AMA with niftynei, core-lightning contributor, btc++ organizer, base58er \ stacker news ~AMA

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AMA with niftynei, core-lightning contributor, btc++ organizer, base58er

28.2k sats \ 89 comments \ @niftynei 29 Oct AMA

Hey ya’ll! Happy uptober.

Would live to chat about anything lightning, working in bitcoin, btc++ past or present, Base58 and the bitcoin LARP, what we’re planning for 2025 and beyond

Also yes it’s my bday!

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122 sats \ 6 replies \ @amaluenda 29 Oct

Is there a meaning behind your nym niftynei?

205 sats \ 5 replies \ @niftynei OP 29 Oct

yes! it’s one of my favorite words (nifty) with the first three letters of my last name.

the other contender for favorite word was “persnickety” but that was too long to type

100 sats \ 2 replies \ @ek 29 Oct

Do most people in bitcoin call you nifty(nei) or by your real name?

54 sats \ 1 reply \ @niftynei OP 29 Oct

it seems pretty split?? most of my friends call me nifty

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @Bell_curve 29 Oct

Neiman Marcus lol

100 sats \ 1 reply \ @endothermicdev 29 Oct

Shorter is better, lol!

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @nym 31 Oct

Agreed!

308 sats \ 2 replies \ @niftynei OP 29 Oct

wrapping it up for today, thanks everyone for the great questions!

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @plebpoet 30 Oct

hApPy BiRtHdAy !!!

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @BlokchainB 29 Oct

Cake for the Queen 🎂

111 sats \ 1 reply \ @DarthCoin 29 Oct

Ok a funny one...

How was your first LN payment? Something like this?

1234 sats \ 0 replies \ @niftynei OP 29 Oct

oh man i actually have a pretty cool story for this one. it took me a week to get my core-lightning node up and funded and a channel setup.

the first thing i did was go to an online lightning store someone was running out of china 🇨🇳 and buy a lightning lamp. it was sooo cool because there’s no way i could have made that payment without lightning. it showed up in my mailbox a week later and has been hanging in my office ever since!!

99 sats \ 1 reply \ @DarthCoin 29 Oct

Finally we have a LN developer answering questions on SN!

So many things to ask about LN that right now can't process them all at once here :)

Recently I came back to this wonderful LN newsletter by Kiara Bickers https://simplelightning.com

I don't know why it stopped posting those nice articles about LN. Do you have something like this to recommend? Something that anybody can understand, not just super technical stuff?

52 sats \ 0 replies \ @niftynei OP 29 Oct

this is a great question! no i do not know of any great resources! sorry

58 sats \ 4 replies \ @k00b 29 Oct

What’s your new office missing?

87 sats \ 3 replies \ @niftynei OP 29 Oct

a bitcoin blockclock! and a website haha

100 sats \ 2 replies \ @nikotsla 29 Oct

Already have a bitaxe there?

47 sats \ 1 reply \ @niftynei OP 29 Oct

we have 3!! and an ancient V9 antminer 🤣

121 sats \ 0 replies \ @nikotsla 29 Oct

5 sats \ 1 reply \ @DarthCoin 29 Oct

OK 2nd question.

How do you see in the future, solving the force closing channels issue? Or at least how we can limit it to strictly necessary.

467 sats \ 0 replies \ @niftynei OP 29 Oct

we’re working on moving to zero-fee commitment txs, thanks to the work the bitcoin core devs have been doing on mempool and v3 txs. this should cut down on the number of spurious closures that happen due to onchain fee mismatches!

i’m not really sure what the total root cause of all force closes are, so not really sure what percent of all force closes that will help avoid but i suspect it’ll be a majority of them

10 sats \ 3 replies \ @k00b 29 Oct

What’s your preferred soft fork proposal among all the recent contenders?

123 sats \ 2 replies \ @niftynei OP 29 Oct

APO ☺️ but it’s a style points thing more than anything. I’m really into magic signatures

adapter sigs are really cool too!!

19 sats \ 1 reply \ @realBitcoinDog 29 Oct

Ah this was the answer to my question! Buy my second part was how do we implement APO?

28 sats \ 0 replies \ @niftynei OP 29 Oct

BIP-118 is probably a good place to start!!

