Gossip, Internet-Based Reputation Systems, and Governance

Internet-based reputation systems allow to generate, process, and publish reputationally relevant information. They sustain practices that at first sight might appear to be an incarnation of traditional gossip, where a subject, “ego,” transmits evaluative information to others, “alter,” about an absent “tertius.” This chapter argues that such identification is inappropriate, and it proposes a characterization of gossip that is suited for the Internet Age. While being different in several ways, gossip and Internet-based reputation systems display a functional similarity: they both generate reputationally relevant information, which reverberates on the distribution of resources, hence of power. In generating such information, Internet-based reputation systems level the playing field and, in a sense, “democratize” gossip. Deliberate engineering could enhance this interesting characteristic of Internet-based reputation systems, particularly so in applications to public governance, which is an explicit focus of this chapter.