At 10:38 PM -0700 4/24/03, Bill Stewart wrote:
If you do modify the protocols to identify coin or signature batches, and delete older batches of coins, you have to also refuse to cash them, like checks that say "Not valid after 90 days" or whatever.
Yup, and I'd prefer signature batches, I think. You can easily determine whether which signature was used at the time of redemption. As to the duration of a given tranche, or epoch, or whatever, that would be pre-announced, and probably calculable by the number of signed coins in a given batch, and, yes, you wouldn't have to be absolute in your redemption-expiry policy, particularly if there's still an outstanding balance in an epoch's reserve account. :-). 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'