100 sats \ 2 replies \ @DarthCoin 29 Oct

If CLN would not exist:

which LN implementation you will choose to run your LN node?
which LN implementation you will choose to write code for?

294 sats \ 1 reply \ @niftynei OP 29 Oct

if i had infinite time, i’d write a lightning implementation in erlang 😏

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @orangecheckemail_isthereany 30 Oct

Erlang is my favourite language from the ones I've used! (which admittedly aren't that many) RIP Joe Armstrong :( He left us way too soon Many of his talks, lectures, Q&A's were recorded. Interesting stuff. Joe graduated with a physics degree, got a phd in CS and worked on writing software for aerospace / satellite applications for a few years if I remember correctly before joining Ericsson where he devised Erlang together with Robert Virding and Mike Williams. Robert Virding is still active in the erlang community and he is an avid language implementer. His academic background is in mathematics. He's a big Lisp fan and implemented one on core erlang.

42 sats \ 0 replies \ @EverythingSatsoshi 29 Oct

Happy Birthday Nifty When btc++ Africa version

42 sats \ 2 replies \ @88db264f12 29 Oct

Favorite country to visit?

21 sats \ 1 reply \ @niftynei OP 29 Oct

this is hard!! i’ve been really wanting to go back to croatia 🇭🇷 dubrovnik was really an amazing place to hang out.

i also really loved japan and taiwan when i visited last month

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @Bell_curve 29 Oct

Dubrovnik is on my bucket list. Also Hvar

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @anon 31 Oct

Nice!

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @Shillohpopi_ 29 Oct

"Happy Birthday! Wishing you a day filled with joy, love, and crypto success!

What's the most exciting thing you're looking forward to in the Bitcoin space for 2025?"

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @OT 29 Oct

Would you rather go to the beach or a forest?

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @j7hB75 29 Oct

What are your thoughts on large payments with LN and liquidity issues with larger channels not being as prevalent?

0 sats \ 1 reply \ @nikotsla 29 Oct

Do you have any news or insight of xpay development? I solved in my personal node with a workaround, but the default behavior of pay is pretty nasty.

26 sats \ 0 replies \ @niftynei OP 29 Oct

rusty had a branch of it in japan back in September, i’m not sure what the current status of it is. i’m also super excited about it

0 sats \ 2 replies \ @realBitcoinDog 29 Oct

Happy birthday!

Do you think we should soft fork OP_CTV or OP_APO or any other covenant proposal, and if so how should we go about that?

41 sats \ 1 reply \ @niftynei OP 29 Oct

fun fact APO isn’t an opcode! it’s a sighash flag, so you’d write SIGHASH_APO not op-apo

APO is my favorite proposal but that’s mostly because i find it easier to reason about magic signatures than constructing complex tx commitments

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @realBitcoinDog 29 Oct

TIL!

0 sats \ 2 replies \ @bounty_hunter 29 Oct

How has your mindset towards programming changed from where you were at with 2 years experience?

71 sats \ 1 reply \ @niftynei OP 29 Oct

i’m a lot more excited about getting stack traces. when i was new in my career, the program blowing up felt like a personal failure, and a good sign that programming wasn’t something i should be doing. now i get excited about stack traces because i like solving problems

33 sats \ 0 replies \ @bounty_hunter 29 Oct

Same at used to yell at the computer like a boomer yelling at cable news.

Now I'm zen like Jack: the solution will reveal itself when I'm ready.

0 sats \ 1 reply \ @nikotsla 29 Oct

Do you have any plans for 2025 in Base58? new courses? renew the olds?

89 sats \ 0 replies \ @niftynei OP 29 Oct

yes! planning to do more in-person and online classes, starting next year

mostly just getting the existing classes (script, sigs, taproot, lightning) into a steady state but i’m also already plotting some fun other stuff

I did a 8 week online read-through of the papers in the white paper this year that I’d really love to start up again over the winter break

0 sats \ 3 replies \ @DarthCoin 29 Oct

Would you be more active on SN, especially answering more practical questions in the "Lightning" Territory https://stacker.news/~lightning ?

For example we had this interesting discussion few days ago: #737285

Sometimes we really need some insight from LN devs, with specific questions.

132 sats \ 2 replies \ @niftynei OP 29 Oct

i’m not more active on stacker news because there’s not a mobile app. i know i know, there’s a mobile web version but i’m a native app maxi.

