Pseudonyms and Reputations

[tmp at netcom.com]

hal finney had very interesting comments about pseudonyms and reputations.
one of the most important notes about the chaumian systems he
indicates is that it would be possible to have forums where pseudonymity
is limited (one pseudonym per user) but at the same time the anonymity
of participants is protected. this seems like a reasonable compromise
between the extreme on one hand, `no one should be accountable for anything
in cyberspace' and on the other hand `people should be accountable for
everything in cyberspace'. 

it does appear that in a completely unaccountable
system, i.e. where pseudonyms are cheaply obtained and accrue bad reptation
without any consequence, `cryptochaos' can ensue. it is quite possible to
have the equivalent of `floodbots' to mailing lists, and i'm really quite
astonished that the only solution that anyone has developed so far is
completly untechnological and IMHO backward: yelling at a site administrator.

in fact, it seems to me the mechanisms for social interaction are most
rapidly evolving on IRC, where there are all kinds of sophisticated rules
regarding operators who have control over channels, to boot out participants,
`ban' them, and the way that people `ignore' each other, etc.-- isn't it
rather remarkable that no widely distributed mailing list software has
any of these very basic mechanisms?

i was just on IRC and i don't know how many people have noticed that (forgive
me if it has been pointed out before) but a very interesting early incarnation
of a positive and negative reputation has already been implemented by
somebody's `commbot' program. it functions as a database of reputations of
IRC nyms. here are some of the rules (ugh, can't they come up with a
less offensive term for negative reputation?)

anyway, i will be very interested to watch the evolution of reputation
systems on the internet.

=CommBot= 
=CommBot= Levels are used to determine which users can make me do what.
=CommBot= The most important use of the levels are:
=CommBot= userlevel >=  50 : user will be made channel operator by me
=CommBot= userlevel >= 100 : user may modify user/shit/prot lists
=CommBot= userlevel >= 125 : The user may use certain "special" commands.
=CommBot= userlevel >= 150 : user may use all my functions
=CommBot= shitlevel >=  50 : user won't be opped, and cannot modify
=CommBot=                  : the various list, regardless of the userlevel.
=CommBot=                  : I also will not allow this user to be opped by
=CommBot=                  : someone else
=CommBot= shitlevel >= 100 : user will be kicked and banned when the
=CommBot=                  : channel is joined
=CommBot= protlevel == 100 : I will not massdeop or masskick these users.
=CommBot=                  : if a user with level 100 is deopped, I will reop
+him/her
=CommBot= 
=CommBot= SEE ALSO: WHOAMI, WHOIS, NWHOIS, USERADD, 
=CommBot=           SHITADD, PROTADD, getting_access
=CommBot=