi vs. something like Minibits?
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