This is actually nonsense. See the discussion of that point
here, and consider how facetious your argument is. After all, Pirate was trusted on this very forum, and you haven't "dismissed that entirely" it would seem. Why not?
Thanks for replying, this point is extremely valid from our perspective.
There is no inherent trust in a forum nor does it guarantee this "web of trust" which as we have seen with Pirate is no guarantee of anything.
The forums members failed simply due to their greed outweighing their common sense, for such an obvious ponzi scheme operator to gain any trust on a service designed to prove trustworthiness invalidates the service in our judgement.