Can the emergence of Alipay be explained through first principles as a solution to the fundamental constraint of "transaction trust"?

Of course.

Think about it: fifteen or twenty years ago, if you wanted to buy something online from a seller in another city, and neither of you knew each other, what would you do?

Would you transfer the money first? What if they didn't ship the goods? Who would you turn to? Would the seller ship the goods to you first? What if you received the goods and didn't pay? Who would they turn to?

You see, that's where the problem lay. The most fundamental barrier between buyers and sellers was "mutual distrust." This is the "fundamental constraint of transaction trust" you mentioned in your question. Without solving this obstacle, e-commerce couldn't thrive.

At the time, many solutions were considered, such as same-city transactions where money and goods were exchanged hand-in-hand. But this could only be done on a small scale and couldn't expand nationwide.

This is where "first principles thinking" comes in. It's not about thinking, "How can we optimize the transaction process?" or "How can we set up a rating system?" Instead, it's about returning to the most fundamental question: "How can two complete strangers dare to do business with each other?"

The conclusion was that they couldn't do it alone; a "middleman" trusted by both parties had to be introduced to provide a guarantee.

Alipay initially played this role of the "middleman." Its logic was very simple and direct, designed to solve this most basic trust issue:

1. You (the buyer) find an item you like and place an order, but the money isn't paid directly to the seller; it's first transferred to Alipay.
2. Upon receiving the money, Alipay notifies the seller: "I've received the money, you can ship the goods with confidence."
3. Seeing Alipay's notification, the seller confidently ships the goods to you.
4. You receive the goods, check them, and if everything is fine, you click "confirm receipt" online.
5. Alipay receives your confirmation and then releases the money from its account to the seller.

Throughout the entire process, the money is "held in escrow" by a platform trusted by both parties, perfectly solving the "who goes first" trust dilemma. This model later became known as "escrow transaction."

Therefore, it's very apt to say that Alipay's birth was based on the "first principle" of the "fundamental constraint of transaction trust." It didn't simply imitate a payment tool; instead, it started from the most basic and core pain point of "trust" and designed a whole new solution, thereby igniting the entire e-commerce industry in China.