Several of the comments about the slow uptake of PKI touch on what seem to be two basic factors that are responsible for this phenomenon:
1. Cryptography does not fit human life styles easily. As an example, truly secure systems would stop secretaries from forging their boss's signatures, and this would bring all large beaucratic organizations to a standstill. 2. Novel technologies take a long time to diffuse through society. "Internet time" is a myth. As just one example, a news story I just read was about the great success of online bill paying. This is all very well and good, but weren't we supposed to have that a long time ago? As a matter of fact, didn't Microsoft try to buy up Intuit back in 1994 largely in order not to be deprived of the possibility of controlling online payments? (I have two papers on this subject, one a short one, "The myth of Internet time" that appeared in the April 2001 issue of Technology Review, and a longer, more detailed one, "The slow evolution of electronic publishing," published in 1997, that argue that consumer adoption rates are not noticeably faster now than in the pre-Internet days. Both are available on my home page.) Andrew Odlyzko -----Please note new address----- Andrew Odlyzko University of Minnesota Digital Technology Center 1200 Washington Avenue South Minneapolis, MN 55415 [EMAIL PROTECTED] email 612-624-9510 voice phone 612-625-2002 fax http://www.dtc.umn.edu/~odlyzko --------------------------------------------------------------------- The Cryptography Mailing List Unsubscribe by sending "unsubscribe cryptography" to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
