Merge branch 'sergei_edit_bomb' into develop

01_introduction.asciidoc

@@ -93,6 +93,16 @@ The Lightning Network is a network that operates as a "second layer" protocol on
  * Unlike transactions on the Bitcoin Network, payments routed on the Lightning Network do not need to be stored permanently. Lightning thus uses fewer resources, hence it is cheaper. This property also has benefits for privacy.
  * The Lightning Network uses onion routing, similar to the protocol used by The Onion Router (Tor) privacy network, so that even the nodes involved in routing a payment are only directly aware of their predecessor and successor in the payment route.
 
+=== Trust in decentralized networks
+
+You will often hear people calling Bitcoin and the Lightning Network "trustless". At first glance this is confusing. After all, isn't trust a good thing? Banks even use it in their names! Isn't a "trustless" system a system devoid of trust a bad thing?
+
+The use of the the word "trustless" is intended to convey the ability to operate without _needing_ trust in the other participants in the system. In a decentralized system like Bitcoin you can always choose to transact with someone you trust. However, the system ensures you can't be cheated even if you can't trust the other party in a transaction. Trust is a nice-to-have instead of a must-have property of the system.
+
+Contrast that to the traditional banking system where you _must_ place your trust in a third party, since they control your money. If they violate that trust you may be able to find recourse in a regulator or court, but you would be facing an enormous power imbalance.
+
+Trustless does not mean devoid of trust. It means that trust is not a necessary prerequisite to all transactions and that you can transact even with people you don't trust because the system prevents cheating.
+
 [[user-stories]]
 === Lightning Network Use Cases, Users, and Their Stories
 

03_how_ln_works.asciidoc

@@ -212,6 +212,11 @@ Because Bitcoin is censorship resistant, no one can prevent someone from publish
 
 The way the penalty works is by giving the cheated party an opportunity to claim the balance of the cheater. So if someone attempts to cheat by broadcasting an old commitment transaction, in which they are paid a higher balance than they are due, the other party can punish them by taking *both* their own balance and the balance of the cheater. The cheater loses everything.
 
+[TIP]
+====
+You might notice that if Alice drains her channel balance almost completely, she could then risk cheating with little risk. Bob's penalty wouldn't be so painful if her channel balance is low. To prevent this, the Lightning protocol requires each channel partner to keep a minimum balance in the channel (called the "reserve") so the always have "skin in the game".
+====
+
 Let us go through the channel construction scenario again, adding a penalty mechanism to protect against cheating:
 
 * Alice creates a channel with Bob and puts 100k satoshi into it.