Re: [ANNOUNCE] contrib/hashcash.el spam fighter

[Stainless Steel Rat <ratinox@peorth.gweep.net>]

* Jan Rychter <jan@rychter.com>  on Sat, 29 Jun 2002
| I guess this discussion is a bit off-topic, but since it continues
| anyway, I'll drop in: I don't think I will use hashcash in any
| foreseeable future. The reason is quite simple: the price I have to pay
| is too high. CPU time is _expensive_, if you work on a laptop computer
| where battery life and power (heat!) are valuable commodities. Laptops
| are not made for continuous CPU usage.

Actually, hashcash -- not X-Hashcash -- is transparent to the end user.  It
runs at the MTA level, entirely behind the scenes, with no user interaction.
And if you do not run a local MTA then you will not see even that.

Real hashcash -- NOT X-Hashcash!!!! They are not the same thing! -- does
not force senders to spend hours and hours calculating a single hash
collision.  The idea is to make him spend 5 or 6 seconds calculating a
single collision.  That is negligible for most legitimate uses, but for
spammers sending out bulk, that 5 seconds times 5 million is thousands of
hours of CPU time.  That is where hashcash works... and X-Hashcash does
not, so PLEASE! do not confuse the two or treat them as the same thing.

Thank you.

-- 
Rat <ratinox@peorth.gweep.net>    \ If Happy Fun Ball begins to smoke, get
Minion of Nathan - Nathan says Hi! \ away immediately. Seek shelter and cover
PGP Key: at a key server near you!  \ head.
       That and five bucks will get you a small coffee at Starbucks.