A thought occurred to me today. What if you wanted to ship something to someone that doesn’t want you to know where they live? Let’s say they are paranoid enough that they don’t even want you to know what state they are in.
Escrow services have existed for a very long time for financial transactions, so that a buyer can guarantee they receive high-value merchandise in good order before the seller is paid. Security of financial transactions is such an important thing that the success of eBay brought a not-quite-escrow service called Paypal into existence.
I poked around a bit trying to see if someone had already thought of an escrow service for package shipments, and could not find anything. This seems like a potentially valuable service in today’s world of vanishing privacy, so I’m surprised I didn’t find someone advertising it widely.
One response to “no ship that’s not crewed by the damned and captained by a man so evil that hell itself spat him back out could possibly have black sails, therefore couldn’t possibly be any other ship than the black pearl”
That is a heck of a good idea. In these days of terror-noia you’d have to take extra steps to ensure validity, but really – I’d love a Fed-Ex -> USPS type home delivery service where all you have to give anyone to receive a package (or mail of a confidential nature) is an account #. There are organizations I haven’t joined out of concern for people knowing too much about me – like the FFRF, whose cause I endorse, but whose membership list I wouldn’t want my name on should we see a second McCarthy.
I guess a PO box comes close to that, but who wants to pay another monthly on top of the inconvenience of having to go pick it up?