Nomadic tribes and the Internet

The current Internet environment can be compared to the state of the nomadic community before Moses introduced the Ten Commandments and organised a communication system based upon a religion. There is no recognised authority and there are no compelling reasons for everyone to play the "sensible game" that will be conducive to cooperation and collaboration.

Looking through those Ten Commandments - which have proven over time to be optimal for bringing order and sensible behaviour to a community - there is not one of them that applies in the environment of the Internet. Although many people will have a belief in a God and make an effort to obey the laws of their religions, there is no way of knowing who those people are. This eliminates this as a basis for trust and credibility: at least, sufficient enough to establish a reasonably high expectation of reliable, fair and honest dealings from people.

Even more serious, is the lack of overall organisation and control of the e-business environment. There is no universally recognised leadership, able to communicate guidance to everyone connected to the Internet. Various organisations and government bodies have tried, and are continually trying, to impose rules and regulations, but without any notable successes. They are unlikely to succeed because unlike the system created by a religious organisation, there is no framework of communication in place to feed back all the various views of the whole community to a centralised body.

This was the great advantage of Moses's system: the network of agents (the Levis), which, besides passing on instructions and guidance, returned information the other way - feeding back the views and combined knowledge of the whole community to the central source. It was only through the feedback of this combined intelligence that gave the central decision making unit its wisdom to be able to provide appropriate guidance and instructions to the whole community.

Here is the problem to be solved. How can the vast numbers of people connected to the Internet be induced to act sensible and to put the efficient long term functioning of the whole environment in front of their personal opportunities for short term gains?

The short answer is that you cannot. People will only act in their own best interests, so, with this realisation it is totally impractical to base any strategy on the assumption that people will, by their own volition, play the game sensibly.