Bitcoin Forum

What is the forum policy on mods accepting business opportunities that are not available to members of the general public under the same circumstances?

The reason I ask is because a certain signature campaign is signature campaign is paying staff (mods) at the same rate that legendary members receive. From what I have seen is that most mods are only senior members, and the specific mods that are participating in this signature campaign are senior members.

On it's face, this does not sound like any problem, but if the mod is receiving a higher payment then is available to members of the general public in the same circumstances then the campaign operator may be able to exert undue influence over this/these mods.

The reason for my concern is that this (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=291387.msg8430709#msg8430709) post has a campaign operator denying payment to 9 members because they were banned during the payment term. The fact that a user is or was banned is not public information. AFAIK there is no publicly available way to know when a user is banned, nor the length of the ban (the length was also mentioned in the above post). I cannot say this for sure but it appears that the campaign operator is giving mods an above market rate for posting and is receiving information that is not generally available to the public.

Another concern is that a campaign operator could potentially use their influence to get a mod to ban a user who should not otherwise be banned because the campaign operator wants to save on advertising costs. According to  this (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=291387.msg3119391#msg3119391) post any user who was banned during any part of the term will not be paid. The above post also says that staff members will be able to join the campaign at any time (no one else is able to join at this time). This post also says that staff members are able to receive a specific higher rate then senior members.

Does the forum have a policy on mods accepting these kind of opportunities? If it does not then I think mods should be prohibited from accepting these kinds of offers. The reason for this is to prevent potential conflicts of interest, or potential perceived conflicts of interest.

...

Does the forum have a policy on mods accepting these kind of opportunities? If it does not then I think mods should be prohibited from accepting these kinds of offers. The reason for this is to prevent potential conflicts of interest, or potential perceived conflicts of interest.
[/quote]

This is a very important issue that you raised. There is no publicly available way to know when a user is banned, or how long they have been banned for. Stunna is getting this information somewhere, and either everyone needs to be able to get it, or no-one should be able to get it, especially as this is for commercial purposes.

Any scheme where staff are treated differently than other members creates a perceived conflicts of interest, and anyone who argues that they are able to control what variables play at all into their decision making process (consciously or subconsciously) is a liar (ie, there are conflicts of interest).

That information about banned users shouldn't have been shared, and certainly shouldn't have been posted publicly, it's been handled.

Bans for sig spammers are generally posted in the staff forum and handled by me, any that aren't handled that way are already an anomaly and would be checked, so it's extremely unlikely that such a thing would go unnoticed.
    

Thank you for replying and addressing this issue.

My concern about banning signature spammers is that these bans are likely based on other things (likely the number of previously delated posts they have). So if these other actions have happened to someone in a signature campaign (a lot of posts get delated that maybe shouldn't have been) then the account might get banned when a ban might not be warranted.

Based on your response, I assume that you know who had provided this signature campaign operator information about the users who were banned. You more then likely know who gave this information because it was likely sent via PM. But what if next time the information is sent in a way other then PM? It would be very difficult to track the dissemination of this information if it was sent by email (for example).

This is also essentially robbing the forum from potential revenue. By receiving a larger payment then what is available to the general public and then providing non-public information the forum is essentially robbed of the opportunity to sell this information if it deemed a good idea to do so. The same applies to anything else that a mod could potentially do in exchange for a higher payment.

I think that the forum should take up a policy to prohibit staff/moderators from accepting payment from a signature campaign that pays them at a higher rate then what they would receive if they were not a moderator/staff. This would stop the appearance of any conflict of interest.

Why don't you just PM hilariousandco and Stunna. We all know you're directing it at these two, but rather you're making some generalizations when it doesn't even involve any other staff or any other sig campaigns.

It's Stunna's sig campaign, he can be as discriminatory as he wants with who he pays and what rate.

I want to keep things as professional as possible. By directing accusations at certain people it makes it look like I am targeting them specifically which I am not (I have nothing against either of the people you mentioned personally). I hope to get the forum to adopt a policy against moderators accepting business opportunities that are not available to the general public if a member of the public was in the same circumstances.

