Zap Introduces Instant Fiat to Lightning On Ramp on Olympus.

Last week, Jack Mallers, creator of Zap, a Lighting wallet that supports Bitcoin and Litecoin, announced a new project called Olympus on Twitter. It is a standalone component and complements Zap, enabling fiat payments in just seconds.

What if you could switch from fiat payments in your bank account to non-custodial Lightning payments in a matter of seconds? What does public onboarding look like?

In an expanded blog post from Olympus, Mallers explains that the project grew out of his desire to remove friction for new users to enter the space and increase adoption of the Lightning Network. Ask yourself:

What if the average consumer has never experienced the limitations and inherently expensive nature of the Bitcoin blockchain? What if you didn’t need to understand the hierarchical complexity of your channels? What if you didn’t have to trust a custodian to own your keys? Anyone who has never experienced Bitcoin before should be able to use a debit card to have Bitcoin delivered directly to the Lightning Network and make inexpensive, instant micropayments within seconds of purchase.

Mallers created a video showing Olympus in a newly installed Zap wallet. Mallers completed the payment and deposited Bitcoin into their Lightning accounts within 30 seconds.

Existing methods of trying to facilitate these types of purchases proactively open lightning channels between participants. However, this still takes time and Mallers believes it is ‘just a stopgap solution that is not scalable in the long term’.

So Olympus instead uses the Turbo Channel, which allows money in the channel to be spent immediately in ‘special circumstances’. In this case, once payment has been received from the buyer, onboarding is possible immediately as there is no need to wait for the typical channel confirmation to occur.

Olympus was designed as an external service that Mallers hopes other popular Lightning clients will adopt. This modular approach has proven popular in the past because it allows other teams to better serve their users while still focusing on key development concerns.

Olympus can deliver BTC in any way it sees fit, including lightning payments, submarine swaps, and on-chain.

Despite Maller’s objections to the KYC/AML process, users using Olympus must comply with existing laws and regulations regarding cryptocurrency purchases. However, it is by no means required for the basic Zap experience.

Olympus is currently in beta and currently only supports Bitcoin purchases. Those interested in testing can find invitations on the Zap website and FiatToLightning.