Bitcoin Global News (BGN)

April 02, 2018 -- ADVFN Crypto NewsWire -- The Bitcoin Lightning Network has taken the lead over Bitcoin Cash (BCH) when it comes to total number of network nodes. The development supports the contention that the Lightning Network is the Bitcoin scaling solution that could make Bitcoin Cash meaningless.

There are now more than 1,400 nodes on Lightning Labs implementation of the Lightning Network protocol (up from 29 in mid-January), compared with around 1,300 Bitcoin Cash nodes.

Node count is a measure of network decentralization. Bitcoin Cash’s mining power is centralized in China with a large portion of BCH nodes hosted on ‘Hangzhou Alibaba’ servers located in Hangzhou.

The main purpose of the Lightning Network is to address scalability, providing a much higher transaction throughput with reduced fees through payment channels. Bitcoin’s current throughput and fees situation is dire.

The Lightning Network still has a ways to go before it is ready for prime time. Contrary to its “beta” status, the network still functions as a product in its “alpha” stage, considering that it may be vulnerable to DoS attacks and that we're talking about money.

In mid-March, Lightning Labs secured $2.5 million investment from Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey and Litecoin founder Charlie Lee.

By: BGN Editorial Staff