Relying on the opinion of others can *be* part of one's measure of
worth.  Firefly ratings are *also* measures of the opinions of others;
they measure the opinions of those Firefly crudely predicts will share
your opinions.  Defining the group right, they are even measures of
majority opinion within a certain group.  Joining a mailing list with
some sort of joint filtering rule is just another way for you to
choose people to rely on.
Robin D. Hanson  hanson@hss.caltech.edu  http://hss.caltech.edu/~hanson/
P.S.  In response to my private suggestion to post more info on
NodeNet, Natasha told me privately that she had already done so in
the last week.  Did anyone see this?