Operational Rules-in-Use

(From Understanding Knowledge as a Commons: From Theory to Practice, edited by Charlotte Hess and Elinor Ostrom)

Individuals are interacting with one another day-to-day.

These rules affect (1) who may submit; (2) what may be submitted; (3) how it is submitted; and implicitly, (4) who may submit what when and how in that context it should be submitted.

Right now in Federated Wiki, one must be admitted to the Wiki, establish ownership of a domain (is that the right term here?), and contribute. The Wiki software itself establishes some of the how, but there is also a cultural standard about the use of links, for example, that may evolve as use expands. Additionally, anyone can request new features, which is where operational rules-in-use influence collective choice rules-in-use.

In fact, one could consider the Wiki code itself to be the mechanism by which collective choice rules-in-use