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Re: Ecash naysayers
On Sat, 4 Jan 1997, Robert Hettinga wrote:
>
> --- begin forwarded text
>
>
> ------------------------------
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> Date: Fri, 3 Jan 1997 17:02:52 -0500
> From: Roderick Simpson <[email protected]>
> To: Multiple recipients of list <[email protected]>
> Subject: Ecash naysayers
>
> Anyone heard a convincing naysayer of electronic cash? Who were they?
>
> Best,
> Rod
The propblem with that question is that as phrased it stacks the deck
in favor of electronic cash. What is "convincing"? Find someone with a
cogent critique of an electronic payments scheme or scheme, and I can
guarantee that I can find someone, very likely on the WIRED editorial
staff, who won't be "convinced" by it. What is a "naysayer"? Someone
who presents a detailed critical technical analysis of a payments
scheme? Someone who thinks that electronic payments represent the
Number of the Beast and are a sign of the coming Apocalypse? Lastly,
what is "electronic cash"? Chaumian anonymous digital cash? Transmission
of credit card data?
The question is so poorly phrased as to be almost impossible to
intelligently answer "yes". Somewhere in it there is buried a real
question with a real answer. Maybe Roderick Simpson will tell us
what it is.
PS: I'm *not* a electronic cash naysayer.
Alan Bostick | To achieve harmony in bad taste is the height
mailto:[email protected] | of elegance.
news:alt.grelb | Jean Genet
http://www.alumni.caltech.edu/~abostick