Subject: Re: [Asrg] no e-postage

From: John Levine <[email-masked]>
Date: 28 Apr 2004 03:50:10 -0000

>> 5 billion transactions per day doesn't impress me as proof positive
>> of anything, particularly world-wide.
>> 
>> Obviously if we can deliver that many emails per day THEN WE CLEARLY
>> CAN HANDLE THAT MANY TRANSACTIONS PER DAY! Nicht wahr?
>
>The fact we perform 5 billion transactions with no charge mechanism in an
>entirely decentralized fashion does not provide an existence proof for
>being able to resolve 5 billion charge transactions. ...

Wow, who'd have thought that Phill would write a message and I'd agree
with every word.

Since what Barry seems to mean by e-postage is what other people call
rate limiting and perhaps usage based charging, I wouldn't be averse
to some suggestions about how we might do the former.

Regards,
John Levine, [email-masked], Taughannock Networks, Trumansburg NY
http://www.taugh.com

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From: Barry Shein <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 28 Apr 2004 16:55:05 -0400

> Wow, who'd have thought that Phill would write a message and I'd agree

Not surprising since he did a chop-job on my note to turn it into a
straw-man to argue with.

 > to some suggestions about how we might do the former.

Since you're adverse to usage-based charging who gets to decide who
gets what limit in a rate-limiting scheme?

You?

Shall we just make you Commissar of E-Mail right now and let you lay
down the rules of what content is worthy and what is not and how we
may go about enforcing such a regimen?

Because that's what's being sold here.

If you don't just let people pay for what they use then either you
will have vast resource abuse as we have now, or someone gets to
decide how much they get to use, and why, by some other means, by
making rules and having the power to enforce those rules.

Me, I'd rather go into the post office and pay 37c to buy a stamp to
mail a letter than try to convince the guy behind the counter that the
contents of my letter conform to the postmaster-general's rules and
should be of sufficient interest to the intended recipient that they
should deliver it for free.

-- 
        -Barry Shein

Software Tool & Die    | [email-masked]           | http://www.TheWorld.com
Purveyors to the Trade | Voice: 617-739-0202        | Login: 617-739-WRLD
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From: "Roger B.A. Klorese " <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 28 Apr 2004 14:59:09 -0700

> > >> CAN HANDLE THAT MANY TRANSACTIONS PER DAY! Nicht wahr?

Nein.

Using your own analogy:

What if I could negotiate permission with the postmaster by phone and in 
lots of 1000 permissions, but could only buy postage at the post office, 
could only mail letters in envelopes that were pre-printed with the 
postage, could only buy one envelope at a time, and could only pay in 
pennies?

There is reason to believe that the processing and data management 
backends for postage management will dwarf the costs of the dumbwork of 
moving the mail itself.