Paul writes: > the whole installed base is in incredible pain > right now ... Oooh ... let's not jump off the deep end here. Spam is a nuisance for most Internet users, not an "incredible pain." It's very important to distinguish between something that does real damage and something that merely annoys. > ... and there will be a lot of sites like mine who will > switch over early, turning off their tcp/25 service, as > soon as we think there are reasonable alternatives for > reaching us. Don't hold your breath. > ... and the vast majority of non-mega-networks is feeling > no ipv4 pain at all. The same is true for spam. > like i said, the motivation is overwhelming. I don't think so. Apart from a minority of power users, most people aren't exactly fuming over spam. It's a nuisance, like postal junk mail, but it's not a preoccupation. > i am damned close to turning off tcp/25 even if the > only alternative is telco and fax and netnews and web. Then perhaps you should do so. It sounds like you're on the verge of a heart attack right now. > SO, telling me that moving 100M users is hard, won't > make me believe it. And not believing it won't make it any less true. Think IMAP, encryption and digital signatures (built in to OE for years now, never used by anyone), PNG (around since forever, but still practically ignored), and so on. > if newproto doesn't work because the firewall or nat > or whatever only allows tcp/25 sessions, then give up > and use the telephone or fax machine. Wow! You must have an unusual user community. In some organizations, you'd be fired for having an attitude like that. > that stuff is all crutches and bandaids while what's > needed is a whole new monster. Nothing that depends on automation will work, because no automated system can distinguish between spam and legitimate e-mail. Any system will require human intervention. And human intervention is likely to be an obstacle to implementation and compliance if human users see it as more trouble than it is worth. And human users who are not drowning in spam (and most aren't) will be disinclined to favor any kind of human intervention at all. > my reason for making "all communications must be > consensual" as the key design criteria for a new > interpersonal batch communication system is that > it's what i've always believed ... That's equivalent to having a screening device on your telephone that only rings the phone if callers dial a certain number code. This works for a handful of telephone subscribers, but for most others, it is simply not practical. In most situations, you must be able to accepted unsolicited communications, without requiring any kind of prior consent.