You are correct to say that any campaign operator is free to pay whatever they want to whoever they want, but it should not necessarily be within forum guidelines/rules to accept these kinds of offers.

I can see deleted posts so I don't see how that's a concern.


I know because he told me, I believe he had good intentions.

Violating someone's privacy by reading pm's because you think they violated someone else's privacy? That doesn't sound right at all, I try to respect everyone's privacy regardless of what I think. And I don't read pm's (though pm privacy can't be guaranteed).

And if sharing of information really becomes an issue then the simplest thing to do is remove the information, or be more selective about who has access to it, there are several easy ways to accomplish this. And that would be better than punishing all the mods for something one might do. Besides, weeding out banned sig spammers is easy, require x posts per week, since almost all are banned for a minimum of a week, usually 2.

If you have a problem with a business paying staff more, then I suggest you take it up with them.

Again thank you for your response.

I personally do not and would not expect privacy for any emails sent/received (equivalent to a PM) with my work email. I would not send any email that I would not want my boss (or her boss, or his boss, or his boss, or her boss, or his boss) to see as I would like to be able to maintain a positive relationship with all of them. I would also personally consider that a PM to a particular mod/staff member to be potentially be seen by any other mod/staff member. Then again I believe it has been said that the mods should be considered and looked at as volunteers.

I believe the moderator in question (I do not know with 100% certainty who it was, but I believe I know who it was) did have very good intentions. If he is who I think he is, then he is a very respected member of the community (and by me), and I think having him as a moderator will have an overall positive effect on the community. I also think that the forums definition of spam are very different then a campaign operator's definition of spam. (this may not matter as it is apparent that various back end processes are somewhat different then what I had imagined).

My concern is not so much as a business offering the higher rate as it is that moderators are accepting the higher rate (or being allowed to do so).

Again I thank you for addressing my concerns. Although the policy what not changed to what I was hoping for, you have at the very least looked into my concerns, and reacted in a way that you feel is appropriate in your best judgment (I would personally trust your judgment).

I hope at the very least my concerns have inspired some level of conversation about this topic (or at the very least inspired some level of thought about this topic).

I don't like signature spammers either (or any other type of spammers for that matter). What I am saying is that it is not right to be able to use your position of power to be able receive a higher payment for no reason other then the fact that you hold this power. This is especially true when the person paying you is monitoring the same people that you (a person of power) has been entrusted to monitor and regulate, and you have additional tools to monitor these people.

Before, weren't we able to see mod actions (like "Jim banned by BadBear. Reason: talked shit about Usenet." - but mostly thread move & deletion spam)? Is there any reason that isn't public data? Worried about kids walking in on what the adults say in the teacher's lounge? :D

hilariousandco was in PD sig campaign before he was a mod (I think?), so according to you, he should be booted from it now?

You were perfectly fine with a tiered payout according to rank. Now when there is a staff/legendary tier, it's a problem all of a sudden? If you're going to bitch about staff having higher pay in sig campaigns, then also bitch about unfair payouts according to rank.

This problem you bring up is isolated to one mod and one sig campaign. You don't sound any more professional making sweeping generalizations like this. Go take it up with Stunna and hilariousandco.


PS - why don't you come on your real account to bring this up? Ironic that you bring up such small "problem", yet your alt account is solely for buying/selling forum accounts, which is borderline shady. Only reason why this activity isn't against the rule is because it can't be enforced. So like you said, how are you going to enforce mods not giving inside info through email instead of PM? You can't, it's all based on the honor system.

Mods can accept bribes?  Sounds great!  How do I get to be a mod then?

Most actions are public yes, through the   modlog  (https://bitcointalk.org/modlog.php) but not users or mods involved. Need to know, etc.

I have no issue with users earning different amounts based on their ranking. A full member account is able to display a bigger signature then a member. A senior account has the same feature then a full member account. A hero account is able to display background colors while a senior account cannot. A legendary member's post is generally looked at more closely then a hero member's posts.

