A bell in a garage in Bellevue rang each time a stranger bought a book, until it rang too often to bear. Shel Kaphan wrote the shop and was later moved aside with a grand title. In between, the chapter explains how a card number crosses a network of strangers, using an open padlock; follows Amazon's editors into a contest with a counting machine written partly by one editor's husband; and watches Julie Wainwright spend the money on a sock puppet.
This chapter has not been serialised yet. It will appear on Substack first, and this page will carry its opening when it does.
- In this chapter
- Shel Kaphan, Jeff Bezos, Paul Davis, Susan Benson, Greg Linden, Taher Elgamal, Clifford Cocks, Julie Wainwright, Henry Blodget
- The idea it builds
- Public-key encryption as an open padlock anyone can snap shut and only its owner can open, worked through with two small primes.