-As their names imply, channel announcements are sent when a public channel opens, and updates when changes are made to a channel. One peculiar characteristic of channels is that they aren't symmetrical: depending on the direction, some of their properties may vary. For instance, if Alice and Bob have a channel, Alice may charge higher fees for forwarding payments to Bob than vice versa, thus requiring that different channel updates be broadcast to the network for each direction. Just as balances may concentrate on one side, routing fees for forwarding payments through the channel are set by different parties depending on the direction. Unlike channel updates, channel announcements do not carry directional information, meaning opening a new channel requires sending at least two channel updates for direction-specific data.
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