One of the most important desired goals of DCoSL is the ability to generate something I call “loose consensus.” Basically, loose consensus means that if Alice and Bob each crowdsource any given list X to their respective webs of trust, then there is a high probability that they will end up with the same (or highly similar) set of items on the list, despite the lack of any centralized enforcement mechanism to guarantee agreement.

Loose consensus is already evident in the way a spoken language works. In English, we all agree to call a pencil a pencil, despite the lack of any central authority enforcing such agreement. Pretty amazing that it happens, if you think about it.