This looks like a great project.
I hope this community will permit a small rant from me.
I try to keep up with the SAFE project and their discussions about the many issues that arise from free speech and decentralization. I recommend a visit to their forum so as not to reinvent the wheel.
To me, free speech means that anyone can say or ask anything, anytime. Full stop. That does mean that some will abuse the privilege and some will try to manipulate for profit or politics. There will be some victims but this is the dawn of a new way to explore our world including all the bits we never knew about or bits that make us shudder. To combine the wealth of data available on the net with a system that rewards organically for views, activities, creativity, alternatives, truth could evolve an entirely better informed, fresh set of commonly held views and beliefs and challenge much of the propaganda being fed to us every day in more and more sophisticated ways by vested interest. The spying revelations are the beginning of our waking up to what is really going on behind our backs.
A project like Synereo should be self balancing. If what is being said is not popular or heavily funded, it will not get attention for long. A bit like not feeding the trolls. I think it will be a very good thing for topics to sometimes enrage or offend and for it to bring real response from contributors who, for the first time, can feel truly at liberty to say what they believe or suspect and to explore issues without fear of attack. So much of what people believe is engineered. So much of what people don't say is because of fear of rejection by peers, fear of having control wrenched from their hands, job loss or, worse still, fear of physical harm. We are in the stranglehold of political correctness, dominant narrative, commerce and absolutist moralists. We are being played.
Building in "committees" to edit, censor content etc would, IMHO, completely undermine Synereo. Let app developers come up with parental lock type gizmos for those who want them but leave those of us who choose freedom, and all the risks that go with it, to do it our way. Law enforcement agencies will have to catch up, which they will. It has always been a cat and mouse game. Most people are decent. Most users of Synereo will be decent folk.
I wonder, however, how Synereo would cope with a huge AMP campaign funded by an agency / business / government with millions of dollars at their disposal? AMPS attract attention and someone wants to ........... (fill in blanks. eg sell cigarettes, recruit ardent followers, undermine a government etc etc ). Offering a lot of AMP would sure get a lot of attention and we end up back at square one. After all, it has been suggested that presidents can be bought in some countries. Individuals don't have the AMPS to counter the pushers. The big players win again?
What about when a new Synereo user imports Facebook material? Might that result in less security? I detest Facebook and would hate to see it weaken what projects like Synereo could offer. But, it's a little like changing phones. If I've been on Nokia for years, changing to Samsung is difficult because they use different formats for data. So, I'm de-incentivised to change. Facebook users are probably the same. They may be susceptible to being bribed off FB! But would it undermine Synereo security?
These new decentralized spaces will bring many challenges and rewards. It's going to be a fascinating trip.
