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Collected a number of devices and services that work on the Lightning Network
How the Lightning Network is used: a selection of unusual solutions.
Lightning Network (LN) is a payment protocol that runs on top of blockchain technology and is the main solution to the scalability problems of the Bitcoin cryptocurrency. Thanks to the involvement of a multilateral smart contract , the system can be used to make micropayments. After all, the protocol consists of nodes and bidirectional payment channels.
Now this technology is actively used in practice to pay for various products and services. We have already covered in more detail how the Lightning Network works. Therefore, today we present a selection of existing services that use the payment protocol, and also analyze how successful the idea of introducing this functionality is.
Drinks charged with lightning
Drinks charged with lightning.
Blockchain company Bitfury, which makes mining software and hardware , was one of the first to use the Lightning Network for various services. The company has developed a vending machine where you can buy coffee by paying for it with cryptocurrency - 16 thousand satoshi ($ 2 at that time). Payment processing is done using the Lightning Network, thanks to which transactions are completed faster, and the commission does not exceed 1 satoshi.
To pay for coffee in this way, you need to use a smartphone with an online crypto wallet. The process of purchasing a drink consists of three steps:
While Bitfury is rolling out LN-based payment solutions to vending machines, Brazilian programmer Ricardo Reis used the technology for a Coca-Cola dispenser. The crypto enthusiast claims that the payment protocol helps to increase the speed of transaction processing, as well as significantly reduces the cost of them.
Reis' creation consists of an old water pump, a wooden case with an integrated touchscreen display, and a compact Raspberry Pi single board computer. The principle of operation of the machine is similar to how the Bitfury coffee machine works. To pay for the drink, the user needs to scan the QR code on the car screen using a smartphone and confirm the payment. Of course, the phone must have a crypto wallet with support for the Lightning Network. After the funds are sent by LN to the machine's Bitcoin address, the customer will receive their drink.
Ordering food for cryptocurrency[
Self-service terminal in Switzerland
Energy Kitchen, a health food café in Bern, Switzerland, has installed a self-service terminal. The device works on the basis of the Lightning Network.
Customers of the institution can choose any dishes and pay for them with their smartphone by scanning the QR code on the terminal display. Payment is made from the user's crypto wallet installed on the mobile phone, which must support the Lightning Network payment protocol.
As you can see in the video, it took the user approximately 5 minutes to order, pay and collect food. From this we can conclude: the introduction of such self-service points will increase the number of customers for fast food establishments, coffee shops, etc. Also, this type of ordering and paying for food will significantly save the time of the visitor.
Lunch for cryptocurrency
For cryptocurrency, you can buy not only coffee or individual dishes, but also pay for a full lunch. How this can be done was demonstrated by the specialists of the LightningPeach company, who were also involved in the implementation of the Lightning Network protocol in the Bitfury coffee machine.
Thanks to the collaboration of LightningPeach with the Paytomat payment system, it was possible to implement the possibility of paying for lunch in cryptocurrency with the following payment processing in the Lightning Network. To do this, a restaurant visitor only needs a smartphone with a crypto wallet. Instead of an invoice, the waiter will bring him a QR code. The client will only need to scan this QR code to pay for the order.
Paytomat offers payment solutions for small and medium businesses. So, in August 2018, a company of crypto specialists implemented the opportunity to pay for goods with cryptocurrency on the Bessarabian market in Kiev. Near one of the market stalls, there is a plate with a QR code that allows you to pay for vegetables and fruits using the Paytomat cryptocurrency payment system.
Pizza for bitcoins
At the beginning of this year, the pizza chain Domino's began accepting payments for orders in bitcoins by connecting the Lightning Network protocol. The institution has introduced an innovative payment method thanks to its collaboration with cryptocurrency startup Fold.
Pizza for bitcoins.
Now only US residents can order Domino's pizza and pay for it with bitcoins. For this, the pizzeria chain created a separate ln.pizza web channel, and also registered a website that redirects the user to the payment address.
