I think the first important thing to note is that running a Lightning node does not equate to using the Lightning network or quantify its adoption, just as running a Bitcoin node doesn't necessarily equate to Bitcoin's adoption and global usage.
Many people in the South use on-chain Bitcoin, yet they've never heard about what a Bitcoin node actually is. They simply install a wallet, send, and receive Bitcoins.
This is what Lightning was designed to do, but basically in terms of making Bitcoin everyday money; however, practically, it is literally costlier to use Lightning in self-custody than to use Bitcoin on-chain.
Aside from the costly infrastructure and the technical skills and know-how required to run and maintain a node, the capital requirement is the main hindrance to having more Lightning node runners, especially in the South. A successful Lightning node needs some significant capital to be constantly locked up.
So, expecting the "unbanked" to run a Lightning node (routing or not) is as good as expecting them to become banks first. That’s backwards.
The majority of people who use Bitcoin in the South use Lightning, but mostly via a custodial solution (This is coming from someone in the South).
So, perhaps optimizing self-custodial mobile Lightning nodes could help us achieve the goal, or designing privacy-preserving Lightning custodial solutions that also ensure easy user exit to self-custodial usage at any time.
Lightning will scale easily through abstraction: hosted liquidity, and exit-friendly custody, not DIY infrastructure.
The important question isn’t whether this happens, but whether we can design it to preserve self-custody and privacy.
At best, I think the Bitcoin mainchain is most suitable for self-custody, while Lightning solutions are the go-to for making Bitcoin an everyday money, but this would come with some trade-off, which, as it stands, that trade-off could mostly be "custody."
The Lightning network was designed for "the Bitcoin that constantly moves, " so custody risk for a few thousand sats should not really be much of a problem, especially if we could ensure water-tight privacy for users.
I think the first important thing to note is that running a Lightning node does not equate to using the Lightning network or quantify its adoption, just as running a Bitcoin node doesn't necessarily equate to Bitcoin's adoption and global usage.
Many people in the South use on-chain Bitcoin, yet they've never heard about what a Bitcoin node actually is. They simply install a wallet, send, and receive Bitcoins.
This is what Lightning was designed to do, but basically in terms of making Bitcoin everyday money; however, practically, it is literally costlier to use Lightning in self-custody than to use Bitcoin on-chain.
Aside from the costly infrastructure and the technical skills and know-how required to run and maintain a node, the capital requirement is the main hindrance to having more Lightning node runners, especially in the South. A successful Lightning node needs some significant capital to be constantly locked up.
So, expecting the "unbanked" to run a Lightning node (routing or not) is as good as expecting them to become banks first. That’s backwards.
The majority of people who use Bitcoin in the South use Lightning, but mostly via a custodial solution (This is coming from someone in the South).
So, perhaps optimizing self-custodial mobile Lightning nodes could help us achieve the goal, or designing privacy-preserving Lightning custodial solutions that also ensure easy user exit to self-custodial usage at any time.
Lightning will scale easily through abstraction: hosted liquidity, and exit-friendly custody, not DIY infrastructure.
The important question isn’t whether this happens, but whether we can design it to preserve self-custody and privacy.
At best, I think the Bitcoin mainchain is most suitable for self-custody, while Lightning solutions are the go-to for making Bitcoin an everyday money, but this would come with some trade-off, which, as it stands, that trade-off could mostly be "custody."
The Lightning network was designed for "the Bitcoin that constantly moves, " so custody risk for a few thousand sats should not really be much of a problem, especially if we could ensure water-tight privacy for users.
Checkout Hosted channels and Fiat channels technology here for more context: https://github.com/standardsats/fiat-channels-rfc
We already implemented this on Valet: https://github.com/standardsats/valet