Date   : Sat, 26 Sep 2009 08:29:29 +0100
From   : zeem.uk@... (Alex Taylor)
Subject: OT bbc money,

2009/9/24 Rick Murray <rick@...>:

> Tell you what, though. I don't believe "micropayments" is viable. How
> often have you seen places refusing to accept card payments for less
> than 'x'?

That's certainly the case with credit/debit card transactions because
there's a cost associated with them, particularly in shops (I'm not
sure about how costly web-based transactions are though). I've read
about efforts to create a workable micropayment system that doesn't
use credit or debit card systems for that very reason. I can't
remember but it may have been along the lines of the 'credit' system
you mentioned - buy ?5 worth of credit and then make micropayments
from that balance. I don't think the idea got anywhere though.

> I pity the sorry sod that "monitors" emails. My god, would your sanity
> survive the tedium looking for that one "juicy" message?

For some reason, I have a sneaking suspicion that the monitoring is
automated! My work email goes through a filtering system but it only
seems to be configured to block swear words - I'm sure there must be
filtering systems out there that forward copies of blocked messages to
an admin.

>  You know those really stupid
> ? phone-in competitions
[snip]
> ? How many people get it WRONG?
> ? That's what I'd like to know.

The questions are designed to be extremely easy, they're there to
exploit a legal technicality, If they just said "phone 0870 373737373,
costing ?1, and be in for a chance to win ?5,000", that's a lottery
and you need a licence to run it. Plonk "what colour is grass, green
or red?" in front of it and it becomes a quiz and therefore doesn't
need a licence. I've noticed Channel 5 do some that ask a question
about the preceding programme - usually an easy question of course,
but interesting that it will have required you to actually watch the
programme.

-- 
Alex Taylor