We take for granted that long distance companies must record who called whom, and when, in order to tally the bill. The 900 redialer doesn't obviate this; it simply adds an expensive level of indirection. Could not the need for such records be eliminated by real-time payment of digital postage? Debit cards for phone calls already exist along these lines, but they are restricted to public phones; I envision home use to eliminate the need for monthly bills and the accompanying recordkeeping. Scenario: long distance company receives a call from one of its customer phones. It doesn't know which phone, only that the phone's local service area provider is requesting a connection. It notes the area code/country to and from to determine the rate, and receives the proper digital postage payment from the calling phone. It notes the destination phone number only in order to pass it on and complete the circuit. The long distance provider doesn't know the caller's phone number and doesn't keep a permanent record of the other information. The incoming d-stamp serial numbers are checked to make sure they have not already been used, added to the used list, and a corresponding amount of time is added to the call. A simple LED on the customer's phone displays the duration and amount of billing as the call progresses. When the phone runs out of d-stamps it could be refreshed from magnetic strips on cards bought at the local drugstore. In addition to new-found privacy, real-time billing would be more customer-friendly, providing the real-time feedback on charges that is expected for most other transactions (eg retail purchase of a good). No more phone bill surprises! (But please, let's not replace bills with rude robot operators: "deposit fifty cents, please"). Alas, there might be regulations requiring some kind of traffic recording to be dealt with in some jurisdictions. But then again maybe not, since such recording has been taken for granted. During the Ma Bell breakup here in the U.S. there sprung up a bunch of Mom & Pop long distance companies. Some of these, providing specialized services, still exist. Assuming no deadly flaws in this real-time postage scheme, if none of the major long-distance companies are willing to implement it, a small startup might rent bulk long-distance time from the majors and concentrate on the anonymous real-time billing system. Nick Szabo szabo@netcom.com