Lightning on the Bitcoin Beach Wallet
with Nicolas Burtey
The lightning network is not going to build and scale itself. Hard work needs to be put into making sure the lightning network is a safe and secure channel for making payments of all sizes with Bitcoin. Additionally, there are tough usability challenges that need to be solved in order to make the experience of using the lightning network simple for users from any technical background. These are some of the challenges that Nicolas Burtey from Galoy Money has decided to focus on. His company builds the Bitcoin Beach Wallet, a custodial lightning wallet. The Bitcoin Beach Wallet is one of the lightning wallets in use by the now-famous Bitcoin Beach project in El Salvador.
A Community Based Approach
Bitcoin Beach Wallet is a simple, zero-configuration lightning wallet. As such, it is ideal for people who are completely new to the world of Bitcoin. Key management and the fear of losing funds is top of mind for those who are beginning to be initiated into using Bitcoin. The Bitcoin Beach Wallet removes these fears by providing a simple and easy user interface. Nicolas Burtey explains that the Bitcoin Beach Wallet is uniquely positioned to form lightning network based community banks, due to its custodial approach. This is exactly what he saw manifest in Bitcoin Beach in El Salvador. The director of Bitcoin Beach, Michael Peterson co-administrates the lightning node that serves thousands of El Zonte community members. Users are free to withdraw their funds from the “community” lightning wallet at any point and time. The ideal scenario would be for individuals to familiarize themselves with the nuances of key management before taking it upon themselves to “be their own bank” so to speak.
Nicolas Burtey Builds GaloyMoney
GaloyMoney is open source, community based Bitcoin banking software. The Bitcoin Beach Wallet integrates directly into GaloyMoney, due to the interoperability of the lightning network. It was important for GaloyMoney to maintain an open source codebase for a couple of reasons. The first is to remain close to the ethos of transparency embedded deep within the Bitcoin mindset. The other is to allow for maximum configurability when growing and scaling a new lightning network based community bank. Every community has their own unique needs and demands for how they will end up using Bitcoin. One community may be more technically adept than the other, while another has a large need to facilitate remittances through an application like Strike. Keeping the wallet open sourced means that anyone can fork the codebase, and modify it according to their own unique needs.
Bitcoin Beach is a Replicable Experiment
One of the exciting things about Bitcoin Beach is that this experiment is open for the world to see. The technologies being used to improve the quality of life for the 3000 people living in El Zonte, are all open source. What this ultimately means is that Bitcoin Beach is able to be replicated in other parts of the world. Nicolas Burtey is receiving inquiries for exactly this proposition. More than 30 communities from around the world have reached out to Nicolas and their company Galoy Money to deploy similar infrastructure as to the community bank that is present at Bitcoin Beach.
One of the issues that Nicolas is facing with his company is simply the rate at which they can feasible scale their technology. As mentioned above, each community has their own unique wants and needs. Developers are needed to customize the technology, and work with community leaders to make sure they have the implementation correctly implemented for community members.
Building Lightning in the Midst of the DeFi Frenzy
There is certainly less money to be made working on lightning, than the latest DeFi protocol. That hasn’t stopped Galoy Money, or Brad Mills from participating in the development of the lightning network. If anything, it has energized Brad to seek out the companies that are doing work on lightning in an effort to promote their technology, and their mission. Brad ends the podcast with a call to arms from the Bitcoin community. It is a call to fund Bitcoin developers, and companies who are choosing to develop on the lightning network. At the end of the day, the lightning network is not going to fund and build itself, so it is up to the people that want to see Bitcoin succeed as a payments technology to fund the technology that will get us there. That is now, and will be, the lightning network.
Timestamps
00:00:00: Podcast Start and Introduction
00:03:40: Nicolas’s Introduction and conversation begins by talking about Bitcoin Beach
00:05:50: Nicolas’s backstory as someone who got into VR, then cryptocurrency through Ethereum
00:09:07: Nicholas starts looking into the lightning network from a payments perspective
00:14:32: Investors are sleeping on the lightning network, DeFi attracting Investors through deceptively enticing ROI
00:18:25: What it is like building on the lightning network
00:24:02: Building the Bitcoin Beach community with Michael Peterson
00:27:20: Discussion on Custodial vs Non-Custody Wallets. Bitcoin Beach Wallet is Custodial and acts as a sort of Community Bank
00:29:00: How is the Bitcoin Beach Wallet scaling?
00:31:28: Economics of El Zonte and El Salvador
00:35:20: People trading in El Salvador, should people even try trading?
00:37:38: What does it take to scale the Bitcoin Beach Wallet?
00:40:50: How to help with the GaloyMoney Project
00:42:10: Thirty communities have reached out to the Galoy. What is the future of the lightning network in these communities?
00:44:00: Translation of Bitcoin content into various languages
00:47:04: Bitcoin Lessons building bite sized Bitcoin educational material
00:49:52: People travelling to El Salvador to help with Bitcoin education
00:52:01: How to help out with the Galoy and the Bitcoin Beach Wallet. Brief discussion on Proof of Reserves, Liquidity on the Lightning Network.
00:55:00: Outro, thanks and pitch to invest in Lightning Network Companies
00:57:45
Links to Mentions in the Show
Guest Social Links
Brad Mills Social Links
Magic Internet Money Instagram
Produced by Brad Mills - Twitter, Hamilton - YouTube, Jason Sanderson - Podcast Tech
Other Credits: bitconnect theme by schmoyoho, graphics by CryptoScamHub, Magic Internet Money inspired by u/mavensbot, invention of Bitcoin & all cryptocurrencies by Satoshi Nakamoto.