-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 Hey all,
> how about an XML standard, "Digital > Gold Markup Language" perhaps. Nice name :) But I see a pattern arising, I think -- here's what I suspect will happen: * we agree that we want a standard, and it must be simple, not like "that other stuff" which is complex, probably because it's been designed by people that are not nearly as smart as us... * in an open discussion more and more complexity gets added: - someone insists on two-step transactions to be able to make cross-gold-system transfers as one whole; and now that we're defining a standard we "should do it well". - someone proposes a system that allows reservations, payment tokens, fee precalculations, escrow support schemes, ... - someone realises a feature that not all gold systems have, such as a repudiability mechanism, a nifty transaction signature, a currency such as the Euro, or a hashing technique such as SHA-1. * the design evolves to one of the following: - minimal, only defining the common denominator - maximal, but not all gold systems implement it completely - vague, with lots of optional parts and no clue when they are needed and when they may be left out - dynamic, with option negotiation between the gold systems - any mixture of the above * gold systems conform to the standard, but it's ambiguous (e.g. syntax-only) just like "proper" standards such as X.509 and we're still just halfway. I hope I'm wrong... and I'd love to actually be proven wrong... but this is usually what happens to standards, and I doubt if gold is any simpler than "those complex standards out there" if you do it well. - If you do it halfway, is it going to be useful? - If you could also just make some simple hacks based on a clear description of a single gold system, would that not be simpler? - is the number and variety of gold systems really so abundant? Just being cautious, Rick van Rein DNS.vanrein.org -- Domain names payable in gold. GOLD.vanrein.org -- Info about gold-based e-commerce + gold sale to the Dutch. -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.0.6 (GNU/Linux) Comment: For info see http://www.gnupg.org iD8DBQE741r8VVg0GvW60c0RAmHsAJ971H8CtFRvk0lz/7tuL2L4/dnfFgCcDwdC uTkpactfXPaVf9hqZOpGdfo= =Rac7 -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- --- You are currently subscribed to e-gold-tech as: archive@jab.org To unsubscribe send a blank email to [EMAIL PROTECTED]