[Lightning-dev] A protocol for requesting invoices

[Corné Plooy]

Hi  ZmnSCPxj,


Thanks for the links. I've done a bit of reading, and this seems to be
the clearest explanation of what the Web Payments Working Group wants to
achieve:

https://www.w3.org/TR/webpayments-overview/

But maybe Christian can give better / more up-to-date info.


From what I can see, their concept is still very much focused on
non-recurring purchases, and then especially on websites. In other
words: the typical web shop use case. The site linked above does however
contain the following text:


"A concern has been raised over the structure of a payment request,
notably that there are other forms of messages that may be initiated by
a payer. There is currently a proposal to modify payment request to a
more generalized "payment instruction" that would be capable of
expressing other messages like subscriptions, preauthorizations,
refunds, and other sorts of payment-related instructions."


So it seems they're thinking about it, but there is no consensus or
standardization yet. The important question: should we wait for this?
How long is this going to take? How bad would it be to first push
forward some simple version of BOLT 12?


CJP


PS. Quote of the day:

"Some aspects of bitcoin are less useful, however. It is currently
impossible to set up recurring payments with the currency, making it
impractical for subscriptions that renew on a short term basis."



Op 09-03-18 om 05:28 schreef ZmnSCPxj:
> Good morning Corne,
>
> You mention URLs in your draft.  This made me remember about the Web Payments Working Group of W3C, https://www.w3.org/Payments/WG/ , of which Decker, Christian of Blockstream is a member: https://www.w3.org/2000/09/dbwg/details?group=83744&public=1
>
> My understanding is that Christian aims to make Bitcoin payments (and possibly Lightning invoice payments?) payable over Web payment protocols that W3C group is working on.
>
> Possibly the Web Payments Working Group may provide better perspective on various other payment use cases as well as their subtleties, which can help inform your considerations in your proposed BOLT12.
>
> Regards,
> ZmnSCPxj
>
>
> ​Sent with ProtonMail Secure Email.​
>
> ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐ Original Message ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐
>
> On March 8, 2018 11:19 PM, Corné Plooy via Lightning-dev <lightning-dev at lists.linuxfoundation.org> wrote:
>
>> Hi,
>>
>> I was thinking of how to use Lightning for various types of payments,
>>
>> and I think it's currently fine for customer/(web)shop type
>>
>> interactions, but it seems a bit inconvenient for other use cases, e.g.
>>
>> salary payments or direct pay-out of cryptocurrency bought on an
>>
>> exchange. I came up with an idea that addresses some of these issues and
>>
>> more (e.g. payee anonymity) by having a direct line of communication
>>
>> between payer and payee instead of BOLT11-style interaction. It's still
>>
>> a bit half-baked, with many details not worked out yet, but you can read
>>
>> it here, and see if you like where this is going:
>>
>> https://github.com/bitonic-cjp/lightning-rfc/blob/payment-protocol/12-payment-protocol.md
>>
>> In true permissionless fashion, I have been so bolD to register bolT #12
>>
>> for my idea.
>>
>> Please let me know what you think.
>>
>> kind regards,
>>
>> CJP
>>
>> Lightning-dev mailing list
>>
>> Lightning-dev at lists.linuxfoundation.org
>>
>> https://lists.linuxfoundation.org/mailman/listinfo/lightning-dev
>