Epistemology, Bitcoin, and "No one knows you're a dog"

Yes. We don't know whether you are a dog on the Internet. We still want to know, but how?

This question is not a brand-new one, and it is inherently related to a question on epistemology: "Can we guarantee the thing we observe is real?"

With a long history in philosophy on epistemology (including Descartes and Kant), this question has added more value to today's networked world. Why? Since lots of things are veiled in the online environments compared to the past world.

I think there is no way to guarantee someone is an expert. We cannot meet, observe, or gauge someone and he/her skills.

Like what social constructivist supposes, I believe credibility and reliability should be understood as a social building process. The credibility and reliability of someone are not given, but rather something that we need to construct in a specific context, like what knowledge is socially constructed. I do not want to be a radicalist on this topic. Still, logically, this would be the only way to explain how we should establish credibility with someone and postings on online communities.

Interestingly, even though the networked world is confusing us to establish credibility/reliability, it can offer other possibilities: using networks to validate credibility like how Bitcoin works.