This sounds very much like a federal system of government like the US, with each level of jurisdiction applying their own rules.
For Bluesky, by default does power lie with the highest authority by or the lowest authority (i.e. the user)?
The US model was originally designed bottom up, with power having to be granted to the higher authority. Admittedly we've effectively abandoned this today.
I’m a huge nerd about this so I enjoy this question. The logic of the system is that the protocol offers users rights by architecture. They include rights to an identity, to speak, and to choose your providers. The right to control reach is controlled by the applications, and they apply business logic to construct the threads and feeds. So: users are independently publishing structured data (a reply to a post) and applications are interpreting that data into app experiences.
As a consequence, the personal jurisdiction model as I described is a construct of the application. It can ultimately choose the logic of what gets shown. Therefore it’s top down in this case. What an application can’t do is remove a user’s identity or posts from the internet. And consequently other applications can make other decisions.
All decentralized networks are an expression of a political philosophy.
For Bluesky, by default does power lie with the highest authority by or the lowest authority (i.e. the user)?
The US model was originally designed bottom up, with power having to be granted to the higher authority. Admittedly we've effectively abandoned this today.