Bitcoin Forum

You can literally sell accounts, create multiple accounts... If such things were against the rules, there'd be no sketchy high activity accounts and multi-accounters... Don't you think the rate of scammers on the site would drop drastically? Thoughts?
And the trust system is so flawed, anyone else noticed that?

people like the freedom, bitcoin is a free currency and i do not think that there should be too much rules about the things you mentioned, the only thing that should be regulated is spams and scams

Actually no, if you want to create new account you need to pay a fee, from same IP though, but I doubt you or any one else could stop people from selling their accounts.
But I'm with you about scammers.

That's not completely true. You're only forced to pay a fee if you sign up through Tor, or on an IP address that an account has been banned from before. If my memory serves me right, you'll also be charged a fee if you sign up from an address similar to one that has been banned before. (ex. if someone has been banned on 1.1.1.1, and you sign up from 1.1.1.15, you'll need to pay a fee, but the fee will be smaller than that of signing up from 1.1.1.1)

That's wishful thinking. Theft is against the law therefore it never happens, right?
If account sales were banned on the forum then it would simply happen off forums, multi-accounting can't really be stopped successfully.

In a perfect world, however this will not happen realistically.

It's been discussed time and time again. It's also very easy to point out problems, try suggesting solutions.

Only once a previous account has been banned on that IP address. Providing you follow the rules you can create as many accounts as you like on one IP address.

2,000 posts woo.

Bitcoin is about freedom but that is separate from having an account here that deals with bitcoin.
You have to decipher the difference of the two or you will be looking at some trouble here in the near future.
You would also need to get your priorities straight or you will be having a rough time here.
Just a fair warning to you.

Thanks for the warning, my life is so much better now. I know bitcoin is all about freedom and stuff, but what that has to do with how the forum and its security system work? It was just a thought how fraudulent exchanges would drop to less if you couldn't just walk in and buy an account. Its an exchanging forum for gods sake. You shouldn't be sharing your account even with your mom, let alone sell it. You decide who to trade with based and their profile, and the fact that accounts are openly sold and bought on the forum itself, it just defeats the purpose of account trust and activity. Just my thought.

I personally appreciate the mature approach. Making it against the rules will not change that accounts are sold, if you believe that you have a problem. Do you think all facebook accounts are legit and never traded just because its against their ToS? Does everyone there use their real name as they agreed to they would? No, its the internet. Some rules can not be enforced, so why bother creating them in the first place? If you think this is a trading place first and a forum second you are wrong again. Trading is a part of this forum, but its not its main focus. The fact that these things are done openly make it harder for someone to fall for an account. Verify who you are dealing with or make it irrelevant.

brace yourself rape (or violent crime) comparisons are coming.

So by what I read I came to understanding that you are saying - Not enforcing rules JUST because people can get around it is the same as not having them at all? Well then, why have any rules at all, about anything, right? And yes, it most definitely CAN be enforced. I'm sure there would be still people who will be selling their accounts, of course that's for sure. I didn't say people will just stop selling their accounts altogether. But if there were rules against it they will have to put the risk in mind before doing so, thus not everyone would be doing it.
(Cause your braced yourself) Have you seen The Purge? When no rules, everyones doing killing, when rules, theres still killing, but not as much. You get the point

And by the way, tell me a reason why would one buy an account?

I think no one would like to follow such rules if he is using an open and free currency as bitcoin, so this forum is good enough according to the main currency it represents that is bitcoin.

I dont think that there is too kuch freedom in bitcointalk forum I think that there is too small freedom here so I would suggest more freedom for everybody like allow referral links.

This is a refreshing change. Signature spammers usually claim censorship and too many rules!
The trust system is an altogether different discussion...

In the case of scammers, i wise man does know how to avoid scammers. IF people got inside you head then it is your own fault. Once is a lesson but twice is damn. Well there a lot of issues in the trust systems. But i guess its not that easy to resolve that issue as to there a lot of previous topics about it.

Isn't it nice?! :p I'm kidding, lol.

[1]How can you be so sure about that? If account sales were banned on this forum, then account sales will take place off-site. Means, there is no way you could avoid dealing with "sketchy high activity accounts" a.k.a bought accounts. Unless there are evidences that the account was sold.

[2]If multiple accounts were not allowed as well, then people will just use VPN or proxies to create multiple accounts, plus it is time-consuming for admin to trace if the particular account is associated with another account and ain't nobody got time for that.

No.

Yes.

I agree there should be limit of one account per ip.That will make it difficult for people to have multiple account to some extent.Although I dont think that will bring down scams as most scammers know ways to get around the system

Hence my brace yourself. Lets talk about this specific rule and dont derive nonsense from it. Laws against rape do not prevent it. That does not mean rape should not be outlawed. Not having a rule how to eat breakfast does not equal absence of any rules.


There are risks invovled right now.


No I dont, its a movie and a bad one. Its a bad plot to justify some violence and mild distress.


