Ask HN: I have a great idea, but nobody likes it. So here it is.

I came up with an idea that I really liked- the implementation is simple and the business model is powerful. However, it seems that the majority of the people I talk to about it aren't crazy about it. My instincts tell me it's got potential, but if nobody else thinks so, I suppose it's time to drop it.

So, I've decided to run the idea by you guys to see what you think. Of course anyone who likes it could just implement the concept themselves, but I'd be happy to try and work with someone on it (I'm not a programmer, but am willing to contribute where possible). The concept I've simply called "ChanceMail", and is outlined below. Any advice/criticism is appreciated.

"Chance Mail is a powerful concept in terms of monetization specifically- users benefit based on how much they pay for the same task.

Users are allowed to send a free message to someone, but the message only has a certain percent chance of actually being delivered. This percentage is determined by the sender, and is displayed in the message, if delivered. The sender is not told whether the message is delivered or not. To promote use of the app, when you send a message and it "fails" to go through, the receiver gets a message saying "someone sent you a message and it failed to go through".

Psychologically, when you send a message with say, a 10% success rate, you obviously don't know if they received it. But if they did receive it, when they see it has a 10% success rate, they know you're pretty sure they didn't get it. Ideally, this will work for things that you don't want to admit in person, because the first level understanding is unbearable.

In other words, if there's a piece of information you want someone to know, but you don't want them to realize that you know that they know, this is the best way to achieve such an understanding. But so far, the system is ineffective- the chance your intentions were actually carried out are slim.

Here's where it gets interesting, and where gaming the system for a few bucks can give the sender a psychological advantage:

You charge the sender for each additional "send" of the same message. Someone who wants to ensure that 10% message goes through buys 20 messages, and after one goes through, no more are sent, but we can't tell him nor not charge him for those extras. The great thing about the charging for additional messages is that people will actually want to pay more.

The reason for this is simple- if the receiver knows it's free or even cheap to send a ton of messages with a given small percentage, they will expect the sender to be sure the message goes through, even though on the surface it says 10% (or whatever percent). If the prices are high, they won't expect the sender to part with that kind of cash, so the sender can gain psychological footing by proving the receiver wrong and paying more.

I imagine this being useful for people who are too proud to directly say things to their family and close friends, or things that would embarrass or humiliate someone if you just told them. What's great about it is that the recipient can't directly respond, because that would imply that they received the message. If they don't respond, supposedly there's a chance they haven't even received it. When they change their actions slightly later on, much to the satisfaction of the sender, it could be because they received the chancemail, or it could be for another reason.

I envision this as simply an email website. You can send regular email, as well as chancemail messages which you specify a certain percent. It would probably be best if we limited the options to a few specific percentages, for simplicity's sake."