Idea: Web-based networks applied to petitions

Interesting idea, Nikita. You're talking about creating a social trust network. You might also want to check out Trust Models for Community-Aware Identity Management.

I happen to be familiar with this topic because I also have a project that is undergoing conceptual development... it may or may not have overlap with the larger application you allude to above. Mine isn't about getting people to take action, but it is about transparency and accountability, mainly of public figures, but also for the community of users that my project would create.

It's intriguing enough to clip, anyway. Thanks.

Your idea has considerable merit. Without a doubt we need to have platforms in place that give the populace a practical lever that enables/enforces accountabilty.

How are you intending to take this to the next step?

It's an interesting proposition, but I'm only seeing it in terms of the consequences of such a system if it were to be implemented and widely used.

As I understand it, something like this would create a credibility index that would function in society much like a credit score.

If an individual is found to have been falsified, this significantly degrades credibility of all members who endorsed this individual.

Who would find that an individual or an action is falsified? It would need external verification and a trusted reporting authority, wouldn't it? Like a credit bureau. Then, what would be the arbitration method between an end user and the external credibility verifier? Then, who has ownership over that credibility index information? If none of this is thought through adequately, privacy rights issues abound.

I wrote about something similar to this, but applying it directly to the voting system [and accounting for other things such as education - not just trust, and plenty of people trust Jerry Falwell]. Personally, I think this is a good idea - though you will have to be careful that it does not become a popularity contest like Digg or it would lose credibility in real world applications. Still, there should be a good way to use the internet to propose solutions for real-world problems.