Re: Fee Based Email (From Re: Process's PreciseMail AntiSpam...)

From: Christoph Gartmann (gartmann_at_non.immunbio.mpg.de.sens)
Date: 10/01/03 

Date: 1 Oct 2003 07:21:43 GMT

In article <bld6s7$ifu$1@news.mdx.ac.uk>, david20@alpha1.mdx.ac.uk writes:
>>Now to the case where delivery of a mail is unsuccessfull: it doesn't matter if
>>it counts as a message. The amount of these cases is neglectable to the overall
>>number of successfully delivered messages. On the other hand, it is technically
>>possible to do an exact billing, but I think it is not worth the overhead.
>>
>As a percentage of successfully delivered mail messages that maybe so but to
>the user who sent out one mail message and is billed for a thousand it is a
>different matter.

The question is whether such scenarios will really exist. As soon as there is a
fee even for unsuccessfull connection attempts those will be immediately
reduced to reasonable numbers. An average user will send perhaps a dozen
messages per day. I would assume that almost all of them will go through
immediately. From time to time there is one that has to bee resent every four
hours during three days or so. So the poor users will have to pay for 18
additionale messages. Remember, I suggest a SMALL fee, 0.05 $ or even lower. A
fee that will only be high in case of huge counts.

>You seem to be assuming that mail and the internet are a hierachical network.
>They aren't. SMTP is routed over a virtual connection directly between the
>sender and recipient systems (Organisations may force this to also pass through
>intermediate systems ie their central mailhubs if they wish).

I am well aware of that. But I still don't see any contradiction with my
approach. Direct connections between small ISPs, links between companies, they
all won't be affected and be free. As a government I would only impose the fee
on the few largest network companies, those that provide the big lines or
links. What these companies then will do is up to them. There are several
possibilities but I am sure that the billing will go along all the channels
until they reach single customers in various places of the world. It is very
likely that contracts will look pretty the same as they do nowadays, with one
exception: the fixed or traffic bound fee will increase if originating mail
messages will exceed a certain number. This number will vary from contract to
contract and will usually not be exceeded unless something "strange" is going
on, e.g. a spammer starts working at your site or you suffer from a virus like
SWEN, etc. . But you will double your effort to prevent such cases (it costs
money!) or take measures to stop such cases.

Regards,
   Christoph Gartmann 

-- 
 Max-Planck-Institut fuer      Phone   : +49-761-5108-464   Fax: -452
 Immunbiologie
 Postfach 1169                 Internet: gartmann@immunbio dot mpg dot de
 D-79011  Freiburg, Germany
               http://www.immunbio.mpg.de/home/menue.html

Relevant Pages

  • Re: why Bother getting a licence to use a GMRS radio?
    ... contract, to be a contract, must include an exchange of consideration on ... Privileges in the radio service in question, ... and the cash fee. ... dirt-poor people have cars - and the license is not the determining ...
    (rec.radio.shortwave)
  • Re: why Bother getting a licence to use a GMRS radio?
    ... contract, to be a contract, must include an exchange of consideration on ... and the cash fee. ... my beef is not with the appropriate processing fee for a license - it ... GRMS administration costs can be higher. ...
    (rec.radio.shortwave)
  • Re: AOL any good?
    ... activation fee, if they've no guarantee you'll stick around for a year? ... 1 month contract, and new customers pay in full. ... ISP they shouldn't need to offer a 1-month contract, ... Virgin.net was doing monthly contract and no activation fee, ...
    (uk.telecom.broadband)
  • Re: To Tim(back at home) & Alex Heney
    ... If you accept the changed contract, ... In principle the admin fee should be a fixed amount ... allowance for a fixed fee in addition to interest, and the statutory ... qualifying debt, the supplier shall be entitled to a fixed sum (in ...
    (uk.legal)
  • Re: Fee Based Email (From Re: Processs PreciseMail AntiSpam...)
    ... > a small fee for each connection to port 25 entering their nets would be ... Some of those connection requests may fail. ... How is a router supposed to know that a connection was accepted? ... Large network carriers don't send e-mail, ...
    (comp.os.vms)