{ "model": { "rank": 1181, "code": "thing-q9158", "model_id": "vr.tr.email", "name": "email", "purpose": "Let an agent explain email and how it works, relay standards, security and etiquette, describe variants such as certified email and threats such as spam and phishing in general terms, and distinguish email from messaging apps and postal mail.", "family": "Thing Registry", "category": "Information and virtual systems", "status": "research-draft", "kind": "thing", "plane": "INF", "domain": "INF.MED", "industry": "", "version": "", "url": "/models/thing/q9158/", "tier": 2, "score": 172, "payload": { "layer": "wikidata", "aliases": [ "malicious e-mail", "edu email", "Decome", "email type", "email spam", "certified email", "Port.ru", "HTML email", "TTMail", "password notification email", "video email", "malspam", "spam email delivery" ], "aliasCount": 13, "merged": 13, "knownIn": 172, "facets": null, "markers": [], "lexicalClass": "", "senseRank": null, "alsoRegisteredAs": "vr.tr.email", "source": { "dataset": "wikidata", "item": "Q9158", "url": "https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q9158", "license": "CC0 1.0" } }, "research": { "vercy": "1.0-draft", "publication": { "status": "research-draft", "adjudicationStatus": "unreviewed", "publishableCanonical": false, "generatedAt": "2026-09-13T01:30:35Z", "providers": [ "Claude" ], "breadth": "written by Claude from model knowledge without web access - no source was read, every claim is a lead to verify", "pass": 2, "wave": 3, "engine": "claude" }, "metaModel": { "id": "THING-Q9158", "registryId": "vr.tr.email", "name": "email", "version": "0.2.0-wave.3", "entryKind": "thing", "family": "Thing Registry", "domain": [ "INF.MED" ], "status": "research-draft" }, "canonicalUrl": "https://ver.cy/models/thing/q9158/", "model": { "registry_id": "vr.tr.email", "name": "email", "purpose": "Let an agent explain email and how it works, relay standards, security and etiquette, describe variants such as certified email and threats such as spam and phishing in general terms, and distinguish email from messaging apps and postal mail.", "definition": "A method of exchanging messages between people using electronic devices over networks, defined by standards such as SMTP, IMAP and MIME, in which messages with headers, body and attachments are sent to addresses and stored in mailboxes, and including variants such as certified email with legal proof of delivery, institutional addresses such as educational email, and abuses such as spam and malicious email used for phishing; email remains the main formal digital correspondence channel and a major security attack vector.", "what_it_is_for": "Exchanging messages electronically.", "affordances": [ "explain how email works", "relay standards and security", "describe variants and threats", "distinguish from messaging" ], "distinguishing_features": [ "Open standards", "Asynchronous", "Address-based", "Security challenges" ], "appearance": "Not a physical object; messages in an inbox with sender, subject and body.", "visual_identification": [ "Store-and-forward electronic messaging", "SMTP, IMAP, webmail, certified email, spam, phishing", "Instant messaging is real-time chat; postal mail is physical; fax transmits documents" ], "physical_properties": [ { "quantity": "emails sent per day", "typical_range": "over 300 billion", "unit": "count", "note": "industry estimates" }, { "quantity": "share that is spam", "typical_range": "about 45", "unit": "percent", "note": "estimates vary" } ], "families_and_kinds": [ "personal and business email", "webmail and client-based email", "institutional email such as educational addresses", "certified and registered email systems", "email spam", "malicious email such as phishing and malware delivery", "mailing lists and newsletters" ], "related_models": [ { "relation": "is a kind of", "target": "telecommunications application", "why": "in registry terms" }, { "relation": "is a kind of", "target": "digital media", "why": "in registry terms" }, { "relation": "is a kind of", "target": "letter", "why": "in registry terms, as electronic correspondence" }, { "relation": "is defined by", "target": "SMTP", "why": "and related standards" } ], "identifiers": [ { "scheme": "RFC 5321", "value_or_pattern": "SMTP", "note": "" }, { "scheme": "RFC 5322", "value_or_pattern": "Internet Message Format", "note": "" } ], "standards_and_regulation": [ "IETF email standards including SMTP, IMAP, MIME, SPF, DKIM and DMARC", "Anti-spam laws such as CAN-SPAM and the EU ePrivacy rules", "Data protection and retention rules", "Legal frameworks for certified email such as Italian PEC" ], "failure_modes_and_hazards": [ "Phishing and malware", "Spam", "Spoofing and lack of encryption by default", "Agents assisting malicious email" ], "in_scope": [], "out_of_scope": [], "characteristics": [] }, "sources": [], "structure": { "bundles": [ { "id": "understand", "name": "Understand", "description": "How email works.", "rationale": "Definition.", "layers": [ { "id": "definition", "name": "Definition", "description": "Definition and mechanics.", "findings": [ { "id": "definition-finding", "name": "Definition", "description": "Definition.", "questions": [ { "text": "What is email, and how do addresses, servers, protocols and clients work together?", "kind": "definition" }, { "text": "Is the question about email, instant messaging or another channel?", "kind": "boundary" } ] } ] }, { "id": "variants", "name": "Variants", "description": "Variants.", "findings": [ { "id": "variants-finding", "name": "Variants", "description": "Variants.", "questions": [ { "text": "What are certified email, institutional email and mailing lists?", "kind": "definition" }, { "text": "Which entry fits the specific variant?", "kind": "action" } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "secure", "name": "Secure", "description": "Security.", "rationale": "Regulation.", "layers": [ { "id": "threats", "name": "Threats", "description": "Threats.", "findings": [ { "id": "threats-finding", "name": "Threats", "description": "Threats.", "questions": [ { "text": "What are spam, phishing and malicious email, and how can people recognise them, in general terms?