Bitcoin has proven to be the most successful and profitable innovation ever. This virtual currency technology has evolved significantly since its launch in 2009 by Satoshi Nakamoto. When this digital currency was first introduced to the public by Nakamoto, some people assumed that it was a scam and not here to stay. But this digital currency proved people wrong. Some of the adopters of these digital assets are millionaires and even billionaires. The number of people who buy and mine this electronic currency has increased significantly. Therefore, this electronic money network is continuously developed by its users as the Bitcoin community aims to improve privacy and scalability. So you can transact Bitcoin through Bitcoin Prime and enjoy the efficiency and privacy of Bitcoin.
The original client of this cryptocurrency, Bitcoin core, is on version 23.0, which means that many changes have taken place behind the scenes. Since this virtual currency was first launched by its original creator in 2009, many Bitcoin improvement proposals have been introduced to this virtual currency community, offering various ways to improve network efficiency. Some of these improvement proposals were approved by the network, while others were rejected by the same network. Moreover, the main developers of this digital currency are involved in the development process of this virtual currency. Below is a list of recent developments in this digital money network.
Lightning Network
The Lightning Network is a two-level payment protocol built on this electronic currency blockchain. Researchers Thaddeus Dryja and Joseph Poon first proposed this lighting network in 2005. Their article was based solely on its original creators, Satoshi’s thoughts on payment channels and forum discussions about them. After the 2005 offering, Thaddeus and Joseph founded Lightning Labs, a company that would focus solely on developing the Lightning Network. However, Thaddeus and Pooh released a beta version of the Lightning network in 2018.
In addition, the Lightning network uses smart contract functionality that allows its users to make instant small Bitcoin transactions. These electronic money payments are made within the payment channels, which allows the two parties to conduct transactions freely. The Lightning Network has also helped solve the scalability problem by offering modest transaction fees, such as transactions and settlements where this digital currency takes place off-chain. This lightning network helps solve the problem of scaling by handling billions of transactions per second.
On the other hand, the Lightning Network is not as perfect as it seems, as there are problems that players constantly solve. Ongoing solutions include route building and trampoline onion routing.
Root root
Taproot launched in 2021 via a soft fork. So this is a digital asset update. This main root increases privacy and makes transactions less expensive as it reduces fees and improves smart contract functionality. It makes Bitcoin transactions cheaper, more efficient and more private thanks to the advantages of the fundamental improvement. Gregory Maxwell first introduced the Taproot update in 2018.
With this major improvement, transactions that require multiple parties to sign in order to pass can be bundled together to provide easier verification on the blockchain. This first check helps to increase the time needed to confirm complex multi-sig transactions, which were too slow before root upgrade.
Moreover, the major root update also benefits lightning users by easing network congestion on this digital currency base layer. Verification of Lightning Network transactions occurs on the Bitcoin blockchain, which can cause congestion. Also, taproot offers privacy to these digital money users as it hides multi-party transactions.
Bottom line
These recent Bitcoin improvements aim to expand the potential of this virtual currency and are therefore important. Also, apart from the two improvements listed above, others include FediMint, Liquid Network and SegWit.