Community

Community Defined

In the context of the ratings system, a community is a group of users who collaborate with each other. They generally have a broad agreement to follow certain rules, conventions, and norms. In some ways it is nothing more than a contract but a contract implies a straightforward give and take economic transaction, and hard economic obligations on both sides. A community is more than that and is less formal although it implies a type of governance, values, perhaps even a culture. It is still a contract, in the sense that members *agree* to abide by the community's standards and the community agrees to give the member certain benefits. But it is more than what a contract normally implies.

We use the word community alot because it is necessary for what we are trying to do. A ratings system can only work amongst a group of people that are trying to accomplish something together. This would seem to become more true the more significant the goals of the group are. A truth-seeking ratings system, one that can really improve society, lead to better governance, etc. needs to be a significant community. Our ratings system is doing much more than helping people decide which product to buy or restaurant to eat at.

The loosely libertarian crypto community that our ratings system is, at least initially, directed at probably sees the individual as the basic unit of government. There's plenty of good reason for this since it is individuals that comprise the groups and individuals who do the thinking to make governance possible. But here we take the presence of individuals as a given and see communities as the basic building block for any worthwhile experiment in social improvement. This is not a value judgement, not a right or wrong thing. It is just why we refer alot of community.

A community might not have its agreements written down. It could be just a set of norms that are implicitly followed. Note how the word "norms" suddenly found its way into our vocabulary when Trump came to power and started violating them. We realized very quickly that we are governed implicitly by alot of informal standards. Most people in a community agree, for instance, to be reasonable and respectful to each other. It is only when this doesn't happen regularly that we might decide to write it down as a rule.

In many cases community norms come from the surrounding culture. In a sense, this just means that communities influence each other and that there may be larger, more encompassing communities that envelop smaller ones. We understand that in our ratings based community system that members may be in many communities and that alot of overlap will exist.