pull down to refresh

I’ve yet to meet a single person who’s run a full Lightning node and said, “Wow, this is really my cash cow, and so fun to maintain, you’ve got to join in, man.”
Why would someone invite competition to take a bite out of their cash cow? The incentive for successful operators is to downplay the profitability of LN routing.
Compare that to running a Bitcoin full node, which at least feels like a public service with minimal upkeep. Lightning nodes, on the other hand, feel like a second job at Starbucks—but one that doesn’t pay.
If you aren't getting paid enough with routing, then your node isn't useful enough. Its not your fault. Its not LN's fault. It just maybe isn't a job for you and that's okay!
Also, your full node isn't a public service unless you forward ports and seed blocks. Even then, its not that useful because your residential internet connection is likely capped on bandwidth.
Incentivize Node Operators
There is incentive already! Help people complete their payments, get rewarded! What you suggest is like a welfare subsidy for nodes that aren't helping anyone.
More Lightning implementations need to simplify onboarding. Abstract away the channel balancing headaches. Make Lightning work like a consumer app, not like a sysadmin puzzle.
Protocol daemons are not apps!
Implementations should stay specialized in the core functions and leave opinionated UX decisions to app developers and service providers.
In conclusion, I agree with your case for more accessible redundancy options at the LN node level.
I think most issues with LN node unreliability stem from inexperienced sysadmins going too deep into a tech stack they don't understand, using hardware that's designed for controlling Christmas lights (Raspi) instead of a proper enterprise grade server that's made for critical payments infrastructure.
very based comment
reply
31 sats \ 0 replies \ @C_Otto 19h
I agree.
reply
Based chad
reply