On Wed, 03 Mar 2004, Dave Crocker wrote: > What makes this such an "interesting" problem is the critical need for > spontaneous (unsolicited and uncoordinated) communication is many > human activities. Eliminating the ability to have new people show up > without an "appointment" will cripple some activities. It ought to be possible to consent to contact without an appointment. For example, you could have a protocol that allows you to encode rules like "I consent to receiving messages from new people, provided that the messages purport to be related to certain specified topics, and provided that one of a set of specified escrow agents vouches for the existence of a bond of a specified value to be paid if the message is not what it purports to be". --apb (Alan Barrett)