Re: [Asrg] SMTP pull anyone?

[John Levine <johnl at taugh.com>]

>> SMTP is currently a push protocol and is initiated by the the
>> sender, no controlling that fact.
  
>> But it is possible to overcome the relay problems, IP spoofing and
>> domain impersonation etc,
  
>> by making the servers pull the mails.

> US6192407

Ah, right, the famous Tumbleweed patent.  Here's a better link
with a readable version.

http://www.google.com/patents?vid=USPAT6192407

This patent covers the idea of putting a message on a web server and
sending the recipient a URL to retrieve the message.  Tumbleweed
enforces it very aggressively.  See the list of suits in their
Wikipedia page.

Were it not for the patent, I expect we'd have a lot of institutions
setting up per-user password protected RSS or Atom feeds with
statements and other messages, and sending you mail telling you to
check your feed when there's something new.

R's,
John