(This message is not an official DigiCash message but represents my personal opinions) Here are some answers to issues recently discussed on the cypherpunks list. I do not read this list as that takes too much time, I only read what people that do read forward from the list to me. Stefan Brands is not excluded in any way from the trial. His request was never received at DigiCash. Several others in the CWI crypto group (all that applied) did receive their accounts. There is no 'political boycot'. The ecash software allows for multiple payment protocols to co-exist. Besides the currently implemented protocol and the Stefan Brands system there are more possible systems. We are not fixed in any way to the current protocol. Besides the patent issues, it is not clear which protocol is better. Last time I checked (a week ago, I am currently on the road) there well over 500 or 600 active ecash accounts. But there are another 1000 accounts waiting, and new requests coming in between 10 and 100 per day. As the mail that was sent out explains, the trial is rolled out in phases. The result is that the software is more 'robust' before large quantities of users run into the same problem, in the sense that it works on any OS in any configuration with any network hookup, no matter how 'bad'. (We are not in the business of being a 'network helpdesk'.) Potential ecash vendors have had priorities in being assigned ecash accounts. But they are also 'harrassed' for actually doing what they promise to do. Because we can not support a 24 hour staff and we want to keep response time low, people in time zones close to ours (GMT+1) have been issued accounts first. At the moment we are confident we can scale up the trial. I promise you it will not be several more months before everyone can join the trial. People that run into ecash problems are almost always helped or replied to the same day, and often within the hour. However, some people send their problems to the wrong address, such as the generic ecash info address or the feedback address, which may result in not getting an answer for several days. If mails go to ecash-bugs@digicash.com, the developers involved immediately see the mail and help out, provided they are technical mails and have sufficient information to actually be able to give help. As you can imagine, problems described as 'it does not work for me' without any extra information take a few mails back and forth, and tedious searching in log files, before the actual problem is clear. You can understand the anonimity of the system does not make that easier. People that compare FV or other systems and ecash are really comparing apples and pears. From a business view they may look the same, but how they operate is totally different. Ecash is the only system that allows for full anonimity on the buyers side using public key technology. We strongly believe it should not be possible for anyone to see all individual transactions a person makes. The business model used is also different. We do not charge users or shops a fee to use the ecash system, and provide the ecash software (both client and shop) for free, and give support for free. Unfortunately this does mean we are not getting large sums of money to spend on slick marketing schemes. Just a final remark before totally boring you to death: Some of the people that post unfriendly messages on mailing lists, like Stefan Brands, do so before actually mailing to us. Please give us a fair chance! Marcel van der Peijl Ecash technical project leader DigiCash bv http://www.digicash.com/