Author: Rune K. Svendsen 2015-08-10 05:57:30
Published on: 2015-08-10T05:57:30+00:00
The Lightning network provides nodes with fees that wouldn't have been available to Bitcoin miners without it. While the base Bitcoin layer can't handle the transaction throughout as well as Lightning can, the Lightning fees were inaccessible to Bitcoin miners from the beginning. By raising the value of a transaction on the blockchain, the Lightning network enables nodes to collect their fees earned over time by settling on the blockchain. Nodes can attach a higher fee to the Bitcoin settlement transaction and ensure their transaction gets into the blockchain quickly. Miners earn a larger fee and nodes can afford to pay this fee due to earning much more on the Lightning transactions they've routed. The concern is that off-chain transactions like Lightning potentially extract fees that would otherwise be paid to miners if the transactions were actually on-chain. Thus, some wonder whether it's contradictory or even harmful to aim for an environment where many transactions are off-chain. This conflict has not yet been addressed in recent discussions among Bitcoin developers.
Updated on: 2023-06-10T19:07:48.129253+00:00