# How to manage a modern image

In most of the world, the procedure for maintaining a reputation has been mostly the same for thousands of years:

1. You need something done.
2. You ask someone you know if they know anyone to do that thing, and if they don't, you can ask if they know someone who would know anyone.
3. You trust that second-degree or third-degree person from how others trust them.
4. That second-degree person's performance determines what you say about them later, and they become a future source for tasks you'll need done.
5. If needed, they'd sequester you for a few months to be certain you didn't have a weird disease or were running from the law.

However, in a [computer-heavy](computers.md) society where the data is unusually [trustworthy](trust.md), your reputation is *not* what you think it is:

1. When you receive a government-issued identification card, that government has created a legal entity that has your name in all-capital letters (a "legal fiction").
   - This entity is nothing more than a documented name with a few linking concepts like date of birth, city of birth, driver's license number, etc.
2. In places where that system has matured (e.g., USA) that legal entity is influenced *every* time a [formal agreement](people-6_contracts.md) is made or amended:
   - Rental and mortgage agreements
   - Bank accounts and [lines of credit](money-2_debt.md)
   - Financial purchases with any card associated to your name
   - [Insurance](money-insurance.md)
   - [School](education.md) attendance
   - [Telecom](networks-computer.md) and utility agreements (e.g., cell phone, cable TV)
   - Hospital and [healthcare](body-4_health.md) visits
   - Official [employment](jobs-1_why.md)
   - Government records, including tax filings and driver's license/vehicle registration
   - Owned [real estate](home-buy.md)
   - Certifications with various authorities (e.g., security clearance, government-managed licenses)
   - [Criminal record](legal-safety.md), courthouse visits, traffic violations, affiliations with *any* civil/criminal lawsuits
   - Car rentals, [auto](autos.md) repairs
   - Mass transit (bus, airline, etc.)
   - Customer loyalty cards
3. Anything that affects that legal entity (change in terms, termination, late payment, new agreements, etc.) is your [reputation](image.md).
   - Multiple organizations track those legal arrangements (e.g., LexisNexis, Equifax, Experian, TransUnion).
   - Many *other* organizations request reports for $20-350 per individual from those tracking entities, context-depending.
   - Nobody individually sees *how* the situation unfolded, but they do see dates and events corresponding to the decisions they are required to make, going back a fixed number of years to the date.
4. While individual rapport still matters in specific subdomains of society (e.g., the wealthy, casual/informal business deals, illegal activity), your *first* reputation with large entities will always be what your legal fiction says.
   - It's never a "complete" picture, but there's enough information to fill in the gaps (e.g., Report 1 has a gap and Report 2 partly fills it).
   - Governments send information to *each other* as well, but it's also not complete.
   - You may [save money](money-4_spending.md) with some of those unconventional services, but it won't reflect on your legal fiction.
   - The Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act typically requires a privacy notice disclosure (initial and annually), an opt-out notification for information sent to an unaffiliated third party, and clarified data security procedures.
   - You can generally request the information available to you through [precedents](legal-doctrines.md) established in the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) and Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA).
   - However, you typically have no control over that information disseminating.
5. If you don't work with that system (e.g., [lying](people-lying.md), failure to perform [your end of the contract](people-6_contracts.md)), you'll be quickly gray listed or blacklisted.
   - You may lose the opportunity to get a bank account, access the internet, or get a [loan](money-2_debt.md).
6. Further, depending on what you've done, almost any entity can conduct a skip trace to find you.
   - Bail bondsmen, lawyers, legal personnel, process servers
   - Banks and financial institutions, credit card companies, collection agencies, repossession agents
   - Employment and tenant verification services
   - Genealogists, journalists, police detectives
   - Insurance fraud investigators, private investigators
   - Medical finance professionals, real estate agencies
   - Even if you try hiding, *any* individual with you who indicates your name will connect your new situation with your old one.

To that end, your reputation involves a few arcane tasks:

1. Make sure those relevant reports capture advantageous things you do:
   - Take out loans in *your* name, not anyone else's (i.e., where you pay back someone else who borrows).
   - Use established institutional entities for your activities whenever possible (e.g., a large bank like Chase or Wells Fargo instead of a transfer service like PayPal or Western Union).
   - When it doesn't matter much, use "standard" institutional services (e.g., mainstream large-scale [insurance](money-insurance.md), large branded banks).
2. Keep your reputation clear with large entities.
   - Treat them like government [bureaucracies](bureaucracy.md), where you're more responsible than they are for any mistakes they make.
   - If they've incurred fees against you, pay them off and rapidly arrange another equivalent [agreement](people-6_contracts.md) with another organization and terminate that one.
3. Watch for the people who abuse this knowledge.
   - The largest risk comes through identity theft, so much of your ability to get *many* things done is dependent on how well you perform [basic cybersecurity practices](computers-cysec.md).
   - There are [*many* laws](legal-doctrines.md) around most situations where this information could be misused, so it's not common.

