Bitcoin’s Lightning Network Takes a Big Step Toward Interoperability

The development of a key bitcoin scaling solution has been fragmented to date – but that could soon change.
Major developers behind the Bitcoin Lightning Network met last week in Milan to determine how work on the micropayment layer will advance and how the varied efforts in progress will be standardized. In total, representatives from six projects attended, with those involved calling it a “culmination” of efforts that have taken place since the technology was first proposed in 2015.
According to organizers, the idea behind the meeting was to design rules for every implementation to follow so that the currently fragmented projects (of which there are at least eight following their own designs) can ultimately be made interoperable.
Prior to the meeting, Lightning Labs co-founder Elizabeth Stark said the loose group had largely synched up over a series of bi-weekly phone calls and over technical discussion on the Lightning Network mailing list.
Stark told CoinDesk:
“Without proper in-depth conversations there might be incompatibilities and different ideas. We want all implementations to talk to each other and to work with each other.”

This post was published at Coin Desk on October 18, 2016.