The goal is just to design the right game, then hopefully the right behavior will just sort of plop out of it. Google has a similar problem regarding SEO. Thei

The goal is just to design the right game, then hopefully the right behavior will just sort of plop out of it. Google has a similar problem regarding SEO. Their search engine is a game for SEOs to play. If they can set up the game well enough (ie if the referee can detect relevant content with high accuracy), then the "ordinary" providers of content and the SEO folks will merge. Then you don't care if somebody says they've used SEO to get on top of the search rankings, because they legitimately belong there. Until they really have a bulletproof relevance algorithm (which is an AI complete problem, I suppose), they have to keep a lot of the rules, the proxies for relevance, hidden. Of course, when you win the Google game, you get cold hard cash. So there is a legion of obsessive players trading tips and trying to figure out the game. I wonder if you could make a fun game for a site with hidden mechanics and unpredictable rewards, without that pot of gold at the end, that could still draw customers...