Governing the Metaverse
Regulating the Metaverse
The system described so far is reflective of a free market economy. However, just like in the real world, there are a number of problems that the Meiyo community will face that the free market will be unable to solve (e.g. policing against hackers, fraudsters and trolls). Meiyo is not an anarchic system; it is governed through a political meritocracy underpinned by an egalitarian Honour system, and has a written constitution that protects the rights of the community.
The Honour System
The purpose of the Honour system is to reward community members for their positive contributions and punish them for negative contributions. There are five Honour levels: Dishonourable; Neutral; Level 1; Level 2; and Level 3. All players begin with Neutral Honour and must positively contribute to the community in order to advance to the higher levels and benefit from Rewards. The types of Rewards a player receives is dependent on their Honour level. If a player negatively contributes to the community, they will move down to the Dishonourable level.
The internet can be a hostile place. There are bullies, trolls, scammers, hackers and extremists (hostile agents) whose sole purpose is to cause harm to communities, and though these types of people exist in the physical world, the internet magnifies their voices for two reasons: they can reach many people very easily; and they can avoid repercussions through anonymity. Internet platforms face the challenge of removing access to these types of people, but even with the most rigorous checks in place, fake identification (ID) and technologies such as virtual private networks (VPNs) make this practically impossible.
Meiyo’s Honour system attempts to address this problem through segregation. Since you'll start with Neutral Honour, you'll receive no benefits or handicaps. Most people you'll meet in the Metaverse will also have Neutral Honour, meaning they're either new to Meiyo or they've not improved their Honour level. As with most games or platforms around today, it will be difficult to regulate this Neutral Metaverse - you should be vigilant and take necessary steps to protect yourself against hostile agents.
Over time, you'll have many opportunities to gain Honour through your activities in the Metaverse. When you accumulate enough Honour, you'll be promoted to Level 1 and will be granted access to the Honourable Metaverse. This Honourable Metaverse will have the same games and experiences - in fact, there will be exclusive games and experiences for Honourable players - the main difference is that everyone you come across will have Level 1 Honour or above. If you're new to Meiyo, a good way to gain Honour is to play with friends who have access to the Honourable Metaverse, as they will still be able to access the Neutral Metaverse if they wish.
The aim of the Neutral and Honourable Metaverses is to segregate the Honourable from the Dishonourable, and the Honour level structure incentivises players to act in good faith by providing them with greater Rewards as their Honour increases. This is both egalitarian and meritocratic because everyone begins with Neutral Honour and are rewarded based on their positive contributions.
Determinants of Positive Contributions
As Players engage in activities throughout the Metaverse, their actions are judged against a set of Positive Attributes that serve to benefit individual players and the wider community. We will not be revealing these attributes at this time.
In many cases, computer systems can be designed to assess the actions of players and make judgements on whether the actions are positive. In other cases, this may be impractical or impossible, hence judgements must be made by Honourable players. The difficulty lies in quantifying the determinants, as computers cannot rank qualitative data as effectively as humans, and humans are not as capable as computers when it comes to dealing with quantitative data. Since each solution solves the limitation of the other, Meiyo will employ both methods when judging positive contributions.
Determinants of Negative Contributions
Defining negative contributions is more clear-cut because the determinants are derived from Meiyo Law. Suppose a player gets mad at teammates for making mistakes (I call it flaming and blaming). If they become aggressive (harassment) or intentionally lose (trolling), players in the game can Report them. These Reports are reviewed at random by Honourable Players, and will either be upheld or overturned depending on the ruling of the reviewers. If the Report is upheld, the angry player will lose Honour, and if this happens enough times they will become Dishonourable. In addition to the Report system, Meiyo will use algorithms to detect negative contributions such as harassment and trolling.
Some negative contributions are more serious than others. For example, a Player can be forgiven for losing their temper, but a scammer should be banned from Meiyo instantly. A difficulty arises when using algorithms to judge the seriousness of two harassment Reports, for example, since this is a qualitative comparison; humans will generally agree that a death threat is more serious than an insult, but a computer may struggle to rate the two types of harassment. Consequently, Meiyo Law defines qualitative and non-qualitative negative contributions. Qualitative negative contributions (e.g. harassment, discrimination, trolling) can be detected and Reported by computer systems, but judgements must be made by Honourable Players who can determine the severity. Non-qualitative contributions (e.g. hacking, stealing, scamming) carry equal weight, hence computer systems can make instant judgments without relying on human interpretation (though humans are able to report these incidents too).
The Meiyo Constitution
The Meiyo Constitution defines the fundamental principles of Meiyo’s governance. To avoid ambiguity and misinterpretation, the constitution includes a set of very specific rules that outline the rights of players, creators and the wider community, as well as the workings of the Honour system. The Meiyo Constitution provides the framework for Meiyo Law, which dictates what you can and can't do, and outlines the consequences for breaking the law.
We will not be revealing further details about the Meiyo Constitution at this time.
Depending on the level of support from the community, Meiyo could transition from Web2 to Web3 over the long-term, enabling the community to govern Meiyo through a direct democracy without a centralised authority.
