this is an intriguing criticism but assumes a corrupted reputation economy. wouldn't a perfect meritocracy be a reputation based economy?
Re:The downfall of Quora (2013)
by rustyconover on Sunday September 28, 2014 @01:08PM
(#8380251)
A meritocracy is a type of government not an economy. Or possibly I don't understand your question.
a meritocracy is a resource allocation system and functionally equivalent to an economy for considering your proposition that reputation based systems lead to bad allocations; i'm questioning that proposition.
This is a socially unfair economy at best, and at worst will generate inequality as social cliques will continue to preserve and enrich themselves and "the people they know". If we're going to move more toward social and economic fairness this isn't the direction to go.
I'm comfortable knowing that Whole Foods takes dollars rather than Klout points or retweets. That way anyone who can make a dollar can eat and not worry about starving because they failed to impress some arbiter of social currency. Reputations aren't fungible hence they are flawed as a just economic currency.