At 9:45 PM 7/17/96, Jeff Weinstein wrote:
Because we have not yet been able to obtain the address verification databases that we need for Canada. There is someone working on tracking this down right now. When we get the proper database we will add access to canada.
--Jeff
Jeff, can you tell us anything more about what these "address verification databases" are? For example, are they derived from government sources? Census data? (Naw, can't be, for at least two obvious reasons). Voting records? (Naw.) Credit card purchases? (??) While I can imagine various commercial firms have indicators that a "T. Christopher May" once lived in Rio Del Mar (the name of a town I lived in, though not an official "Postal Service" address), I really find it odd that, for example, there would be any database that could "parse" the informal information people provide (absent a well-defined set of addresses and precise spellings). In case I'm not making myself clear, there are no "official" addresses of persons in the U.S! Not even the tax system requires registration of all persons and specific addresses. This has come up in several "voter's rights" cases, where persons with no fixed address were nevertheless able to vote. If I, T.C. May, say my address is Moonbeam Trailer Park, who's to say it's not? Maybe it's where I'm staying with a girlfriend, maybe it's where I get my mail, maybe it's my spiritual home. And yet just which "address verification database" could possibly confirm that I live in (or get my mail at the Moonbeam Trailer Park at this exact moment? Absent any laws clearly defining what one's official name is, official phone number is, official zip code is, official address is, etc., just about anything we choose to put down on the Web form is kosher. At least the MIT system was based on ISP domain names, crude as this is, and not on putative names and residential or business addresses. Anyway, I don't know if Netscape is rejecting the information I'm providing them, as I've been unable to get through in roughly 30 connect attempts. But I'm still curious about what these "address verification databases." Sounds ominous to me. --Tim May Boycott "Big Brother Inside" software! We got computers, we're tapping phone lines, we know that that ain't allowed. ---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---- Timothy C. May | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money, tcmay@got.net 408-728-0152 | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero W.A.S.T.E.: Corralitos, CA | knowledge, reputations, information markets, Licensed Ontologist | black markets, collapse of governments. "National borders aren't even speed bumps on the information superhighway."