Re: making the webcredits.org spec more strict about 'source' and 'destination' fields.

On Sat, Apr 28, 2012 at 12:07 PM, Melvin Carvalho
<melvincarvalho@gmail.com> wrote:
>> Good point, I should mark all the fields in the spec as mandatory.
> Done.

Great!

Btw, i think amount should be an number value, not a string value? and
how about making 'created' a date value instead of a string? Right now
using strings instead of data types we're sort of violating the
'structured' star of 5-star open data.

Still, i'm struggling with the vagueness of not the syntax but the
meaning of a webcredit. you say that we should allow people to do
produce semi-broken webcredits, and make the best of it. i have two
questions for discussion though:

1) app A starts to willingly use mailto: URIs as currency, because its
vendor knows app B errors on that. the users of app B angrily phone up
the vendor, and app B blaims app A for diverging from the standard.
Which app is at fault here?

2) i buy your car, and give you a webcredit for amount: 2000,
currency: 'EUR'. after a month you say 'hey, you still owe me 2000
euros!'. i say 'no, who says so?'. you say 'the webcredit you signed
does'. and i say 'that webcredit is in grains of sand. all my
webcredits are. where does it say it was in euros?' you look up the
spec, and effectively, it turns out that the webcredits spec treats
the 'currency' field as 'it can be an ISO code', but nowhere does it
state what that means.

in other words, i propose adding something like:

a webcredit is a document representing a credit, owed by the Source
Agent, and owed to the Destination Agent, whose value is calculated by
multiplying the Amount by the Currency.

The Source Agent of a webcredit is:
- if the "source" field is the URL of a document, then the agent
described by this document (e.g. foaf).
- if the "source" field is the URI of an interface, then the agent
reachable through that interface (e.g. the user of an email address).

The Destination Agent of a webcredit is:
- if the "destination" field is the URL of a document, then the agent
described by this document (e.g. foaf).
- if the "destination" field is the URI of an interface, then the
agent reachable through that interface (e.g. the user of an email
address).

The Amount of a webcredit is the number in the "amount" field.

The Date of a webcredit is the date in the "created" field.

The "comments" field is not meant to contain machine-readable content,
although it might be used to remedy the absence of a  machine-readable
'intention' field.

The Currency of a webcredit is:
- if the "currency" field contains a 3-letter ISO code, the
corresponding real-world currency.
- if the "currency" field contains the URL of a document, then the
currency described in this document.
- if the "currency" fields contains the URI of an interface, then the
agent behind that interface is free to choose and change the currency
of the webcredit at any time (e.g. self-signed money issuing).

The existence of a credit as described by a webcredit document does
not preclude the existence of another credit between the same Source
Agent and Destination Agent, except when the 'created' field also
exactly coincides. There is no way to indicate that a webcredit
represents a 'balance', so the credits represented by webcredit
documents should always be treated as additive, and never as "[Source
Agent] currently owes [Destination Agent] (only) [Amount] [Currency]"

There is also no field for 'intention' or 'gesture', so deriving
rights from e.g. the fact that someone signed a webcredit document is
hard, unless something is said about intention in the comments.
Possible interpretations (it is recommended to add these in to the
'comments' field:
LOAN:
"I will pay you back without delay"
"I will pay you back if at a later time I have the money"

BUDGET:
"This credit is earmarked and reserved specifically for travel costs.
I will pay you up to the quoted amount, but only in recompensation for
travel costs you may have due to X"
"I have no intention to pay you back, unless you get into money
trouble and call on me for help; then i'll remember this credit, and
try to return the favour"

GIFT:
"I have no intention to pay you back, even if you ask me to, but I'm
grateful for your gift"

SALE:
"this webcredit document represents the money i owe you for the blue
Suzuki Alto you sold to me on date X"

Received on Saturday, 28 April 2012 10:53:46 UTC