Virtual Private Node

An underrated aspect of Virtual Private Node is users can rent compute and run the software in any jurisdiction.

@GHOST_UDD @notgrubles Fork Virtual Private Node and create an add-on.

@notgrubles Really tempted to give an agent their own bark wallet.

Really tempted to run a Bark wallet on one of these.

Virtual Private Node is built for the digital nomad. When traveling to places that accept bitcoin, think of it as your e-sim for bitcoin payments.

A nodeless solution to privacy, security, and sovereignty is not available. If you want the above, you will have to become abnormal and run a node.

A quick note to Lightning node operators: You do not need to purchase channels to get inbound liquidity, ever. The correct sequence of actions when opening a LN channel is as follows: 1. fund your LN node onchain wallet with a substantial amount of sats (5M+) 2. Open a channel to a good peer, preferably with minimum channel requirements 3. Now you have all the liquidity on your side, which is not what you want. SPEND it with a SWAP on boltz.exchange (e.g.), back to your LN onchain wallet. 4. Use these funds to open another channel. 5. Repeat. Now, you have a nice set of channels with full inbound liquidity. The only channel management you will ever need is SPENDING from your node (unless you are into routing fees game, we are not)

My attempt to protect users from scam apps on the @AppStore has gotten my Apple Developer account flagged for termination - ironically, for "dishonest activity". Unless it's reversed by June 30, all new installs of Sparrow Wallet will fail, and development on macOS will end. The context: since 2023, more than a dozen fake "Sparrow" apps have appeared on the App Store, as recently as April this year. Users have contacted me after losing their savings, in some cases their life savings, to these impersonators. I'm the developer of the real Sparrow Wallet, a desktop app, and I hold the registered US trademarks for the name and logo. I have publicly warned @Apple and the community about these fake apps from early 2024, but they keep appearing. The app @Apple flagged was a placeholder that was never published. Its only purpose was to warn users that Sparrow is desktop-only and that other "Sparrow" apps aren't mine. This approach may have been misguided, but there was nothing dishonest about it. I'm confident this is an automated misclassification that Apple would reverse on review - but I may be terminated before a human ever looks at my appeal. The cost would fall on @Apple's own users: blocked installs and no updates for a tool people rely on, which opens the door for more fakes. If you value Sparrow, a repost would help. @AppleSupport

@Airbtconline Normal people are the biggest threat to Bitcoin. If some killer app comes out that onboards every person to Bitcoin AND zero of them run a node, Bitcoin is dead.

The biggest threat to Bitcoin isn't governments. It's Bitcoiners building products for other Bitcoiners instead of normal people. Agree or disagree?

@EricChennells @spark @sparkbtcbot Automatic channel backups via Syncthing on Virtual Private Node: github.com/ripsline/virtu…

Two separate lightning network companies have now released official skills that don't address channel state backups. A reminder a seed phrase alone is NOT sufficient to recover your funds on a lightning node. However it is enough if you are using @spark via @sparkbtcbot .

@benthecarman @SuperTestnet @callebtc Privacy on Lightning is only achievable via a self-hosted node. Arguably the case for every cryptographic currency. Privacy without responsibility is not a possibility. A nodeless solution is not out there.

@SuperTestnet @callebtc Even if you use a unique address for every payment, you end up looking up the balance with the same IP so its trivial to track payments and balances. There's no real way to use spark privately

Reminder: Cake Wallet talks a big game about how privacy has to be default, but they gave user info to chain analysts, including a direct mapping of user ip addresses to their transactions: digilol.net/blog/chainanal… They *claim* it was an accident. And maybe it was. But maybe not.

Move your Bitcoin off-chain with Virtual Private Node.

Only if you run a Lightning node...

Self-custody is preached from the mountain tops because it makes the price go up. If obtained from an exchange, self-custody puts your life at risk. If there were no exchanges, there would be no need to discuss self custody. P2P is correct.

Virtual Private Node users pay on average 0.00% fees. That is 100x less than Phoenix.

@buckethatbtc You should try out Virtual Private Node: easiest way to learn about and actually use Bitcoin. ripsline.com

Let's normalize spending your sats 🙏

@GHOST_UDD Update Packages: does an apt update && apt upgrade in the background. Update Node: caches the latest version for 24 hours, so if you launched the TUI before v0.6.0 was published, just delete the cache file with rm /home/ripsline/.cache/rlvpn/latest-version and relaunch. Or wait.

@ripsline In system, Update Packages doesn't seem to pull v0.6

Virtual Private Node v0.6.0 is live. Coin control for channel opens. One UTXO in, one channel out. No change output linking your channels on-chain. Blinded paths. SCID alias. Taproot channels. Tor-only. Coin control. All on by default. github.com/ripsline/virtu…

@nvk Used for cloudless channel backups on our Node stack. github.com/ripsline/virtu…

Anyone using syncthing.net? haven't looked at it in years.

Virtual Private Node is one of the more interesting Bitcoin node projects I’ve run across. I tested the download process, Tor default setup, ZEUS QR pairing, TUI workflow, and the trust tradeoffs. I appreciate the work going into this stack. Full Review untraceabledigitaldissident.com/virtual-privat…

Latest Strikes is out! In this issue: - Lightning Trades in @hodlhodl (powered by @arkade_os @satora_io ) - Blinded paths by default in @ripsline - @tando_me bridging LN & M-Pesa for 40M Kenyans - @Core_LN release, and also in @getAlby Hub - @ambosstech paper on ...

@SparrowWallet Congratulations on such an important release @craigraw. Cannot imagine the hours that went into it.

There are many other smaller changes such as bitview.space as a new fee rates source, Electrum transport reliability improvements, and an upgrade to JavaFX v26. See the release notes for more: github.com/sparrowwallet/…

Sparrow v2.5.0 released with: Silent Payments (SP) wallets SP-capable Frigate public server @2140_dev bitview.space fee rates source sparrowwallet.com/download