An account has value due to the way ranks and acitivty works. Thus it can be used as security for a loan. The lender will have no use for the account, but essentially bought one.

Another reason are signature campaigns or simply the benefits that come with higher ranks. Its a shortcut for those unwilling to wait, but willing to pay. There was a nice argument by one of the global mods that signature campaigns in combination with account trades make it more difficult for scammers to ROI on a bought account. As signature campaigns raise account prices, scammers would need to scam more in order to ROI.

If you trust a hero member (one you never encountered before) more than a newbie account your perception of things is wrong. This does not change whether sales are allowed or not. What changes when its public knowledge that account sales are allowed but discouraged is that its easier for newbies to understand this.

You assume that somehow high ranked accounts would gain legitimacy when sales would be against the rules. This is not true, it would only appear that way, which is more dangerous than the current solution.

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They used to be allowed, then people started to spam the links.

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You are funny. Most mobile phone users share an IP address with 1000s of other users. Every larger household would be limited to a single account(?). Whats with those that have changing IP addresses (probably the majority of users here), do they create a new account per IP and have to give up the old one?

Even if this forum is not allowing accounts to be sold anymore, then this market will move to elsewhere to get people to buy accounts. Beside that, I do however want to see scammers get their account banned for ever instead of only getting market with red negative trust, but it's the way the forum is. Not much we can do about it. To me even more worrying is the fact that so many people fall for scams. How hard is it to actually use common sense? In my private life and here on Bitcointalk, I can glady say I have never been scammed. That's because I am very careful when it comes to doing business. If things don't feel good, or simply look too good to be true, then skip them. Very simple.

We can't win whatever we do. Moderate more - people complain about censorship. Take a Laissez-faire appraoch - People complain about too much freedom. People will literally complain censorship when you delete their ref link and then invent a conspiracy about why it was deleted. Mods must be on the payroll of a competing cloud mining company! Nope, just stop spamming your ref link.

The most important point here though is moderators are not babysitters of the community nor are we responsible for policing every aspect of the forum and every little dispute that happens. Could we limit people to one account per IP or remove scams? Sure, we could, but it's far too much work and hassle not to mention what happens when we get it wrong? Only admins have access to the info that would be needed to stop alt accounts and effectively moderate scams not to mention it would be a full time job for them alone and that's why we largely let the forum police itself. Plus, as has been discussed numerous times there are genuine reasons for having alt accounts and people sharing IPs or whatnot.


Have you people not heard of proxies? All you would do would make the value of accounts be worth much more. Whoever could farm the most accounts on his unique IP addresses could sell them on for a pretty penny. When you put restrictions in place like this you just inflate the price on the 'black market'. If we said today all account sales are now prohibited, do you think that would stop people from selling them? No. It would stop them on this website but people would just set up their own sites or sell them over skype and it would just lead to more scams because escrows wont get involved and other people will think that account sales don't happen so they let their guard down just because a user is a Hero member or whatnot. 

Theres plenty of technology that filters out proxies/vpns. No matter how hard you try you wont be able to access the forum with vpn/proxy. I can list you at least a dozen of forums that you wont be able to access it with vpn. It will either forbid you access or just tell you the site is offline. Doesn't matter. And I'm not talking about some free chrome extensions/tor or whatever. Paid vpn.
About the unique IP. Lets say some member registers multiple accounts on the same IP. It would be nice if we check on his account profile, it would tell us how many matching IPs he has with another members. Has more than 1? This user possibly has one legit account, and is scamming with the others.
And I see your point about the account sales, keeping its members on this forum and not elsewhere..

Fair enough, altho that wasn't my point. And how do you decide its bad if you haven't seen it?

offtopic; I know I messed up the quotes.

So we don't allow people to use proxies at all? Why not? Many of the Staff use them. So we punish users who use them to protect their privacy or security just to stop a few scammers with alt accounts? Whatever restrictions you put in place they can just as easily be bypassed and punish legit users in the first place. You don't even need to use proxies either. Just use whatever wi-fi signal you can pick up or your mobile internet. Get a few different pay as you go phones and use the internet connections of each one. Also, what happens if two people happen to log on from the same Mcdonalds one time? It now looks like he has alt accounts. It just adds more trouble.

I have seen it, I dont get your point in that regard.

So No I dont was in response if you get my point. Okay got it, my bad.

So I came to a conclusion I wouldn't trust anyone based on his activity nor feedback as today I might be talking to one person, tomorrow to different, nonetheless its the same account.

Essentially thats the consquence of the current situation yes. There are ways to verify someone is might be the same person, but they are not perfect. E.g. I can give you a message signed with an address I posted in 2013. I could have sold the private key for that address with my account though. So its just an indicator. Same goes for PGP signed messages. You still get to know people and can build trust based on their actions over time. Just stay cautions. Might be the reason why this community is so paranoid sometimes.