Fold specialists announced plans to integrate LN payments into applications of such popular services and establishments as Starbucks, Whole Foods, Dunkin Donuts, Target and Uber.
Trips with BTC
Lightning Network payments are not limited to the food service industry. Matthias Steining, a developer from Germany, showed how you can connect them to an e-bike.
The 28-inch bike is equipped with an e-ink display powered by a compact Raspberry Pi computer that is no larger than a plastic card. In addition, the vehicle has a built-in USB modem with a network card, which is required to connect to the Lightning Network.
Steining's payment solution will allow you to easily and quickly pay for your e-bike rental:
Entertainment for bitcoins
Blockstream has developed the Lightning Jukebox, a video jukebox that lets you download songs for micropayments. In this way, the developers wanted to demonstrate how such a seemingly ordinary device like a jukebox can be changed using innovative technologies.
This extraordinary development by Blockstream allows the user to select a song and video from YouTube, scan a QR code and confirm payment. The calculation is carried out thanks to the Lightning Charge system.
According to the creators, it took 128 lines of code to develop such a solution. As a result, the specialists managed to demonstrate how it is possible to monetize certain services using LN.
Lightning Network and art
The LN protocol is used not only by large companies or experienced developers, but also by children. A nine-year-old boy used it to sell his drawings in order to make money on the Nintendo Switch game console.
So, a young entrepreneur sells both sketches and already full-fledged drawings. The sketch costs $ 1, and the finished work costs $ 10. The boy can send his drawings by e-mail and traditional mail.
This is how the boy's drawings look.
The idea of such earnings was thrown to the child by his father, who is an active fan of the cryptoindustry. He created a WordPress site for his son called Lightning Pictures. You can pay for a drawing using LN through the OpenNode platform (a service for deploying support for virtual servers).
Interestingly, this is not the only example of such a non-standard use of the Lightning Network. Previously, the artist sold his creation at an auction for the lowest possible price - 1 millisatoshi. So he wanted to demonstrate the capabilities of the LN payment protocol.
Painting "Black Swan", sold at auction for 1 millisatoshi.
Why Everything Is Imperfect: Lightning Network Problems
Lightning Network technology should accelerate the mass adoption of Bitcoin. However, there are still shortcomings in the operation of the payment protocol.
For example, while reviewing the BlueWallet wallet, Canadian blogger and bitcoin enthusiast Ben Perrin found a bug. So, during the transfer of cryptocurrency to your LN account, twice as much funds were received than were sent. Perrin reported the issue to the wallet developers and they quickly fixed the vulnerability. However, such a bug indicates insufficient reliability of the protocol.
There are also opinions that the Lightning Network does not solve the issue of the cost of a payment transaction in the Bitcoin network. Proponents of the payment protocol believe it will help deal with high transaction fees. They argue that high fees resulting from network congestion will decrease when most payments are not recorded on the main blockchain.
However, network congestion is only one factor that affects the cost of transactions. Specifically, Thaddeus Dryya, co-author of the original Lightning Network datasheet, argues that fees for payment transactions on the Bitcoin network can increase regardless of the protocol implementation.
Why Everything Is Imperfect: Lightning Network Problems.
Also, in LN, the nodes must be online, sending and receiving transactions, and storing funds online is impossible here. After all, this increases the risk of cyberattacks and fraud. In addition, if a node goes offline in the LN network, this will also entail problems. In particular, as Dryya says, if any of the nodes supporting the channel disappears, then the other node will close the channel and appropriate the funds. This process is called “channel closure fraud”.
Thus, although the Lightning Network has a positive impact on the bitcoin blockchain, it is not the final solution for its development. After all, the implementation of the protocol at the global level can provoke the emergence of new problems.
How the Lightning Network is used: a selection of unusual solutions.
