Bitcoin Forum

I would not bother to trust anyone who has taken out a "reputation" loan and paid it back.  Taking a loan for the point of getting the money and paying it back just a few days later to provide you are trustworthy doesn't prove a thing.  If anything it allows for scammers to get some reputation pretty easily.

Is there an alternernative? Do you have any suggestions of how one could go about improving rep w/o currently needing to trade?

Or are you saying it's best just to leave rep-building to actual trades?

Basically, people should borrow when they need to borrow, lend when they want to lend, and let the trust form naturally.  You can't force trust.

Not exactly.

To receive a loan you need to meet some requirements. So after I apply for my loan and IBB approve my application, yes for 1 day back not so many but this mean that they give me a some trust for this. They not will allow to everyone to apply fir a loan, get and back for nothing.

Second my reason is to win the Treasure Chest :)

^^^ This

Someone who takes a loan out to get their reputation up could easily be doing it to be able to scam more easily at a later time.

You think this.
This men sell on lost https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=41888.0 to build his reputation. By your logic he want to scan more easy in the future?

I build a reputation in ebay from years. By your logic this mean that i want to scam someone?

Just many posts and activity in the forum not exactly mean trust. Everyone can talk. The real actions build a reputation.

I didn't say that someone taking a reputation loan is definitely a scammer, but that just because they paid it back does not mean that they are trustworthy.  I've also said not to trust people based off of their post count.

You are correct. My point is that I provide a information for me before to get a loan. They not will allow on everyone to get a loan.

I agree that the "reputation" logic is somewhat flawed.

It is as though people go directly from "he didn't scam his last customer so he won't scam his next customer" to a conclusion, when they have only considered an extremely small subset of the whole picture.

In real life that works much better, because there are already inescapable consequences for failing to pay your debts.  If you're able to get a loan or something because you have good credit, and you default on it, the repercussions are that you don't have good credit anymore.  It's not as though you can easily just abandon your account and start over like you can on a forum.  And unlike in real life, there's no practical way to collect from someone who doesn't pay, because most of the time you can't even prove who they are.  If they were going to scam you, they already gave you fake contact info and you believed it.

Here on the forums, there seems to be this attitude of "since we're trying to replace currency, the whole established legal system doesn't apply to us either", which is laughable.  And so people make up their own rules (e.g. "bitcoin police") and their own "laws", all of which completely ignore the existing legal framework for settling disputes - a framework which may not be perfect, but it DOES function a whole lot better than anything made up on a forum.

Just as logic is only a litmus-test for truth, so are purely rep-trades for trust. So I agree that rep-trades should not and can not indicate trust by themselves.

This may just be me, but where I'm from it's custom to at least have a small chat with the person doing you a favor (in my case, a rep-loan from the IBB). This turned into a great, thought-provoking conversation between senbonzakura and I, which (I would think) is a better foundation for trust than the loan itself.  Rep-trades can also demonstrate other 'trustworthy' characteristics such as attention to detail (repaying the correct amount) and timeliness (on time) - of which the indebted is exposing themselves in addition to the initial amount.

I would be willing to bet that there are numerous robbers and burglars and career thieves on eBay who have a 99%+ feedback score, who are very personable, and who promptly respond to inquiries from their customers.  They're incented to play straight on eBay, so as to maintain a way to sell their stolen goods.

But that doesn't mean these people are good risks.  They are good sellers on eBay mainly because it's in their rational best interest to be.  And "good" is highly qualified - stolen goods don't come with legal title to the goods, so they appear "good" only to the extent they are able to conceal the true nature of what they are selling.

If being personable, prompt, and having a consistent, long record of 99% feedback isn't enough to dissuade the 'career criminal' label, what is?

I think the only way to avoid getting scammed 100% is to use a reputable escrow service.

You have a point, but "we" have their details..  :D

Fake stuff wouldn't be that hard to come up with.