What are the steelman arguments for ecash/fedimint trusted mints?
443 sats \ 8 comments \ @0228fbcd1c 20 May bitcoin
I'm trying to understand what are the main steelman arguments for ecash or fedimints that i am missing. these systems assume that there is a trusted entity or group of entities that are suitable to manage the underlying collateral.
My general questions are:
  • what prevents this group of entities to runaway/escape with the collateral once it gets large enough?
  • (ill be damned but) what are the main differences (enumerated) between that and state run regulations that prevent banks from taking all the their collateral?
  • Are ecash/fedi a stop-gap solution or are they the end goal for security? if not what could be an ideal future and where can i read more about it?
Thank you for your attention or replies.
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40 sats \ 1 reply \ @Radentor 20 May
eSats vs LN :
  • Privacy
  • Async payment
  • Decentralizing risk of rugpull
  • No liquidity management
  • No pathfinding (intra payment)
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0 sats \ 0 replies \ @030a29f333 20 May
This
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120 sats \ 1 reply \ @TheBTCManual 20 May
It's a custodian without the legal protections afforded by current custodians, you trade that for the privacy aspect, and you select how much risk/exposure is right for you.
I think for these mints/federations to work, you need to have a relationship with the custodian, a friend, family member, local leader, that's not to say they can't or won't rug you and everyone in the mint, but if people know where you live, it is a deterrent.
This custody model is pretty popular in South Africa, one person has a bank account/manages cash for the community, we call it stokvels, and these stokvels hold millions of dollars/billions of South African rands and I think it works for small purchases low value, and if you build wealth you go your own way
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0 sats \ 0 replies \ @0228fbcd1c OP 20 May
stokvels Thank you for the story on stokvels! i learned something!
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105 sats \ 0 replies \ @benthecarman 20 May
Self custody in its current form doesn't scale. We either scale with the best form of custodians (ecash) or do some soft forks
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1 sat \ 0 replies \ @BitcoinAbhi 20 May
Nothing prevents them. They can runaway when they want.
No state run regulation apply to fedimints, so I don't think there's any similarities but there are only differences.
For me, they are like end of security.
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0 sats \ 0 replies \ @MiddleWay 20 May
If you want to be a bank for your friends and family just open a private 0-conf channel to a Blixt wallet in their phone. You won't see sources and destinations of their payments, only the amounts and balances. And if you don't drain your node intentionally, its liquidity will manage automatically. They can only spend the sats you sold them in the beginning, or what they received later.
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0 sats \ 0 replies \ @erict875 20 May
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