From: Robert Hettinga <rah@shipwright.com>
Date: Mon, 5 Aug 1996 00:56:50 +0800
To: cypherpunks@toad.com
Subject: Re: fbi, crypto, and defcon
In-Reply-To: <199608040258.VAA06801@sr.radiks.net>
Message-ID: <v03007805ae2a5c9f04e9@[206.119.69.46]>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain


At 2:06 AM -0400 8/4/96, anonymous-remailer@shell.portal.com wrote:
> You guys are confused.  The actual telephone call may cost only 2
> cents/min, but the accounting and billing procedures are way more
> expensive.  As long as they are doing any kind of usage-based
> charging, that actual act of charging will continue to cost
> considerably more than the data transmission.

Ah. So, why settle the transactions for digital cash and skip all that
overhead? Yet another application for micromoney.

It seems to me that I've been arguing -- for two years now -- that digital
bearer certificate settlement will prove to be *much* cheaper than
book-entry settlement, and here the answer's been looking at us, straight
in the face, all this time.

Anybody have any ideas how to go about measuring the savings between
accumulating, storing, and processing call-billing data and simply paying
for them  before/during/after the call with digital cash?

I hear this strange rumbling underground. Hey, isn't that "Dad" Joiner?

Cheers,
Bob Hettinga

-----------------
Robert Hettinga (rah@shipwright.com)
e$, 44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA
"'Bart Bucks' are not legal tender."
                -- Punishment, 100 times on a chalkboard,
                       for Bart Simpson
The e$ Home Page: http://www.vmeng.com/rah/