In the delusional period between sleeping and waking, with Minster FM in one ear and a pillow in the other, I thought up this great scheme for preventing SPAM.

Emails cost you $0.50 to be delivered to a mailbox. When the recipient accepts the email, they choose whether to refund you. Your account would be monitored by a licensed host and you must operate in credit. ISPs would grant users so much credit, like $5 on signup.

Email software would allow you to make a list of senders who were automatically refunded.

Mailing lists would have to be well-funded and well-targeted. Poor people like you or I could still do mailshots, we’d just have to take longer over it. Say with a credit of $10 I can send 20 emails, then as the refunds come in, more emails can go out.

Not sure who would carry the load of administration. It could be largely automated, but someone would have to set up and monitor the accounts for abuse. Maybe the large ISPs would be able to sell it to their consumers … hmm it looks like a tough selling job though, there’s no clear angle that appeals to the disinterested consumer.

And there are bound to be unforseen technical administrative and legal obstacles.

Oh well, I said I was delusional.