A crucial element to lowering the stakes of any particular moderation decision is the knowledge that the user has the genuine option to go to another community or start his own. The same applies to moderators: The ultimate check on a moderator’s power is that if most users start to believe he is using it poorly, users can either protest until a new... See more

But if this ideal of freedom may be absolute within its domain, this is possible only because the domain is narrow, tightly limited by rigorous conditions for entering it.

town square that spans the entire globe. Our aim, then, is to show a way past this impasse. The two views ar

Max Weber introduced a three-fold typology of legitimacy, the sentiments that get people to acquiesce to authority, especially regarding rules or commands they may dislike or disagree with.[viii] For most of human history, the most common kinds of authority have been traditional or charismatic. Traditional authority appeals to the “eternal yesterda... See more

Without trust in the decision-maker, trust in the process breaks down, and the only important question becomes, “Who decides?”