On Sun, 15 Apr 2001, Tim May wrote:
The canonical example is of an escrow agent handling a deposit by a buyer of an untraceable killing. When the killer presents the appropriate form of evidence that this happened, and that he or she was "there" (*), the escrow holder pays.
True. This is a case where Esther *can* verify that Bob's goods aren't tainted: there's a body and it's common knowledge. Try this in case the hit must be kept a secret. And how about trade in KP, and other sensitive information? Since anonymous cash is likely to develop online, if at all, I think infotrade is an important part of the picture. Sampo Syreeni, aka decoy, mailto:decoy@iki.fi, gsm: +358-50-5756111 student/math+cs/helsinki university, http://www.iki.fi/~decoy/front