Still, why is that distinct from offline reputation (hence my original question still holds)? All second-hand information about another person's reputation is j

Still, why is that distinct from offline reputation (hence my original question still holds)? All second-hand information about another person's reputation is just as out-of-context when repeated by another person. Consider (1) your friends, who might have their own political agendas, bad-mouthing a politician who disagrees with them or (2) someone recommending their friend for a job you have. It seems to me that it's even worse off-line: people actually intentionally select evidence to influence a person's reputation when trying to relay reputation about a person you don't know directly. At least when a machine does it there's code you can look at to verify whether it has an agenda.