This situation means most casual (and typically cost-effective) interactions are simply your name running by on a [database](database.md):

- The [credit score](money-2_debt.md) asks 3 possible reporting companies (Experian, TransUnion, Equifax) if other banks found this entity trustworthy to lend money to.
- The [insurance score](money-insurance.md) asks a reporting company (LexisNexis) who this entity has had insurance with and what dates.
- [Health](body-4_health.md) information is accessible through the Medical Information Bureau.
- There are numerous other [trade-specific](jobs-specialization.md) reports, ranging from [academic](education.md) records to bank accounts open in your name.
- The reports never give a *complete* picture, and instead provide information that may be relevant for that [professional](professionals.md) to do their job.

There *are* exceptions to this arrangement:

- The wealthiest class can afford to travel across the country to meet people in-person.
- The poorest class tend to be rejected by the formal system or perform extra-legal activities, meaning they *can't* run reports on people and must instead trust on in-person interaction.

However, about 90% of the USA runs on this reputation-by-legal-fiction, meaning you are a database entry to them, with [customer service requirements](people-customerservice.md) to prevent that walking dataset from moving to another provider.

There are benefits to this arrangement:

- Your legal fiction is relatively easy to positively [influence](power-influence.md) by simply following the [rules](people-rules.md):
  - If you don't pay bills, most late fees are *not* negotiable more than once or twice.
  - Fully reporting relevant information typically makes your interactions (and price) consistent nearly wherever you go.
- Large organizations trust *other* large organizations more than you.
  - If it's a smaller organization, they *might* trust it, but big institutions (e.g., insurance companies, banks) will prefer to receive clear data from other big institutions and governments.

But, there are also major risks with it:

- The bureaus are intentionally *not* easily available for disputing the information.
- If you ever [lie](people-lying.md) about anything that materially exists in your legal fiction, *that* will often be reported as well.
- If there's ever a clerical error (e.g., typographical error on a name, Social Security number entered incorrectly), that will connect to an entirely *different* entity and not count positively toward your score (and may even make the report indicate more people than there actually are).
- The information tracks correlation, but not causation. It is very easy to cause trouble for yourself without realizing it:
  - Having an argument with an awful neighbor who escalates by calling the police on you and lying about you could give you the same reputation as someone who legitimately causes trouble.

The entire system is portable, and it can follow wherever someone is authorized to run a report on your [insurance](money-insurance.md), [credit](money-2_debt.md), [health](body-4_health.md), or [tax](money-accounting.md) information.

- It does mean that most professionals are keenly aware of details of your background that may be relevant to them before you are.
- There's zero grace if you screw up, since any chance to explain your situation will *only* work with one person at a time.
  - Even one missed payment, on *anything*, can harm your score, and there's nothing you can do about it except earn it back with future payments.
  - If you ever incur a [criminal record](legal-safety.md) of any sort, the only way to fix it is to wait out your probation/parole then move to another state/region, and that *still* won't fix it.
- The only way to fully fix a tarnished record is with better decisions and time.
  - The improved evidence won't erase the record of what happened, but it'll make your future engagements work out fine once those older records fall off.
  - Expect your record to improve at 3, 5, 7, or 10 years to the date of the infraction.
- Since they don't need to contact you, they won't put much effort into it until they have to.
  - If they reach out 2-3 times, they've legally fulfilled *their* requirement to contact you, and will act according to a [compliance-based](people-rules.md) form of their best interests.
  - Always [keep your address current](home-moving.md), access your email at least weekly, and check your voicemail at least a few times a week.

This also creates many practical implications:

- You can use the internet and online banking for nearly every routine activity.
- While they may charge a fee, you can withdraw money from almost *any* bank besides the one that has the money.

[Culturally](people-culture.md), many people [identify](identity.md) themselves by their discrete, arbitrary measurement.

- The scoring is based on the approval of the people who may render a [mutual benefit](people-6_contracts.md) to you.
- There is *no* [direct meaning](goodlife.md) from having a great insurance score, credit score, or health score.