Dark (New) on Nostr: I’m using the hosted option and a single decent channel but there is no channel ...
I’m using the hosted option and a single decent channel but there is no channel management required with the hosted option other than adding liquidity if you want more on a particular channel. I still have a lot to learn about lightning and the app but it seems to me that if your node has more than one channel it’d be opportunistic for channel selection based on finding the most efficient route.
Interested to hear anything you learn.
The main reason I have the hosted service is because I’m not transacting huge amounts on lightning and if there’s a hardware issue, Alby sorts it out. I’m not faced with a potential loss of 1M sats for each decent channel, and the need to replace my node hardware.
I messed around with a self hosted node on Start9 and while it is pretty easy to do, I wasn’t willing to risk a couple million sats and mess around trying to find reliable channel partners for experimentation purposes. I don’t have the time in a given week to be maintaining and troubleshooting liquidity and other issues if they arise. And they do. My Alby service went down for a while because the machine that my hosted Alby Hub was running on had a hardware issue. It took a week, but Alby sorted it out. If it took them a week, such an issue would have taken me a month on my own self hosted lightning node.
If there’s one thing that will deter me from continuing my subscription, it’s the price. Since it is denominated in USD I’m paying more CAD for the service than I think it’s worth just for sending and receiving zaps. But I’m mostly eating that subscription fee gladly every month for now, and treating it as tuition cost and perhaps supporting the network and devs along the way.
As far as node operating goes, I’m quite happy just to have a Core node humming away with Electrum allowing me to connect wallets to it. I just don’t have the free time for a full fledged Lightning deployment. Alby (npub1get…0nfm) hub is a nice fit for users that don’t have the time or free sats to risk, but it mainly comes down to time. The subscription fees that will likely end up being $250 CAD for me this year are guaranteeing that I won’t have to mess around for hours managing channels and solving hardware issues if they arise.
I’m monitoring the experience and how Alby handles billing and reliability month to month and will renew my subscription according to the utility I am getting out of it. For now it’s a pretty premium service just for sending and receiving zaps, but I like the promise Alby Hub has as a means for me to set up vendors to accept Bitcoin.
Interested to hear anything you learn.
The main reason I have the hosted service is because I’m not transacting huge amounts on lightning and if there’s a hardware issue, Alby sorts it out. I’m not faced with a potential loss of 1M sats for each decent channel, and the need to replace my node hardware.
I messed around with a self hosted node on Start9 and while it is pretty easy to do, I wasn’t willing to risk a couple million sats and mess around trying to find reliable channel partners for experimentation purposes. I don’t have the time in a given week to be maintaining and troubleshooting liquidity and other issues if they arise. And they do. My Alby service went down for a while because the machine that my hosted Alby Hub was running on had a hardware issue. It took a week, but Alby sorted it out. If it took them a week, such an issue would have taken me a month on my own self hosted lightning node.
If there’s one thing that will deter me from continuing my subscription, it’s the price. Since it is denominated in USD I’m paying more CAD for the service than I think it’s worth just for sending and receiving zaps. But I’m mostly eating that subscription fee gladly every month for now, and treating it as tuition cost and perhaps supporting the network and devs along the way.
As far as node operating goes, I’m quite happy just to have a Core node humming away with Electrum allowing me to connect wallets to it. I just don’t have the free time for a full fledged Lightning deployment. Alby (npub1get…0nfm) hub is a nice fit for users that don’t have the time or free sats to risk, but it mainly comes down to time. The subscription fees that will likely end up being $250 CAD for me this year are guaranteeing that I won’t have to mess around for hours managing channels and solving hardware issues if they arise.
I’m monitoring the experience and how Alby handles billing and reliability month to month and will renew my subscription according to the utility I am getting out of it. For now it’s a pretty premium service just for sending and receiving zaps, but I like the promise Alby Hub has as a means for me to set up vendors to accept Bitcoin.