Repute

Repute is value associated with some identity. In general there is no such thing as bad repute, if the identity can be discarded or changed, as it can in almost all brand management or troll situations. If one has a repute one wishes to discard, one simply discards the identity and starts over. In wiki management this is called the right to vanish.

Some think that because negative reputation is so hard to make stick to anyone, the whole concept of reputation is negative and only enables those capable of promotion regardless of any values. Others think that this can be managed but only when reputation itself is always negative, and no one can ever have a good reputation (i.e. reputation is expressed as zero or some negative number, a score on the identity). This kind of question is basic to social capital and trademark issues.

Ad hominem approval and permission-based models are poor wiki management practice where edits by "trusted users" go unexamined (while those by new or untrusted users (see New Troll point of view) are often attacked without reason or for ideological reasons). Obviously this assumes that there can be such a thing as positive repute.

See also ad hominem delete and ad hominem revert which assume that repute is necessarily, and only, negative - however these practices generate sysop vandalism and aren't troll-friendly and so also are poor practices, relying on a uniformly positive reputation for the sysop. Ask Wikimedia "can a sysop be a vandal?" and watch their tiny brains fry.

Contrast wiki best practices like the Lowest Troll role, which makes the assumption that any conflicts between users necessarily lowers the repute of all involved - thus whoever is involved in all disputes by default is "Lowest".