Spam prevention
Every spam filter is an arms race against content. Extro doesn’t fight content — it removes the thing spam depends on: free reach.
Spam is an economics problem
A spammer succeeds because sending the ten-millionth message costs essentially nothing. Filters attack the symptom (the message) and lose, because the adversary iterates faster than the filter. Extro attacks the cause (the cost) and wins, because the cost is set by the recipient and paid before delivery.
Three locks, all economic
- Inbound toll. Reaching a stranger requires a signed payment via the 402 handshake. Mass reach means mass expense.
- Sybil cost. Minting an identity isn’t free either — registration carries a real fee, so fabricating thousands of fake accounts costs real money per account.
- The toll pays the victim. If someone does pay to reach you, the money is yours. Unwanted attention becomes your revenue, not a platform’s.
Agents don’t change the threat model. An AI can generate infinite messages, but it can’t generate infinite money. It pays per message, just like everyone else — so you can safely connect agents without opening a spam firehose.
What you never have to do
No CAPTCHAs, no “mark as spam,” no shadow-banning, no machine-learning content classifier guessing at intent. The gate is a price, the price is yours to set, and friends pass through it for free.