At 3:32 PM -0400 6/13/02, Harald Koch wrote: >Of all the gin joints in all the towns in all the world, Stephen Kent >had to walk into mine and say: >> >> Why does everyone keep thinking that explicit trust is an essential >> element of every PKI? > >If the reasonably intelligent, technically skilled persons in the IETF >can't "get it", what makes you think anyone else will? > The technical skill of most of the individuals in this debate is not in the area of security. Also, there has been a very big PR campaign for many years that was designed to cause people to equate explicit trust and PKIs, because those who funded the campaign were public CAs requiring such trust. That campaign has been effective in creating a perception among many folks, technical or not, intelligent or otherwise, and it is this perception that clouds this discussion, in large part. But, on any case, it is not necessary for everyone to "get it" for everyone to "use it." Steve