Permissionless

Free access to participation (or use) if certain requirements or rules are respected. An extreme form of openness, with no filter at the entrance, no permission or credentials required.

Example, the Bitcoin network is permissionless, i.e. anyone can become a miner by installing the Bitcoin mining software into a dedicated computer and connecting it to the network through the Internet. No permission is needed, the only requirements are that the software is genuine and that the computer meets the minimal hardware specifications. The same can be said about Wikipedia, one doesn't need to create an account to edit a page. All open source development (software and hardware) relies on a form of permissionless access: everyone is free to fork and improve or modify a project. But when it comes to submit a change to a canonical version of the developed artifact, various types of decision making or governance are used, spanning from "benevolent dictator" to consensus-based. All permissionless processes have mechanisms to defend from spam or vandalism, and various forms of quality control processes. In other words, permissionless access doesn't mean free for all. It can be highly regulated, structured. Permissionless means equal access to opportunity, which doesn't exclude rules and thresholds. The difference is that these mechanisms are blind to the identity of the agent.

Permissionless access to economic processes is justified by the economic model that is used in commons-based peer production. This is not a matter of philosophy or ethics, but based on economic reasoning, observation and practice.

In an OVN anyone has access to stat contributing. Access to specific processes (governance for example) and resources (shared funds for example) is mediated by a benefit distribution algorithm, which sets minimal requirements (or credentials) based on contributions (fluid equity, skin in the game).