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Is the user seeking to send deceptive or bulk unsolicited email, which the model refuses?", "kind": "boundary" } ] } ] }, { "id": "protection", "name": "Protection", "description": "Protection.", "findings": [ { "id": "protection-finding", "name": "Protection", "description": "Protection.", "questions": [ { "text": "How do SPF, DKIM, DMARC, encryption and filtering protect email?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Which references are standard?", "kind": "provenance" } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "use", "name": "Use", "description": "Use and etiquette.", "rationale": "Practice.", "layers": [ { "id": "etiquette", "name": "Etiquette", "description": "Etiquette.", "findings": [ { "id": "etiquette-finding", "name": "Etiquette", "description": "Etiquette.", "questions": [ { "text": "What conventions govern professional email writing and management?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Which entry fits business communication?", "kind": "action" } ] } ] }, { "id": "law", "name": "Law", "description": "Law.", "findings": [ { "id": "law-finding", "name": "Law", "description": "Law.", "questions": [ { "text": "What laws govern marketing email, retention and legal status of email, in general terms?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Which sources are cited?", "kind": "provenance" } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "context", "name": "Context", "description": "History and future.", "rationale": "Context.", "layers": [ { "id": "history", "name": "History", "description": "History.", "findings": [ { "id": "history-finding", "name": "History", "description": "History.", "questions": [ { "text": "How did email develop from ARPANET to webmail?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Which entry fits the history of the internet?", "kind": "action" } ] } ] }, { "id": "future", "name": "Future", "description": "Trends.", "findings": [ { "id": "future-finding", "name": "Future", "description": "Future.", "questions": [ { "text": "How are messaging apps, AI filtering and new standards changing email, as reported?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Which entry fits instant messaging?", "kind": "action" } ] } ] } ] } ] }, "openQuestions": [ "Should email spam and phishing be separate primary entries?", "How should standards be linked?", "The registry entry has merged aliases naming variants and abuses; should they be split off?" ], "statistics": { "bundles": 4, "layers": 8, "findings": 8, "questions": 16 } }, "draft": { "generator": "vr.draft.v3", "status": "draft-generated", "researched": false, "archetype": "work, medium or creative form", "method": "Written from the archetype playbook - what this kind of thing needs beyond identity and provenance - and from the structure that recurred across 6,333 models already researched by two engines. Applied to this entry by rule. No source was read for this thing and no claim here is researched. This entry carries no facets of its own, so they were inferred from its domain - a guess about a whole domain applied to one thing.", "facetsInferred": true, "nextPass": "A researcher replaces this draft with a sourced specification. Treat every sentence below as a proposal to argue with.", "purpose": "Give an agent a durable, checkable way to recognise a email, record what state it is in, and decide what may be done with it.", "whatItIs": "Let an agent explain email and how it works, relay standards, security and etiquette, describe variants such as certified email and threats such as spam and phishing in general terms, and distinguish email from messaging apps and postal mail.", "characteristics": { "substance": "information", "origin": "conceptual", "agency": "inert" }, "whatYouCanDoWithIt": [ "read and interpreted", "observed and measured" ], "distinguishingFeatures": [ "Names folded into this entry, which a task may need to split apart again: malicious e-mail, edu email, Decome, email type, email spam, certified email, Port.ru, HTML email, TTMail, password notification email, video email, malspam.", "13 finer distinctions are held as aliases rather than separate entries, because telling them apart needs a task that asks for it.", "Described in 172 Wikipedia languages, which is a measure of how widely the thing is known, not of how important it is." ], "openQuestionsForResearch": [ "Which of the bundles below does a real task actually need, and which are ceremony?", "What does this thing have that the facets do not capture at all?", "Which neighbouring kind is most often confused with a email, and on what evidence are they told apart?" ], "whatItIsMadeOf": "content that has to be carried by something else", "physicalCharacter": [ "Does nothing on its own; everything it does, something else did to it.", "These come from the domain this entry sits in rather than from the entry itself, so treat them as a first guess about the whole domain applied to one thing." ], "whatCanBeDoneWithIt": [ "read it and act on what it says", "observe it, measure it, record its state" ], "howItIsRecognised": [ "What is seen is a copy or a performance, not the work. Recognising the work means recognising the content through whatever is carrying it." ], "relatedModels": [ { "relation": "covers", "note": "Finer kinds folded into this entry because telling them apart needs a task that asks for it. Each is a model waiting to be split out when one does.", "targets": [ "malicious e-mail", "edu email", "Decome", "email type", "email spam", "certified email", "Port.ru", "HTML email", "TTMail", "password notification email", "video email", "malspam" ] } ], "standing": "Described in 172 Wikipedia languages, which measures how widely it is written about rather than how important or how common it is. 13 finer distinctions are held inside this entry as names rather than as separate models.", "structure": { "bundles": [ { "id": "identity-and-classification", "name": "Identity, naming and classification", "description": "How an agent tells one email from another, and a email from things that resemble it.", "rationale": "Recognition comes before every other claim. Without stable identity nothing else in the model can be trusted to be about the same thing twice.", "layers": [ { "id": "naming-and-identifiers", "name": "Names and identifiers", "description": "The names this thing goes by and the identifiers that survive translation and time.", "findings": [ { "id": "preferred-name-and-aliases", "name": "Preferred name, aliases and local names", "description": "Which name to use, which names mean the same thing, and which merely sound similar.", "questions": [ { "id": "preferred-name-and-aliases-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes the name of a email, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "preferred-name-and-aliases-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about the name of a email, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "preferred-name-and-aliases-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once the name of a email is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] }, { "id": "stable-identifiers", "name": "Stable identifiers and external keys", "description": "Identifiers that keep pointing at this kind of thing across systems and languages.", "questions": [ { "id": "stable-identifiers-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes an identifier for a email, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "stable-identifiers-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about an identifier for a email, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "stable-identifiers-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once an identifier for a email is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "classification-and-granularity", "name": "Classification and granularity", "description": "Where a email sits among kinds, and how finely a task needs to cut it.", "findings": [ { "id": "kind-and-parents", "name": "Kind, parents and neighbouring kinds", "description": "The classes this thing belongs to and the ones it is next to.", "questions": [ { "id": "kind-and-parents-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes the kind of a email, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "kind-and-parents-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about the kind of a email, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "kind-and-parents-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once the kind of a email is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] }, { "id": "distinguishing-features", "name": "Distinguishing features", "description": "What separates a email from the things most often confused with it.", "questions": [ { "id": "distinguishing-features-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes what distinguishes a email, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "distinguishing-features-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about what distinguishes a email, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "distinguishing-features-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once what distinguishes a email is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "state-and-lifecycle", "name": "State and lifecycle", "description": "The states a email passes through and the events that move it between them.", "rationale": "Most decisions about a thing depend on what state it is in now, which is a claim with a time on it, not a property.", "layers": [ { "id": "lifecycle-stages", "name": "Lifecycle stages", "description": "From coming into existence to ceasing to be one of these.", "findings": [ { "id": "stages-and-transitions", "name": "Stages and transitions", "description": "The stages worth naming and what moves a email between them.", "questions": [ { "id": "stages-and-transitions-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes the lifecycle of a email, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "stages-and-transitions-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about the lifecycle of a email, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "stages-and-transitions-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once the lifecycle of a email is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "observations-and-status", "name": "Observations and current status", "description": "What is observed about a email, how often and by whom.", "findings": [ { "id": "observation-record", "name": "Observation record", "description": "How an observation of a email is recorded so that it can be superseded rather than overwritten.", "questions": [ { "id": "observation-record-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes an observation of a email, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "observation-record-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about an observation of a email, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "observation-record-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once an observation of a email is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "content-and-access", "name": "Content, encoding and access", "description": "What a email says, how it is encoded and who may read it.", "rationale": "An informational thing carries content that can be copied, versioned and withheld, none of which its physical carrier explains.", "layers": [ { "id": "content-and-encoding", "name": "Content and encoding", "description": "The content itself, its format and its language.", "findings": [ { "id": "content-and-format", "name": "Content, format and language", "description": "What a email contains and in what form it is held.", "questions": [ { "id": "content-and-format-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes the content of a email, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "content-and-format-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about