0 sats \ 1 reply \ @DarthCoin 29 Oct

I use exclusively SN on desktop. Mobile for me is only for LN wallets and answer wife's (desperate) calls.

52 sats \ 0 replies \ @niftynei OP 29 Oct

i travel a lot, i rarely have my laptop open these days. and if it is open, I’m probably working on something or scrolling twitter

0 sats \ 1 reply \ @benwehrman 29 Oct

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!

What is your biggest personal growth goal for your next year of life?

134 sats \ 0 replies \ @niftynei OP 29 Oct

More discipline. both in waking up early and exercising regularly

0 sats \ 1 reply \ @ek 29 Oct

what we’re planning for 2025 and beyond

What are you planning for 2025 and beyond?

1392 sats \ 0 replies \ @niftynei OP 29 Oct

conferences and classes and more content!! i feel like i really learned a lot about the power of working with other projects this year and I’m really excited about doing more collaborations next year

2025 is going to be 🤝

specifically though, some things I’m hoping to get done next year:

btc++ conferences in brazil, austin, turkey, berlin, taiwan
relaunch base58 classes, with a focus on building a network of base58 powered educators and education projects. maybe do our first collab or two for a in-depth class
get liquidity ads shipped on core lightning!! ⚡️ ⚡️ ⚡️

0 sats \ 1 reply \ @ek 29 Oct

What’s the best and worst part about organizing btc++ all over the world?

144 sats \ 0 replies \ @niftynei OP 29 Oct

the best thing is making new friends everywhere in the world. i’ve realized that my favorite way to build relationships is through shared projects, and btc++ has been an amazingly great one to expand my friend graph.

the worst part is all the stress about how to pay for them. i’ve been very lucky to have countless other sponsors and supporters who show up to help make the events possible. if this is you, a million thanks for showing up to participate and make these events possible. here’s to hoping the bull market makes sponsorships an easier thing for partner orgs to say yes to 😅 we started in the 2022 bull run and its been a long bear market to make it through (but we did it, thanks to our friends and community) ❤️

0 sats \ 7 replies \ @ek 29 Oct

Happy birthday!

Any updates regarding base58 in-person courses or a way to subscribe to updates? 👀

1348 sats \ 6 replies \ @niftynei OP 29 Oct

hey! thanks!

great question! I’ll definitely be posting updates to the base58 twitter and nostr profiles. I’m working on our schedule for next year right now!

33 sats \ 0 replies \ @nikotsla 29 Oct

Nostr please :), looking for "Lightning: BOLTs in a flash"

0 sats \ 4 replies \ @ek 29 Oct

111 sats \ 2 replies \ @niftynei OP 29 Oct

is there a class in particular you’re interested in?

100 sats \ 1 reply \ @ek 29 Oct

Thanks for asking!

As a lightning app dev, I’m especially interested in the lightning class. But since I don’t know yet how well versed I already am in bitcoin since it’s been all self-taught so far¹, I definitely want to take the basic class first to make sure I’m properly prepared.

I’m just wondering if it’s better to take that basic class online now and then the lightning one in-person when it’s offered or wait for both. Maybe I can do both together if both are available around the same time? It feels a little like a gamble though haha

I also don’t mind the price tag on the in-person courses anymore. I think it would be a good investment into myself :)

Basically all my knowledge about bitcoin and lightning is from Mastering Bitcoin and Mastering the Lightning Network. ↩

55 sats \ 0 replies \ @niftynei OP 29 Oct

honestly they don’t overlap that much, but understanding scripts + sigs is probably useful for lightning (but extremely not necessary)

48 sats \ 0 replies \ @niftynei OP 29 Oct

🙌

0 sats \ 2 replies \ @orangecheckemail_isthereany 29 Oct

What could be a bitcoin lightning equivalent of electrical ball lightning

42 sats \ 1 reply \ @niftynei OP 29 Oct

is this like zmn’s super scalar proposal??

100 sats \ 0 replies \ @orangecheckemail_isthereany 29 Oct

I will have to look into that Didn't have anything in particular in mind but thought it was a fun question. I like this kind of thought experimenting stretching metaphors and exploring which parts might map back and forth A little out of my depth to be honest

0 sats \ 3 replies \ @orangecheckemail_isthereany 29 Oct

What is your favorite analogy between bitcoin lightning and electrical weather lightning?