Lightning Network (LN) is a payment protocol that runs on top of blockchain technology and is the main solution to the scalability problems of the Bitcoin cryptocurrency. Thanks to the involvement of a multilateral smart contract , the system can be used to make micropayments. After all, the protocol consists of nodes and bidirectional payment channels.
Now this technology is actively used in practice to pay for various products and services. We have already covered in more detail how the Lightning Network works. Therefore, today we present a selection of existing services that use the payment protocol, and also analyze how successful the idea of introducing this functionality is.
Drinks charged with lightning
Drinks charged with lightning.
Blockchain company Bitfury, which makes mining software and hardware , was one of the first to use the Lightning Network for various services. The company has developed a vending machine where you can buy coffee by paying for it with cryptocurrency - 16 thousand satoshi ($ 2 at that time). Payment processing is done using the Lightning Network, thanks to which transactions are completed faster, and the commission does not exceed 1 satoshi.
To pay for coffee in this way, you need to use a smartphone with an online crypto wallet. The process of purchasing a drink consists of three steps:
- first you need to scan the QR code;
- then - wait for the transaction to complete;
- the vending machine then dispenses coffee.
While Bitfury is rolling out LN-based payment solutions to vending machines, Brazilian programmer Ricardo Reis used the technology for a Coca-Cola dispenser. The crypto enthusiast claims that the payment protocol helps to increase the speed of transaction processing, as well as significantly reduces the cost of them.
Reis' creation consists of an old water pump, a wooden case with an integrated touchscreen display, and a compact Raspberry Pi single board computer. The principle of operation of the machine is similar to how the Bitfury coffee machine works. To pay for the drink, the user needs to scan the QR code on the car screen using a smartphone and confirm the payment. Of course, the phone must have a crypto wallet with support for the Lightning Network. After the funds are sent by LN to the machine's Bitcoin address, the customer will receive their drink.
Ordering food for cryptocurrency[
Self-service terminal in Switzerland
Energy Kitchen, a health food café in Bern, Switzerland, has installed a self-service terminal. The device works on the basis of the Lightning Network.
Customers of the institution can choose any dishes and pay for them with their smartphone by scanning the QR code on the terminal display. Payment is made from the user's crypto wallet installed on the mobile phone, which must support the Lightning Network payment protocol.
As you can see in the video, it took the user approximately 5 minutes to order, pay and collect food. From this we can conclude: the introduction of such self-service points will increase the number of customers for fast food establishments, coffee shops, etc. Also, this type of ordering and paying for food will significantly save the time of the visitor.
Lunch for cryptocurrency
For cryptocurrency, you can buy not only coffee or individual dishes, but also pay for a full lunch. How this can be done was demonstrated by the specialists of the LightningPeach company, who were also involved in the implementation of the Lightning Network protocol in the Bitfury coffee machine.
Thanks to the collaboration of LightningPeach with the Paytomat payment system, it was possible to implement the possibility of paying for lunch in cryptocurrency with the following payment processing in the Lightning Network. To do this, a restaurant visitor only needs a smartphone with a crypto wallet. Instead of an invoice, the waiter will bring him a QR code. The client will only need to scan this QR code to pay for the order.
Paytomat offers payment solutions for small and medium businesses. So, in August 2018, a company of crypto specialists implemented the opportunity to pay for goods with cryptocurrency on the Bessarabian market in Kiev. Near one of the market stalls, there is a plate with a QR code that allows you to pay for vegetables and fruits using the Paytomat cryptocurrency payment system.
Pizza for bitcoins
At the beginning of this year, the pizza chain Domino's began accepting payments for orders in bitcoins by connecting the Lightning Network protocol. The institution has introduced an innovative payment method thanks to its collaboration with cryptocurrency startup Fold.
Pizza for bitcoins.
Now only US residents can order Domino's pizza and pay for it with bitcoins. For this, the pizzeria chain created a separate ln.pizza web channel, and also registered a website that redirects the user to the payment address.