the content of a email, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "content-and-format-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once the content of a email is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "access-and-rights", "name": "Access, rights and retention", "description": "Who may read, copy or change it, and for how long it is kept.", "findings": [ { "id": "access-rules", "name": "Access rules and retention", "description": "The permissions attached to a email and the period it survives.", "questions": [ { "id": "access-rules-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes access to a email, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "access-rules-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about access to a email, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "access-rules-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once access to a email is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "work-and-manifestation", "name": "Work, version and copy", "description": "Which level of email a statement is about.", "rationale": "The work, the edition, the file and the copy in hand are four things; rights and content attach to different ones.", "layers": [ { "id": "levels", "name": "Levels of the thing", "description": "Work, expression, manifestation and item, in plain terms.", "findings": [ { "id": "level-rules", "name": "What belongs at each level", "description": "Which facts hold for the work and which only for one copy.", "questions": [ { "id": "level-rules-q01", "text": "For email, which facts belong to the work itself, which to a version, and which to a single copy?", "kind": "boundary" }, { "id": "level-rules-q02", "text": "What identifier exists at each level, and which one is being cited?", "kind": "definition" } ] } ] }, { "id": "versions", "name": "Versions, editions and variants", "description": "How versions differ and which is canonical to whom.", "findings": [ { "id": "version-record", "name": "Versions and canonicity", "description": "Differences that matter and who calls one authoritative.", "questions": [ { "id": "version-record-q01", "text": "Which versions or editions of email exist, and how do they differ substantively?", "kind": "definition" }, { "id": "version-record-q02", "text": "Who treats which version as authoritative, and for what purpose?", "kind": "provenance" } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "authorship-and-rights", "name": "Authorship, rights and permitted use", "description": "Who made email and what may be done with it.", "rationale": "Rights are jurisdictional, time-limited and attached to a level, and an agent that ignores that will copy what it may not.", "layers": [ { "id": "authorship", "name": "Authorship and contribution", "description": "Who contributed what, and in what capacity.", "findings": [ { "id": "contribution-record", "name": "Contributors and roles", "description": "The people and bodies behind it, with their roles.", "questions": [ { "id": "contribution-record-q01", "text": "Who authored or contributed to email, in what roles, and how is that attested?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "id": "contribution-record-q02", "text": "Where authorship is disputed or anonymous, what is recorded instead?", "kind": "boundary" } ] } ] }, { "id": "rights", "name": "Rights and permissions", "description": "Which rights subsist, where, until when, and what they permit.", "findings": [ { "id": "rights-record", "name": "Rights, term and permitted acts", "description": "The regime in force and what it allows.", "questions": [ { "id": "rights-record-q01", "text": "What rights subsist in email, in which jurisdictions, and until when?", "kind": "definition" }, { "id": "rights-record-q02", "text": "Which acts are permitted without further permission, and which must an agent refuse?", "kind": "action" } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "provenance-and-evidence", "name": "Provenance, evidence and time", "description": "Where every claim about a email came from and when it held.", "rationale": "A claim without a source and a time cannot be superseded, only overwritten, and an agent that overwrites loses the ability to explain itself.", "layers": [ { "id": "source-and-authority", "name": "Source and authority", "description": "Who said it, on what evidence, and how strongly.", "findings": [ { "id": "claim-provenance", "name": "Claim provenance and confidence", "description": "The authority behind each claim about a email and how confident it is.", "questions": [ { "id": "claim-provenance-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes a claim about a email, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "claim-provenance-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about a claim about a email, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "claim-provenance-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once a claim about a email is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "time-and-versions", "name": "Time, versions and supersession", "description": "When a claim was true, when it was learnt, and what replaced it.", "findings": [ { "id": "validity-and-supersession", "name": "Validity period and supersession", "description": "How an old claim about a email is retired without being erased.", "questions": [ { "id": "validity-and-supersession-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes the validity of a claim about a email, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "validity-and-supersession-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about the validity of a claim about a email, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "validity-and-supersession-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once the validity of a claim about a email is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] } ] } ] }, "statistics": { "bundles": 6, "layers": 12, "findings": 14, "questions": 38 } } } }