A staff member on the other hand generally will have their posts directed towards a smaller subset of people, more often then not addressing a specific concern of a user. Sometimes a staff member may post something unrelated to their duties as a moderator (and adding something to the conversation of the topic) but the rules for signatures are not changed because someone is a moderator, and a post is generally not looked at more closely because someone is a moderator/staff member (I don't have specific stats on how much staff members contribute to a conversation verses are directed towards a specific concern, but the best case scenario is that a moderator contributes 100% to the conversation and carries the same signature as others in his ranking). As a result there is no valid business reason to want to pay a staff member at a higher rate then other senior members earn (assuming the subject staff member is a senior member) other then to use that additional payment to get something out of them later.

In my private career, I have been forbidden from accepting gifts exceeding $25 per year from any one person in order to prevent any perceived conflict of interest. In the case in question, a senior member who also is a staff member would receive an extra $60 per month (based on $500/BTC) in compensation which comes out to $720 per year, or would be able to take advantage of an offer that is not available to anyone except for a staff member if they are not yet enrolled. The purpose of this limit is to prevent judgment from being clouded in the event of a request being received that should not be granted or a request that is borderline appropriate/inappropriate.

There is only one signature campaign that is doing this to my knowledge. The reason why I did not name the specific campaign is because I think the rules should be evenly be applied to everyone.

Someone's username and/or ranking should not have an effect on how you receive a message as long as the message contains a valid point. I would hope that you would not give money to a legendary member when they are clearly scamming when you would not give money to a newbie when the newbie is trying to pull the same scam. Why should my message be any different?

Why do I need to be personally affected by this in order to want the market to be as fair as possible?

Would you admit that this setup is not fair? If so would you think this is something that is okay?

Like I said before the length of time an account has been around (as well as the number of posts an account has made) does not affect the message being said.

What you're saying is that sig earnings should be relative to how much a sig can display. That makes sense. But why are you ok with different member ranks having different privileges of what is displayed in their sigs? And you're arguing for fairness?? Post quality are not determined by rank as you say, so why aren't you bitching about unfair sig displays too (higher ranks having more flashy sigs)?





This is according to YOU, but you cannot speak for everyone. I can argue the other position, where a staff's account name, avatar, and sig are more noticed by the general public compared to a regular account in the same rank. So even though sig displays don't have more privileges, the overall account and status gets them more attention, regardless of what they post. So in this sense, it is a valid business decision to pay staff more.





Lets not pretend that you're requesting this new policy out of a sense of altruism. If you really did care about the well being of the forum, then you wouldn't sell account. But the fact is, your whole existence on this forum is to hustle accounts. What you're doing is destroying credibility, selling trust, and indirectly promoting scamming. Worry about what your business revolves around and the implications of it before you worry about sig pay fairness.

Hey ACCTseller, ignore BitcoinExpress. He's using a common technique of deriding forum conversations, and that's by trying to turn the conversation away from the issue, and onto the people who makes the issues. It's very common -- see Julian Assange and supposed 'sexual assault', see Edward Snowden and 'russian spy', etc etc.

Don't fall for it. Ignore the moment you recognize someone is attempting this technique.


Um, no. What you say may hold weight, however Stunna has closed registrations for everyone but Staff members. If he is interested in getting more signature visibility, he would open it to everyone (and if demand > supply, decrease prices paid). The fact that he has closed enrollment for new members implies that he's not looking for more exposure for PrimeDice, but wants to have more staff on his payroll.

If you cannot see a problem with the latter, please concede your claim that this is a reasonable business decision (w/o considering benefits from paying staff), then we can argue that point specially.

And yes: every issue is made based on specific cases. Legal questions about the death penalty, abortion, constitutional are decided with a specific case involving two parties. Same concept in this case, and this belongs in meta.

I think no. Stunna is probably accepting legendaries too, though I dont see a mention of that in the current OP (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=291387.0). Moreover, contrary to popular belief, PD is not shut down for everyone. Rather, they are now accepting Jr. Members too, but all these are in their affiliate campaign (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=745779.0).

