Re: Looking at the U in UBE

>The reason that e-mail has been so inexpensive thus far is that it was 
>inexpensive to operate.  Now, due to abuse, it is no longer so 
>inexpensive to operate.  The cost for the operation of e-mail servers 
>and the bandwidth to support them may seem insignificant to the end 
>user.  But, those costs are not insignificant.

If you think email is expensive to operate *now*, wait until you see
how expensive it'll be for everyone to deal with a micropayment-based
email system like the one proposed earlier!

>I am subscribed to this list because I believe that the sending party 
>should be responsible for the e-mail they generate.

I agree.  But, at some point, a receiving party *will* want to take
responsibility for a given email.

SMTP and IM2000 each introduce excess expense into the process of a
receiving party deciding whether and just when to accept such
responsibility.

Therefore, I believe the solution is to design and deploy an email
protocol that reduces that expense while still providing the
flexibility of a range of options that includes the SMTP "push" and
IM2000 "pull" models.

Since SMTP is already rolled out, and IM2000 is "new", it might be
easier to make IM2000 more flexible prior to its design being fleshed
out and its deployment.

-- 
James Craig Burley
Software Craftsperson
<http://www.jcb-sc.com>