I’m learning as well but let me take a stab
  1. Taro is a new lightning protocol proposed by lightning labs who produced and maintains LND. The layman’s idea is taro if/when implemented will allow other assets/tokens to travel on the same payment channels that lightning currently uses. Meaning other things Besides sats can have instant and final settlement
  2. Taproot allows the bitcoin network to recognize and enforce more complex programming scripts using a bit more complex cryptology. For example multiple people can sigh for one transaction and it will look the same on the blockchain as if one person signed it.
  3. Because of the complex scripting allowed on bitcoin protocol now lightning labs developed a née code base that will allow developers to add their own tokens to lightning.
  4. Yes it could be layer 1 is btc 2 is ln and 3 is taro tokens.
  5. Hope this helps! These things are very complex but just don’t give up! Read and watch as many YouTube videos you can and listen to podcasts. Don’t be bashful. If I’m wrong on anything I said above someone here will correct me
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It's not L3, Taro can run directly on chain without lightning, or it can run on lightning
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I don't understand a word of this article. Can someone broad-stroke this for me? I'll give it another read in the morning when I'm more in concentration-mode than I am at night, but it seems like it's a bit beyond me, at the moment.
Big questions to ELi5: What is Taro? What is Taproot? (I know it was added recently, but I was still learning the basics so that had to be pushed aside) How does one relate to the other? Is this considered a "layer 3", since it purports to use lightning? Anything else you can add for a simpleton.
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What is Taro?
It looks to me like a new comm protocol for machines on the bitcoin network to describe more complex transactions than what's easily supported on BTC & LN already.
What is Taproot?
A change to way signatures are able to be included in on-chain transactions. These new signatures all look the same, irrespective of whether they are single or multi-signature. If i understand correctly, it supports multi-sig more rubustly. See here.
How does one relate to the other?
Taro is taking advantage of Taproot. Taproot doesn't relate to Taro.
Is this considered a "layer 3", since it purports to use lightning?
According to @kobie above, Taro can run on chain... which is whoa.
Anything else you can add for a simpleton.
I'm half-jokingly telling my friends to get ready for the real ICO boom as Taro would open up a bajillion cans of worms that (since they're settling to Bitcoin, instead of shitcoins) I suspect will be very interesting to hard-money enthusiasts who have been watching a lot of interesting, distributed, "defi" technology develop in the shit-coin space.
Good luck on your journey.
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