Joseph Poon & Tadge Dryja: Scalability and the Lightning Network

Since Gavin Andresen’s proposal to increase the Bitcoin block size, how Bitcoin can scale to accommodate higher transaction volumes has been heatedly debated among developers. One of the most promising long-term options to allow near infinite scalability is the Lightning Network. Joseph Poon and , the co-authors of the whitepaper, joined us for a discussion of scalability and how the lightning network could allow massive numbers of off-chain transaction in a trustless way.

Topics covered in this episode:

• Why Bitcoin has a scalability problem
• How payment channels work and the architecture of the Lightning Network
• Why the Lightning Network would still require a block size increase
• How transaction fees would work in the Lightning Network
• How the Bitcoin blockchain would take on a court-like function to ensure honest off-chain behavior
• The risks and downsides to the Lightning Network

Episode links:

• Gavin Andresen - Why Increasing the Block Size is Urgent
• Mike Hearn - The Capacity Cliff
• Mike Hearn - Crash Landing
• Rusty Russell - Series on the Lightning Network Part 1
• Rusty Russell - Series on the Lightning Network Part 2
• Rusty Russell - Series on the Lightning Network Part 3
• Rusty Russell - Series on the Lightning Network Part 4
• Lightning Network Whitepaper
• Lightning Network website

This episode is hosted by Brian Fabian Crain and Sébastien Couture. Show notes and listening options: epicenter.tv/080