1031 sats \ 2 replies \ @niftynei OP 29 Oct

chris guida had a really great analogy at the btc++ in Mexico City back in Dec 2022.

physical lightning apparently does a path finding down to the ground and then the charge actually shoots upwards from the earth? (or something like that)

the HTLC path works similarly in how it makes a lock-in path first and then a unlock to make the payment

21 sats \ 1 reply \ @BITC0IN 29 Oct

Now you're just showing off.

24 sats \ 0 replies \ @niftynei OP 29 Oct

✨

0 sats \ 1 reply \ @orangecheckemail_isthereany 29 Oct

Can a fedimint token issuer give a cryptographic proof of reserves? Is is it possible for a fedimint mint to demonstrate that the tokens exist one-to-one with bitcoin locked in lightning contracts? Is it possible for the user-base to collectively prove this to themselves?

63 sats \ 0 replies \ @niftynei OP 29 Oct

the fedimint observer project is working on helping solve these questions i think.

one thing that isn’t well known about fedimints is that the federation members actually have a whole lil blockchain that records the state of ecash tokens in the system. I’m assuming it also has an audit log of funds locked in and signed for. so that’d probably be the most obvious place to start looking for details about the funds in a mint

0 sats \ 1 reply \ @orangecheckemail_isthereany 29 Oct

At 7 transactions per second every one of 8 billion people could have an on-chain transaction every 36 years. What are some bitcoin lightning scaling scenarios you see as likely? E.g. increase the blocksize 10-fold and have every person move funds between checking account and saving account on average every 4 years. Or an uncle Jim model where most people never touch on-chain. Or a model where large trusted stores offer lightning banking functionality and most people never touch on-chain. Or ...

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @orangecheckemail_isthereany 29 Oct

I meant more to say something like "realistic", "possible", "workable", "practical" etc instead of "likely".

0 sats \ 4 replies \ @BlokchainB 29 Oct

Hello Queen! I took your course. It was tough but will retake. Thanks for making it available.

Okay question time!

How tall are you?

Tacos or pizza?

132 sats \ 1 reply \ @niftynei OP 29 Oct

hey!! really great to meet you!

i am 5ft 9.75” and the shortest person in my family

tacos! especially beef crispy ones

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @Bell_curve 29 Oct

you have a tall family

you are 5'10

0 sats \ 1 reply \ @ek 29 Oct

Which course did you take? Did you take them in person or online?

21 sats \ 0 replies \ @BlokchainB 29 Oct

I took the Bitcoin Developers Basics 02: Crypto + Digital Signatures course

0 sats \ 1 reply \ @anon 29 Oct

Hey the rust ecosystem is developing rapidly, including in bitcoin. Thoughts?

21 sats \ 0 replies \ @niftynei OP 29 Oct

it’s been really cool to see people contributing code to bitcoin in a new language. as more languages pop up, it creates a opportunity for new devs to implement bitcoin protocols, which in turn creates a bigger community of devs that really understand bitcoin 🚀

so yes, really exciting to have a huge rust ecosystem taking off, but I’m equally excited about new projects across all languages haha

0 sats \ 1 reply \ @k00b 29 Oct

Smartest person you ever met?

270 sats \ 0 replies \ @niftynei OP 29 Oct

This is extremely hard. I think Rusty Russell is the wisest person I know, based on how i’ve seen him manage open source communities and the lightning spec process. absolutely the goat at interfaces and apis too.

there’s a million ways to be brilliant, but i really appreciate how emotionally smart rusty is. i dont even know if he realizes how good he is at it. maybe its ingrained after working at IBM forever idk haha

0 sats \ 1 reply \ @k00b 29 Oct

Happy birthday! What do you wish for your birthday this year?

254 sats \ 0 replies \ @niftynei OP 29 Oct

honestly if we break ATH today i will be beyond tickled 🚀 it’s looking bullish!!

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @xiaohong520tyz 5 Nov outlawed

stackers have outlawed this. turn on wild west mode in your /settings to see outlawed content.

0 sats \ 1 reply \ @1984 29 Oct

deleted by author

121 sats \ 0 replies \ @niftynei OP 29 Oct

hey thanks! i dont have any great monitoring recommendations but i like using ncdu to explore disk space usage

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