On Feb 11, 2004, at 1:00 PM, Seth Breidbart wrote:
Well that's the rub, eh? The validity of an accrediting entity is always questionable. If you look at most accreditations in meatspace, you end up with the same issue. In general, unless the accrediting entity is granted there powers legally, the legitimacy of such an entity rests with the community.Accreditation to me involves an official, recognizable entity certifying that the party in question meets some sort of standard. This accrediting entity should be widely recognized as being able to provide this sort of assessment without need for corroborating support."official" according to whom? "widely recognized" among whom?
Well, why do all cases have to fall into those two categories? I would say that SPEWS is neither. It certainly is not an accreditor, asReputation is a less-formal aggregate measure formed from the collective opinion of a community.Defined how? Where would you place something like SPEWS? It seems to me that just about all of the interesting cases don't meet either of those definitions.