不要依赖信誉背书Don’t Rely on Credibility Stamps
Naval： 当今社会有许多机构依赖信用背书来获取信任。
它们曾是人们在社会中赢得信用的方式。如果你是为《纽约时报》或《华盛顿邮报》撰稿的记者，你就有了《纽约时报》和《华盛顿邮报》的报头背书。如果你是哈佛的教授，你会因为"哈佛教授"这个身份而获得信用。
当然，这些系统已经被攻破了。许多根本无权对世界指手画脚的社会科学家，如今混迹其中，拿着荒谬的政治模型冒充经济学家或自然科学家。还有一些活动人士，顶着这些昔日伟大报纸的报头写作，不断消耗这些报纸经年累月积攒起来的信用资本。
互联网正在缓慢而坚定地揭露他们，我们正处于一个过渡阶段——大众依然相信这些机构。
我们被困在这个谢林点（Schelling point）——这个属于机构的协调点上：我怎么知道该不该雇用你？你会有哈佛的文凭吗？我知道它不如从前了。我知道如今一张哈佛人文学科的文凭很可能一文不值，但我没有其他信用标准来筛选你，而我需要以一种高效的方式来筛选。
我们正在见证权力从机构向个人转移，但这个进程会很混乱，而且至少需要一代人的时间。
与此同时，机构正在反击。我们正处于"帝国反击战"阶段，它们正试图接管 Twitter、Facebook、Patreon 这些赋予个人权力的新平台。
Brett： 大学以及整个学术界握着一根很大的"大棒"——它们能够培养自己的下一代教师，而这些教师随后会去教育下一代的中小学生。
Naval： 这就像一个神职体系。你只能说那些牧师批准过的话，而且只有你自己是牧师时才有资格说，而谁有资格当牧师，由牧师们说了算。
Naval: There are a lot of institutions in our society today that rely on credibility stamps.
They used to be how you gain credibility in society. If you were a journalist writing for The New York Times or The Washington Post, then you had the masthead of The Times and The Post. If you’re a professor at Harvard, you have credibility because you’re a professor at Harvard.
Of course, those systems got hacked. A lot of social scientists who have no business telling the world what to do are now in there with nonsense political models masquerading as economists or natural scientists. You have people who are activists writing under the mastheads of these formerly great newspapers and burning up the credibility capital that these newspapers have built up over time.
The Internet is exposing them slowly but steadily, and we’re going through a transition phase where the masses still believe in the institutions.
We’re caught in this Schelling point, this coordination point for the institutions: How do I know if I should hire you? Will you have a diploma from Harvard? I know it’s not as good as it used to be. I know a Harvard humanities diploma’s probably nonsense at this point, but I don’t have any other credibility metric to filter you and I need to do it in an efficient way.
What we’re seeing is the transition of power from institutions to individuals, but it’s going to be messy and it’s going to take at least a generation.
In the meantime, the institutions are fighting back. We’re in the Empire Strikes Back phase where they’re trying to take over the new platforms like Twitter, Facebook, Patreon, which empower the individuals.
Brett: The university and all of the academia have a very big stick in terms of being able to train their own next generation of teachers who then go on to teach the next generation of primary and secondary school students.
Naval: It’s a priesthood. You’re only allowed to say what the priests have approved, and you can only say that if you are a priest, and the priests get to decide who’s a priest.