[SpamCop-List] Re: Gates forecasts victory over spam [Media]

[emf]

Michael R N Dolbear wrote:

> http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/3426367.stm [...] But
> ultimately, Mr Gates predicted, spam would be killed through the 
> electronic equivalent of a stamp, also known as "payment at risk".
> 
> 
> This would force the sender of an e-mail to pay up when an e-mail
> was rejected as spam, but would not deter senders of real e-mail
> because they could be confident that their mail would be accepted.
> ==
> 
> Heh, not the experience of spamcop or any mailing list admin.
> 

Here is the relevant part of the AP article
(http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20040124/ap_on_hi_te/world_forum_gates_4):

===============
Fri Jan 23, 8:57 PM ET
	
By PAUL GEITNER, AP Business Writer

DAVOS, Switzerland - A spam-free world by 2006? That's what Microsoft
Corp. chairman Bill Gates (news - web sites) is promising.

"Two years from now, spam will be solved," he told a select group of
World Economic Forum (news - web sites) participants at this Alpine
ski resort. "And a lot of progress this year," he added at the event
late Friday, hosted by U.S. talk show host Charlie Rose.

Gates said Microsoft, where he has the title of chief software
designer, is working on a solution based on the concept of "proof," or
identifying the sender of the e-mail.

One method involves a human challenge, or requiring the sender of an
electronic pitch to solve a puzzle that only a flesh-and-blood person
can handle. Another is a so-called "computational puzzle" that a
computer sending only a few messages could easily handle, but that
would be prohibitively expensive for a mass-mailer.

But the most promising, Gates said, was a method that would hit the
sender of an e-mail in the pocketbook.

People would set a level of monetary risk — low or high, depending on
their choice — for receiving e-mail from strangers. If the e-mail
turns out to be from a long-lost relative, for example, the recipient
would charge nothing. But if it is unwanted spam, the sender would
have to fork over the cash.

"In the long run, the monetary (method) will be dominant," Gates
predicted.

He conceded, however, that his prognostications have not always been
on the mark. Notable misjudgments include the rising popularity of
open-source software, epitomized by Linux (news - web sites), and the
success of the Google search engine.

"They kicked our butts," he said, while promising a better
next-generation Internet search engine from Microsoft, due as early as
next year.

...