I will pick up on your choice of phrase, “imposing the standards”.

Standards are a funny thing. They can shackle and liberate, frustrate and inspire. The setting of and adherence to standards should come neither too early nor too late in any field, and yet adjudging that is far from easy in the moment.

Selecting a side of the road to drive on makes the road more usable to all. Adopting Web standards has allowed the Web to flourish in ways a free-for-all could never.

And I reference the Web specifically because the standards inherent to a realisation of the hi:project would be similarly proposed, debated, implemented and, likely, deprecated at some future point in time. It’s a process of consent rather than consensus, with all interested parties have the opportunity to contribute to the process.

So I hope the standards the hi:project requires over and above Web standards would have similar liberating qualities. And the similarity will extend to the thorough and yet, as many would attest, slow and painful process of development and ratification.

I’d like to like to know more on how you can decentralisation and empower local groups whilst imposing the standards you propose.

I can’t think of any historical reference where decentralised communities didn’t continually fight over land or trade. Human nature being what it is the same would happen on a citizen’s internet.

How do you think we could overcome these issues through the use of a human interface?