Proposal for Advertising Lightning nodes via DNS records.

Summary:

Tyler and Robert have proposed a new BOLT (Basis of Lightning Technology) to allow domain operators to create SRV records for their nodes. This would allow users to look up advertised nodes and connect/open channels. The proposed BOLT would improve user experience and increase decentralization of the network for "fringe" users such as mobile users and SPV nodes. A side effect of this BOLT would be that mobile Eclair wallet could be updated to accept a domain parameter to specify an initial node to open a user's first channel. This would provide additional means to advertise "official" nodes to ease clients, especially mobile ones, onto the network. However, Christian Decker has some issues with the proposal. He believes that selective attachment to the node of a merchant is not beneficial to neither the node that is opening the channel nor for the network as a whole. For example, it causes all future payments to go through that merchant, which can now collate your shopping activity with all of your other payments, and create a profile. It also creates a network of large hubs that are only weakly interconnected unless the merchants are "generous" enough to maintain connections among each other. Christian suggests that people should be encouraged to open random connections, biased towards strengthening the overall connectivity. With the gossip protocol, we already disseminate enough information to allow nodes to identify bottlenecks and provide additional capacity to bridge them. Tyler agrees with Christian's concerns but notes that the proposed BOLT lays the groundwork for cryptographic means of associating nodes and their associated domains. In conclusion, Tyler and Robert have proposed a new BOLT to allow domain operators to create SRV records for their nodes, which would improve user experience and increase decentralization of the network. However, Christian has some concerns with the proposal and suggests encouraging people to open random connections to strengthen the overall connectivity.

Updated on: 2023-05-24T22:52:20.970130+00:00