BITCOIN RAILS EPISODE 7: the Case for Lightning Maximalism | with Lisa Neigut (@niftynei)Lightning is working through some narrative challenges right now. After holding the title of Bitcoin’s “only L2” for quite some time—it’s recently gotten some competition, not just for scaling Bitcoin, but for attention in the sector as well.Former Blockstream dev and Bitcoin educator, NiftyNei, is back on the pod to dive into why, despite it all, she still broadly considers herself a “Lightning Maximalist.”While Lightning is limited as a payments network—and wasn’t designed for the DeFi use-cases many builders aspire to in Bitcoin Season II—Nifty makes the argument that, for many, that’s all you really need:a high functioning payments network with unilateral exit—which no other “L2s” on the market have been able to execute.Other topics we cover in this episode include:
- How Lightning works + pros/cons of the architecture
- Why payments is an underestimated use case
- Why Lightning has a “last mile problem”
- How e-cash systems like @fedimint will interoperate with Lightning to make a Bitcoin super highway
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74 sats \ 0 replies \ @south_korea_ln 7h
That's really the key criterion, imo, to decide if a so-called L2 is really an L2.
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58 sats \ 0 replies \ @SimpleStacker 7h
Great interview.
For anyone that's wondering, the "last mile" problem describes how lightning is not a cost efficient option for the small nodes that only plan to have a few small channels and make a few payments occasionally. It works best for channels that have a lot of volume running both ways.
The ability to unilaterally exit is a great point. I didn't know LN is the only operational L2 with that capability.
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10 sats \ 0 replies \ @elvismercury 9h
Timely.
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