Conjecture

SYNTHESIS (Ostrom principles 4 and 5 + P6 credit): in a knowledge commons the credit ledger can be the sanction ledger, so no separate enforcer has to be paid. When the P6 arbiter rules that a claim was wrong, the holder's credit for it is drawn down, and a fixed share of that drawdown, always less than the whole, goes to whoever found the error. From Ostrom: in the Spanish huertas "a portion of the fines is kept by the guards", and "Private benefits are allocated to those who monitor". From us: credit is attached to each checkable change and stays revisable after it is awarded. Together: the reward for contributing and the fine for erring are one balance, and the fine funds the monitor. The mechanism: holders pay for errors from the same credit that pays them for contributions; finders earn only on a ruling, not on an accusation, and a dispute that fails costs the finder a small stake; because the finder's share is below the drawdown, a holder and a friend who stage an error lose credit between them, which is the cheapest collusion closed. Ostrom did not have this because her fines were money or sake, separate from the water right; we did not have it because our credit was a reward only.

Keeping power in check