From: Anonymous <anon@anon.efga.org>
Date: Mon, 29 Sep 1997 04:03:18 +0800
To: cypherpunks@cyberpass.net
Subject: Re: Digital Postage (fwd)
Message-ID: <db8beb4ba96edeb769df76f1ee41f8b9@anon.efga.org>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain



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Jim Choate wrote:
>> Ecash is in place right now.
>
>True, but there are only 3 systems and it is not clear at all which
>will dominate and be used by all parties.

No, there is only one system which provides anonymity.  It's called ecash.
The other systems do not have the features we want.

There is a commonly held belief that one form of payment or another
must dominate.  This is an artifact of laws which require a society to
use one type of payment.  Historically there have been a wide variety
of different currencies, just as there has been a wide variety of any
"commodity."

>Also there is the issue of security in regards to maintaning
>anonymity when there is such a small pool of parties to use. Doesn't
>take a genius to figure out where to hang out and watch the action.

Do you mean watch the bank and see who is using e-cash?  That might
tell you who is using remailers, but not much else.

>> > -  how do you charge for the postage, per submission? What happens when
>> >    I want to send 10,000 parties the email. Do I still pay the digi-postage
>> >    equivalent of $.35? Or do I pay $350.00?
>> 
>> This is easily worked out between the remailer operator and the
>> customer.
>
>How? There is certainly no clear mechanism in place. Does the
>customer contact each remailer operator prior to sending the traffic,
>thus opening up N opportunities for anonymity cracking.

Can do!  Remailer operators can easily advertise what they sell and
how much it costs without compromising the customer the same way they
advertise their remailer and its features now.

Price setting is a black art.  People running businesses make
decisions based on talking to potential customers, pilot marketing
tests, and common sense.

I recommend that people start pricing at a quarter per message per hop
because it is easier to move prices down than to move them up.

Besides, the remailer operators have been doing all the work while a
bunch of free loaders like Monty Cantsin use their services and then
carp about it.  It seems fair for us to shoot some money towards the
operators for a change.

>If the operators agree to a system how do we get there? Is it time to have a
>anon-remailer conference to settle on distributed payment schemes?

Absolutely not.  The remailers certainly don't have to charge the same
rates.  Each remailer operator should use a pricing scheme that works
for them.

>> Were I running a remailer, I would charge $350.00.  As a customer,
>> I would not see this as unreasonable.
>
>Unless it is pertty serious nobody is going to pay such a fee just to
>send an email around.

What is being sold is privacy and security, not e-mail transport.  It
has great value to me and many cypherpunks.  If you don't value it,
that's your business.

>The problem I see is one of scale. The infrastructure for handling
>physical mail is very 'bulky' and requires a lot infrastructure.

>Email on the other hands effectively rides on the back of an existing
>Internet infrastructure for nearly free.

You are confusing one cost of doing business with the price the market
will bear.

>Because of the historicaly low cost for email this would tend to in
>general indicate a low market value on anon remailers.

Not to people who care about their privacy.  But, I agree that the
price per hop will likely drop far below a quarter, not because people
won't pay more, but because they won't have to.  If it's basically
inexpensive to provide remailer services (and it is), price
competition should reduce the costs.

Monty Cantsin
Editor in Chief
Smile Magazine
http://www.neoism.org/squares/smile_index.html
http://www.neoism.org/squares/cantsin_10.html

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