This is a totally pointless thread with a totally pointless OP because it is already totally fair.  It is fair because the buyer can pay whatever he want to whomever he wants.  It is his money.  If the buyer of signature space wanted to pay girls more than boys they could.  If you do not like how someone runs a signature campaign then you are free to not participate.

No one is forcing you to sell signature space to them.  You do not have to sell your signature space at all.

Quit you insesant whining.

Forgot to answer this.

Bribes obviously.

I'm upset that nobody offer me any bribe. :-[

What we need is a fair system of bribes.  BCX also wants to be a mod but to be totally fair his bribe to be a mod should be more than my bribe to be a mod.   Bribes to be mods should be based on activity and post count.  It is the only fair way to accept bribes.

I am sure that ACCTseller would agree with me.

You mean the bonus payment from your signature, solely based on you being a staff member, isn't a bribe? ;)

What is it.. a political donation? ::) If it seems like a bribe, it is a bribe.

Quite a silly question... Simply drop an admin a PM with your offered amount. It must be more that any mods get tho ;)







(Sarcastic post for those that are unaware).

You're an administrator now, so you can assign a moderator. So... bribe. I can send you like 10 satishos that I've worked on earning through faucet sites for the last 15 weeks for moderator? It's totally a great deal.
/me gains moderator.

So, dat bribe, if you pay me like 2 trillion stashies, I'll make a post or something, idk.

I didn't request any raise for my signature payment. In fact I was gonna remove my signature but I hold it when I see the raise. It's normal because I have sticky posts etc., my signature gets more attention than other members'. It's not bonus payment, it's well deserved earning. If theymos decides to remove paid (or all) signatures, I'm okay with that, too.

How about you give me what your old owner owe me, Mr. bought VIP account?

While we are on the subject of bribes.  How much would it cost me to have the forum get rid of all paid signatures? 

I would like to see an immediate perm ban on anyone who has a paid signature.  OK, one warning then a perm ban.

This would:

Make this idiotic thread go away
Get rid of all the stupid spam due to paid signatures
Make signatures more interesting to read - because it would then be something the user wants to say rather than being there just to get paid

Biggest bribe to be a Mod is the no. of posts reported. More you report, better your chance. I wish, reporting accuracy was considered to be a bribe too...

Sorry, but since I have only reported a few posts that system would not work for me so by my definition of fair it is not fair.  I have a lot of activity and posts so, since that works for me, that is what I think is fair.  You get my drift?

LoLz Burt. U remind me of something I read on Wikipedia. It is Relativism (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relativism).

I don't think you are understanding what I am saying. Let me say it a different way. If someone makes a valid point then it should be listened to regardless of who makes the point. It will be more difficult to notice a signature for someone who has a lower rank because of restrictions on their signature.

I am arguing that if a staff member accepts a higher payment then what is otherwise available to them then the staff member will be able to be influenced to the person providing payment. This is akin to the campaign manager buying power.

As noted above the only users that are allowed to join the PD campaign are staff. Do you have any evidence to support this argument? Do moderators posts get quoted more often? Do they get replied to more often? In my experience they do not. As I said before there are a lot of staff that post something that is addressed to a smaller subset of users, for example explaining a ban or a rule that apples to few people.

Legendary members used to be able to join, however this is no longer the case.

Campaign has changed as of August term, ranks below senior are no longer allowed to participate. Also all senior/hero slots are full
The affiliate program is really nothing more then a scam. I would not expect to get any referrals or referral earnings from having my referral link on my signature. PD already has a very large user base, and I would argue that the effect of the PD signatures is to get people who already have accounts to deposit money and gamble. Few few people have not heard of PD and very people do not already have an account at PD. This however is a very different conversation for a different place.

