LocalCoinSwap AMA August 2019
Transparency and being available to respond to questions within our community is incredibly important to the team here at LocalCoinSwap. For this reason, each month we host a live LocalCoinSwap Ask Me Anything (AMA) on our English LocalCoinSwap Telegram channel to discuss topics that matter to the crypto community.
This month, our LocalCoinSwap AMA was held on Friday, August 30, 2019. It was a live Telegram AMA that gave the LCS community and our LocalCoinSwap traders the opportunity to discuss all things LocalCoinSwap directly with the team!
Hi everyone welcome to the August Live Telegram AMA. The team will be here for an hour to answer any questions that you may have
Q) When going non-custodial, will we still have wallets on the platform? How does that work?
You’ll have a web-wallet on the platform, with the private keys only available to you. We will never be able to view or access your funds. After launch we’ll build in the ability to plug in a hardware wallet
Q) Are there any plans to exhibit at future crypto conferences (I.e bitcoin 2020)? Do you see value in this as an exhibitor or attendee?
The tangible and immediate benefits of large scale conferences has diminished a little over the last year or so due to them being so popular with ICOs trying to raise capital and the market being so diluted with a huge amount of events. We may be still be attending a few, in some capacity or another, however, our focus will be on slightly smaller crypto events as they generally have higher quality and more relevant audience.
Q) Any plans to make trade chats end-to-end encrypted as well?
Yes, this has been on our plate for a long time, and after non-custodial is launched it will be easier to implement
Q) How will the new non-custodial web wallet treat deposits? How many confirmations required?
You wont require any confirmations to begin trading, but it will be up to the other party how many confirmations they wait for before continuing with the trade. We will provide recommendations of course
Q) Hi guys, As you know there is a lot of discussion about FATF and an implementation worldwide. How will LCS cope with this give the platform is anonymous and based in a jurisdiction which would probably have to comply?
Increasingly tightening regulations is one of the key reasons that we are transitioning to completely non-custodial platform. This significantly reduces the requirements of what information is required to be collected by LCS. Users will be creating their own keys, and holding and transacting their own funds.
However, users trading with each other may still be required to collect and transfer information between each other to remain compliant in their relevant regions.
Q) Will it still be possible for sell ads to be visible on the platform without having the underlying funds beforehand? And does it mean that 0-conf deposits will be instantly tradable unless the other party wants to wait for more confirmations?
Absolutely, the advertisement creation process is independent of the trading process. You can still create advertisements without funds just as currently.
Q) In the case I want to use a hardware wallet, will I still have to use the web wallet?
We will be launching with just the web-wallet but once hardware wallets are implemented you wont have to use the web-wallet
Q) Do you plan for supporting both major hardware wallet brands? Ledger and Trezor?
Trezor is my favourite hardware wallet, with Ledger a close second! We’re also looking into WalletConnect and a few other protocols
Q) I also use Trezor, so I should be confident that it will be given priority? 😀
Definitely!
Q) Will it be easy to implement the hardware wallet part? Not relying on a web wallet might be technically difficult to achieve from what I think. Any opinions on that?
It’s not too difficult once we build the proper level of abstraction between the wallet components of the site and the trading components. The only technical difference is that a hardware wallet is providing the public key and performing the signing rather than a web-wallet. Of course it’s still a lot of work to implement, but from a technical perspective it’s straightforward
Q) Why will this be a world first non custodial exchange and will we still be a competitor of localbitcoins?
The key difference of LocalCoinSwap from the majority of other non-custodial exchanges is that LocalCoinSwap will be peer-to-peer (P2P). Most non-custodial exchanges (like etherdelta) are of an automated orderbook type exchange, similar to most centralized exchanges. This limits users to a single payment method (crypto), and limits trading to the order books.
The difference from the other couple of non-custodial P2P exchanges that exist, is that LocalCoinSwap users will be given a web-wallet for all the currencies tradeable. This is something that no other platform has ever done for bitcoin.
Technically we will still be in the same competitive landscape as localbitcoins. That being P2P trading of bitcoin. However, many cryptocurrency enthusiasts are hesitant to store their BTC on any custodial platform (including localbitcoins). Once LocalCoinSwap goes non-custodial, it will open up a whole new market of these user types!
Q) But in the case both parties use hardware wallets, how can a release happen? Does not it require both parties to sign at the same time?
It’s slightly different for Bitcoin-based cryptos, Ethereum-based cryptos, and tokens - so i’ll try and answer this in a general sense.
Upon opening the trade we gather the public addresses of both parties, regardless of if the wallets being used are web-wallets or hardware wallets.
The escrow funding for Bitcoin-based cryptos involves an escrow transaction which locks the funds up so that they can only be released when 2 out of 3 parties sign the release. The 3 parties in this case being the buyer, seller, and LocalCoinSwap.
For Ethereum-based cryptos and tokens a smart contract takes possession of the funds, and releases them based on a similar process (consent from 2 out of 3 parties).
When we open the escrow trade there is a pre-sign in-case of disputes - so both parties sign for the funds to go to them in advance. So once the trade has started we essentially have 2 different release transactions partially created.
If the trade goes normally and both parties are happy, then the seller simply clicks “I have received the fiat” which signs the release transaction the buyer created in advance. The funds are released to the buyer without the buyer having to do anything.
If the trade ends in a dispute then both the partially signed transactions are sent to the LocalCoinSwap administrator. It’s now up to the administrator to sign one of the transactions with our key, depending on who wins the dispute
Q) When will we do another vote for the community?
Once the non-custodial platform is launched we will start gathering feedback on what the next community vote should be on and look to lock in a date for that vote! Until the non-custodial platform is live, we are holding off non-essential development tasks as the whole dev team is focus on this feature/functionality.
Q) Podcasts have been a great vehicle to the masses, and many interviews have been conducted with key influencers in the industry. Are there any plans to engage with any of these influencers to discuss LCS’ key value propositions in what makes it the best P2P exchange in the world?
Yes, definitely. Podcasts are a very important tool for mobile engaged users. We have reached out to a range of different influencers from key communities in various languages/regions and are working with them to determine the best times to begin doing interviews again alongside the migration to non-custodial. If you have any suggestions on key influencers that you listen to, we would love to hear from you so don't hesitate to reach out on here in Telegram, Discord or via customer support.
Q) So as a seller I require to sign two transactions until release? Can you estimate the amount required in blockchain fees for a trade from start to finish? When the platform asks me to sign a transaction on my Trezor, do I get to choose which amount of gas I want to use?
The total trade will consist of 2 transactions:
1. seller -> escrow
2. escrow -> buyer
In the case of a dispute resolved in favor of the seller the second transaction will be escrow -> sellerHowever, more transactions will be pre-signed. This process of pre-signing costs nothing though!
The total amount of blockchain fees will be that of 2 individual transactions. The exact cost of this is dependant on how busy the blockchain is at that time.
Regarding the second part of your question, you can choose the gas on all transactions. It all depends on how long you are willing to wait.
Don't forget that you can view the full transcript in our Telegram channel
Here is a list of Ask Me Anything (AMA) events to read in your spare time:
We would like to thank everyone who took the time to attend our AMA and we look forward to chatting with you the next month.
Happy trading!
The LocalCoinSwap team