On 8/4/2015 4:27 AM, Pieter Wuille via bitcoin-dev wrote: > Don't turn Bitcoin into something uninteresting, please.
Consider how Bob will receive money using the Lightning Network. Bob receives a payment by applying a contract to his local payment channel, increasing the amount payable to him when the channel is closed. There are two possible sources of funding for Bob's increased claim. They can appear alone, or in combination: Funding Source (1) A deposit from Bob's payment hub Bob can receive funds, if his payment hub has made a deposit to the channel. Another name for this is "credit". This credit has no default risk: Bob cannot just take payment hub's deposit. But neither can Bob receive money, unless payment hub has advanced it to the channel (or (2) below applies). Nothing requires the payment hub to do this. This is a 3rd-party dependency totally absent with plain old bitcoin. It will come with a fee and, in an important way, it is worse than the current banking system. If a bank will not even open an account for Bob today, why would a payment hub lock up hard bitcoin to allow Bob to be paid through a Poon-Dryja channel? Funding Source (2) Bob's previous spends If Bob has previously spent from the channel, decreasing his claim on its funds (which he could have deposited himself), that claim can be re-increased. To avoid needing credit (1), Bob has an incentive to consolidate spending and income in the same payment channel, just as with today's banks. This is at odds with the idea that Bob will have accounts with many payment hubs. It is an incentive for centralization. With Lightning Network, Bob will need a powerful middleman to send and receive money effectively. *That* is uninteresting to me. _______________________________________________ bitcoin-dev mailing list bitcoin-dev@lists.linuxfoundation.org https://lists.linuxfoundation.org/mailman/listinfo/bitcoin-dev
