Charlie Lee founded Litecoin using Bitcoin's code, adjusting the block time and mining algorithm before releasing it on bitcointalk.org as silver to Bitcoin's gold. Six years after that initial launch
Charlie Lee founded Litecoin using Bitcoin's code, adjusting the block time and mining algorithm before releasing it on bitcointalk.org as silver to Bitcoin's gold. Six years after that initial launch, the decision to stay tied to Bitcoin's codebase has become one of Litecoin's greatest strengths.
Lee no longer holds litecoin. These days he oversees the protocol's development. For years, Litecoin didn't need much of a development team. The developers would simply take updates from Bitcoin Core, the reference implementation for Bitcoin, and rebase them onto Litecoin's codebase. This approach let Litecoin benefit from the same security practices and code stability that went into Bitcoin, while keeping the adjusted parameters that defined Litecoin from its start.
Litecoin played the role of Bitcoin's little brother. It didn't require extensive development resources in the past, but now the platform serves as a testing ground for features that could eventually reach Bitcoin. Many assumed Litecoin would only test features already planned for Bitcoin. Lee has a different approach now. He wants to implement some of his own innovations on Litecoin.
The code structure separates Litecoin from Bitcoin Cash. Litecoin Core tracks Bitcoin Core far more than Bitcoin Cash's node software does. Bitcoin Cash omitted Segregated Witness, the upgrade that Litecoin activated before Bitcoin did. Lee has written about how SegWit opens the door to atomic swaps on the Lightning Network, tying the two chains together. He wants other improvements to land on Litecoin soon: MAST and Confidential Transactions rank high on his list.
Congestion on Bitcoin has made wallet software struggle with fee estimation. If you underpay, your transaction sits for hours or days, even weeks. Solutions exist: replace-by-fee and child-pays-for-parent. But wallets still miscalculate, and users end up overpaying. Some set fees too high out of caution.
On Friday, Lee tweeted a proposal for better fee estimation. Miners would record the lowest fee they included in a mined block and write it to the block header. A soft fork would prevent miners from accepting transactions below that threshold. Wallet software could then examine the last 100 blocks, calculate the median fee, and set a payment that confirms within a couple of blocks.
The fee data would also reach Simple Payment Verification clients, machines that don't hold the full blockchain. Lee told MiningPool the move accomplishes something else: it creates a fee market with price signals from both sides. Right now Bitcoin and Litecoin receive signals from only one direction. Transactions waiting in the mempool represent demand. Miners' choices stay hidden. This change would expose the supply side too.
