At 12:21 AM -0700 on 6/15/02, Morlock Elloi wrote:
The security is proportional to wetware cycles burned per transaction.
I guess I don't think that's right. Sooner, hopefully rather than later, machines will be able to buy things from other machines using on-line cash. The risk will be absorbed by having a multitude of underwriters of cash instead of a single issuer for all cash, so you're partly right. But the point is, you can have an authenticated on-line transaction, at least at a risk low enough to move all kinds of money around safely. Cheers, RAH -- ----------------- R. A. Hettinga <mailto: rah@ibuc.com> The Internet Bearer Underwriting Corporation <http://www.ibuc.com/> 44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA "... however it may deserve respect for its usefulness and antiquity, [predicting the end of the world] has not been found agreeable to experience." -- Edward Gibbon, 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire'