A survey in which thousands of social media users answered the question of whether BTC on the Lightning Network can be equated with Bitcoin has stirred up the crypto community.
Lightning is the most well-known and successful attempt to reduce transaction fees on the Bitcoin (BTC) network.
For years, the network was positioned as the cheapest way to send and receive BTC with self-custody. However, despite rapid growth from 2019 to 2022, its development has stalled over the past three years.
In fact, many of the Lightning Network’s performance metrics have remained stagnant for years.
The total BTC supply on the public network is approximately 4800 BTC, the same as in September 2022. The total number of Lightning nodes has also remained unchanged since March 2022.
Despite this, the number of payment channels on the Lightning Network has nearly halved since March 2022, from over 80,000 to a current 45,000.
One of the reasons for this is that Bitcoin has risen significantly in price and is increasingly used as a means of payment. It seems stablecoins are taking on this mission.
Furthermore, thousands of survey participants (80%) agreed that Lightning is not the real BTC. The author of the post called BTC on the Lightning network «a separate token on a separate network,» despite the fact that Lightning BTC has no market capitalization distinct from BTC itself.