Subject: RE: [Asrg] Economic model is borken. (sic.) Let's fix it

From: "Hallam-Baker, Phillip" <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 8 Mar 2003 10:29:47 -0800

> by using stamps, you will eliminate any need for special 
> white listing, domain 
> authentication, complicated dns reverse lookup rules and can 
> be implemented 
> quickly and easily without major changes to infrastructure.

Changing from a model in which email is free to one where there 
is a per message charge *IS* a major change to the infrastructure.

This is like saying that its a long way to go down the street
to the convenience store so lets climb Mount Everest instead.

Instead of taking infrastructure change as an impossible task
lets look at the reasons why.

The IETF has not shown much ability to achieve major infrastructure
changes in the past. When I first started attending IETFs ten years
ago the three big problems were deploying security for DNS, deploying
security for IP and transitioning from the 32 bit address space. To
date none of those transitions have been achieved. IPSEC is the only
protocol of the three that is widely deployed and used - but it is
only addressing the VPN space which is not what it was designed for.

There have been infrastructure changes that have taken place, they are
all incremental changes on existing specifications.

I think that the main reason that the DNSSEC, IPSEC and IPv6 have 
failled thus far is because the people writing the specs have not
put the effort into convincing the vendor community to deploy. A
lot of people have the idea that you get a spec through the IETF
and then everyone implements it. Well it never worked like that
ever.

To get people to implement XKMS I started by working with Microsoft, 
webMethods and two major banks. We approached our competitors for
support when we started the W3C working group. We are still working
with vendors getting XKMS built into products - with some success 
but we are far from finished.

Changing the infrastructure is not impossible, we just need to go
about it in the right way. Make sure that we co-opt the major ISPs
and software providers as part of the solution.

Another problem with the IPSEC/DNSEC/IPv6 deployment is that the
IETF proposals were overly complex and either proposed too late 
to meet market needs or the market did not see a need for them.

I think that all of these problems are completely fixable. I do
not believe that moving from a free mail system to a pay per
message system is viable.

		Phill
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From: "Eric S. Johansson" <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 11 Mar 2003 13:24:16 -0500

> is a per message charge *IS* a major change to the infrastructure.

maybe it's a perspective difference.  Adding postage to e-mail is no more 
difficult than adding some headers and having filters to operate on those 
headers.  It's something that is an end client change.  It does not require any 
changes to SMTP, mail servers, dns, or the legal system.  It is well 
bounded/localized in terms of what must be changed.  It can be implemented as an 
add-on proxy or a plug-in.

> to the convenience store so lets climb Mount Everest instead.

well that all depends on where you are, how high you climb Mount Everest, and 
where the convenience store is.

> lets look at the reasons why.

this is a really good description and I appreciate you taking the time to write 
it.  This is one of the reasons why I think changes to SMTP are doomed to failure.

> I do

obviously, I differ.  Also remember that payment is not in terms of money but in 
terms of cycles which most people have an abundance of.

One question I have for you is: would you be willing to try an experiment with 
sender pays?

---eric

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From: Vernon Schryver <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 11 Mar 2003 11:37:35 -0700 (MST)

> From: "Eric S. Johansson" <[email-masked]>

> ...
> headers.  It's something that is an end client change. ...

If adding some headers and having filters operate on those is so
trivial, then why is it that most legitimate bulk mail still does not
contain RFC 2919 and RFC 2369 headers?  RFC 2369 is 5 years old.

The most reliable RFC 2822 header indication of bulk mail is the
absense of a Message-ID header.

Vernon Schryver    [email-masked]
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From: [email-masked] (Justin Mason)
Date: Thu, 13 Mar 2003 15:52:31 -0800

> contain RFC 2919 and RFC 2369 headers?  RFC 2369 is 5 years old.

Yes!  Legit bulk mailers should really try to generate
standards-compliant messages; it'd really help them avoid
becoming filter false-positives.  (I'd say most content filters,
even bayes ones that read the headers, are likely to run into
this problem.)

Good indication, BTW, that any technical solution we come
up with here, may take a long time to get into legit
bulk mail systems... :(

> absense of a Message-ID header.

And, sadly, where it occurs in non-spam mail, it's a
good indicator that it's sent by a legit,
mainstream large-scale bulk mailer. :(

--j.