Sun CEO Schwartz points to a terrific move they are making:
"Which is why you'll see something very interesting next week start to appear on Sun's web pages and throughout our our on-line store. You'll start to see product reviews written by users. You'll see user defined ratings, right on our products. Just like book or product reviews as Amazon.com..."
They are starting with a few products and going from there. Brilliant!
This got me thinking about the need for a system for recommenders to be authenticated. Some kind of opt-in registry so those of us reading the reviews get even more transparency into who is recommending. As much as I would like it though, I'm not sure it is needed.
The very act of participating and the inherent transparency of the act turns blogs and the web into one big "transparency engine". Sunlight is indeed the best disinfectant.