Fold specialists announced plans to integrate LN payments into applications of such popular services and establishments as Starbucks, Whole Foods, Dunkin Donuts, Target and Uber.
Trips with BTC
Lightning Network payments are not limited to the food service industry. Matthias Steining, a developer from Germany, showed how you can connect them to an e-bike.
The 28-inch bike is equipped with an e-ink display powered by a compact Raspberry Pi computer that is no larger than a plastic card. In addition, the vehicle has a built-in USB modem with a network card, which is required to connect to the Lightning Network.
Steining's payment solution will allow you to easily and quickly pay for your e-bike rental:
- first, the person needs to indicate the time of use of the bike on a small display;
- then the system will process the request and submit a QR code;
- then the user within one minute needs to scan the QR code using a smartphone, on which a crypto wallet with LN support must be installed;
- After confirming payment, the Raspberry Pi starts the engine and you can start cycling.
Entertainment for bitcoins
Blockstream has developed the Lightning Jukebox, a video jukebox that lets you download songs for micropayments. In this way, the developers wanted to demonstrate how such a seemingly ordinary device like a jukebox can be changed using innovative technologies.
This extraordinary development by Blockstream allows the user to select a song and video from YouTube, scan a QR code and confirm payment. The calculation is carried out thanks to the Lightning Charge system.
According to the creators, it took 128 lines of code to develop such a solution. As a result, the specialists managed to demonstrate how it is possible to monetize certain services using LN.
Lightning Network and art
The LN protocol is used not only by large companies or experienced developers, but also by children. A nine-year-old boy used it to sell his drawings in order to make money on the Nintendo Switch game console.
So, a young entrepreneur sells both sketches and already full-fledged drawings. The sketch costs $ 1, and the finished work costs $ 10. The boy can send his drawings by e-mail and traditional mail.
This is how the boy's drawings look.
The idea of such earnings was thrown to the child by his father, who is an active fan of the cryptoindustry. He created a WordPress site for his son called Lightning Pictures. You can pay for a drawing using LN through the OpenNode platform (a service for deploying support for virtual servers).
Interestingly, this is not the only example of such a non-standard use of the Lightning Network. Previously, the artist sold his creation at an auction for the lowest possible price - 1 millisatoshi. So he wanted to demonstrate the capabilities of the LN payment protocol.
Painting "Black Swan", sold at auction for 1 millisatoshi.
Why Everything Is Imperfect: Lightning Network Problems
Lightning Network technology should accelerate the mass adoption of Bitcoin. However, there are still shortcomings in the operation of the payment protocol.
For example, while reviewing the BlueWallet wallet, Canadian blogger and bitcoin enthusiast Ben Perrin found a bug. So, during the transfer of cryptocurrency to your LN account, twice as much funds were received than were sent. Perrin reported the issue to the wallet developers and they quickly fixed the vulnerability. However, such a bug indicates insufficient reliability of the protocol.
There are also opinions that the Lightning Network does not solve the issue of the cost of a payment transaction in the Bitcoin network. Proponents of the payment protocol believe it will help deal with high transaction fees. They argue that high fees resulting from network congestion will decrease when most payments are not recorded on the main blockchain.
However, network congestion is only one factor that affects the cost of transactions. Specifically, Thaddeus Dryya, co-author of the original Lightning Network datasheet, argues that fees for payment transactions on the Bitcoin network can increase regardless of the protocol implementation.
Why Everything Is Imperfect: Lightning Network Problems.
Also, in LN, the nodes must be online, sending and receiving transactions, and storing funds online is impossible here. After all, this increases the risk of cyberattacks and fraud. In addition, if a node goes offline in the LN network, this will also entail problems. In particular, as Dryya says, if any of the nodes supporting the channel disappears, then the other node will close the channel and appropriate the funds. This process is called “channel closure fraud”.
Thus, although the Lightning Network has a positive impact on the bitcoin blockchain, it is not the final solution for its development. After all, the implementation of the protocol at the global level can provoke the emergence of new problems.
