I think you’re exactly right to be thinking of writes and reads separately, with writes being scattered and potentially in various formats. The heavy lifting is deciding what to do with the data, and we can be flexible in our approach: no need for everyone to use the same algo, or even to know what algos are available when creating the trust attestation.

On the topic of zaps: I think it is important to separate out in our minds the notion of PROXY INDICATORS of trust, like zaps, likes, etc, and EXPLICIT CONTEXT BASED TRUST ATTESTATIONS. No reason we can’t use both at the same time! The former exist in spades; it’s time for us to focus our attention on ways to represent the latter. 

 That's fair! I agree with you, I don't think these proxies for trust are great. The gold nuggets will be in application-specific kinds like the bitcoinmints example (kind 38000 is 100% an explicit trust attestation). I just don't see at the moment who will want to put enough energy to build hierarchies, but if people do, all the better! 

 Perhaps I’m the only one who will want to put in the energy to build hierarchies 😜😂

That’s ok by me. One person is all it will take!