Craig Newmark on Trust

Cragislist founder Craig Newmark has an interesting op ed in today’s Washington Examiner on ways in which voluntary collaboration will help resolve new issues of trust in the always-developing online world (and in some cases in the real world). He sees great promise in “neutral, independent reputation systems, like the ones in eBay or Amazon, but independent of any particular business,” and in “forms of collaborative filtering acting as BS screens, which will make it easy for people to figure when they’re getting scammed.” He notes:

Success in using digital technology to advance the science of establishing trust and reputation will have implications in countless fields, including, but not limited to, commerce, communications, national security and law enforcement, education, government and politics, personal development and financial planning.

And, most promisingly, in the scenarios he entertains, nowhere does Newmark call for government intervention.