It is not a matter of fairness as to who gets paid what. Any campaign manager has the right to pay whoever whatever they want. The issue at hand here is if someone who has power over the forum can accept a business opportunity that involves them receiving a higher then market rate. The higher payments do not only affect the members in the campaign, they affect the entire forum. The only way to avoid this would be to not participate in the forum, to not exercise your right to free speech. When someone with power receives an above market payment, they will owe the person who gave them the payment something in return. This will affect the way the forum is moderated; when someone wants a mod on their payroll to turn a blind eye they will be more likely to do so, or (more likely) when someone wants a mod to be more strict against a certain member or group of members they will be more likely to do so.
Since you were offered a higher rate then what other people with your same rank receive, you decided to keep your signature? This is exactly my point. Although there is nothing against the rules with you having a signature, you admit to keeping it because of the higher rate. Now since you are receiving a higher rate, if you were to receive a request to look at a particular account/thread and take action against the account/thread by the operator of PD would you possibly do so? Do you think the action you would take would be at least a little bit influenced by the fact that you are now earning more money then what other members earn?

You don't have to be a mod to have your post sticked, you only need to have written a post that is very important and informative to the sub-forum in question. There are many stickies that are not written by a mod. Also your well deserved earning is what you get from the forum in exchange for being a mod/staff member.

No.


No. I don't really understand your logic.


That's irrelevant to what I said.

Stunna did not ban anyone. He did not pay 9 people because the admins had banned them.

If you wanted to ask if any of my accounts were banned, then the answer would be no. If you wanted to ask if he has not paid me, then the answer would be no (although there are several members of the campaign who were not banned but have not been paid as of yet - I would not be surprised if they ended up getting banned soon).

My arguments however are still valid regardless of if any of my accounts were banned or not. That fact does not have any bearing to the conversation.

I am not scamming anyone by selling accounts. This is within the forum rules. I would think that most accounts that are purchased do not end up scamming because they would get negative trust once it is found out they are trying to scam. This is not the point however.

I am a huge believer in everyone having to play by the same rules. If you are paying off mods in exchange for favors then you are not playing by the same rules as everyone else.

I have said what I want. I want the forum to have a policy that would prohibit mods/staff from accepting any business deal that is not available to the general public under the same terms and conditions that is available to the general public (this would include accepting a higher signature rate just because they are a mod).

You do not know that my accounts were banned, and you do not have proof. And no I will not prove it to you by disclosing the names of my accounts.

I don't understand why you insist on trolling like this. It is very annoying.

Oh and P.S. I googled your handle and it looks like you have done a lot of damage to a lot of people in the past. Even forged a tweet to try to do damage to your competition.

Shouldnt there be some rule to prevent this? Someone put a poll up.

A poll isn't going to accomplish anything.

You're getting butthurt about an isolated incident that's been taken care of

Move on

And I want the forum to have a policy that would prohibit account selling. But since neither is going to happen, get over it. Have you realized that no amount of bitching about this will matter? You always have a choice to leave if you feel that strongly about it.

there is a valid business reason to allow for account sales. If you are so strongly against account selling (despite your account being purchased) you should do something about it. Signature campaigns are what essentially creates a market for accounts. You are participating in a signature campaign so you clearly don't feel that strongly about the issue.

There is no valid business reason to allow what essentially amounts to a bribe of mods.

I do express subtle disapproval here and there when it's relevant, but not to the point where I'll cry about it. The topic of account selling has been discussed several times already, and this issue is actually widespread on the forum. Personally, I just choose not to do any transactions with any accounts that are flagged as sold ones. You on the other hand, are crying about one specific case and expect the whole forum and all sig campaigns to adopt to what you feel is best, out of self-interest for that matter. Don't BS about how you brought this up for the betterment of the whole forum.



Sig campaign is only one aspect. The other market for account trading is the ease of doing business, as it presents fake credibility. And with fake credibility, there is also an abusive side. Are you going to be personally liable if an account you sold is used to fuck someone over?



I don't feel anything about the issue you brought up, because in no way does it affect me, or the vast majority of of users. But it has obviously made you bitter because either one or more of your alt accounts got banned, or you can't accept the fact that two staff gets paid more than you.




Pretty bold statement there, and that's where you lost all credibility.

But I'll make you a deal. If you have definitive proof that my account was purchased, and mod can even verify if you want, then I'll either delete this account, or never come back to use it. But If I can prove that I've owned this account since 2011, then you delete all your alt accounts. Of course, I know you'd never take this offer, seeing how you cowardly post from a fake account in the first place.