- reputation systems
- A new kind of digital divide ten years from now will separate those who know how to use new media to band together from those who don't.
- Today's online reputation systems are computer-based technologies that make it possible to manipulate in new and powerful ways an old and essential human trait.
Howard Rheingold - The Evolution of Reputation
Since Tokyo and Helsinki, I've investigated the convergence of portable, pervasive, location-sensitive, intercommunicating devices with social practices that make the technologies useful to groups as well as individuals. Foremost among these social practices are the "reputation systems" that are beginning to spring up online - computer-mediated trust brokers. The power of smart mobs comes in part from the way age-old social practices surrounding trust and cooperation are being mediated by new communication and computation technologies.