Bitcoin Forum

Previous idea is no longer center of discussion on the thread.

This suggestion from o_e_l_e_o


and DdmrDdmr data


Clearly points out a better solution than the one I was proposing first.


I quite like the idea of diminishing sig spamming by restricting signatures to people managing to acquire merit. Do anyone see a problem with that? It would at least reduce spam while allowing anyone who just wants to talk do it.

I don't like this idea as it doesn't feel like something that would progress us further as a community..

Some people that are hanging out in certain sections are rarely getting any merits, same goes for some oldies that are hanging around who usually just pop in every now and then (Happens from time to time in collectibles).

If a person does not get merit for every 20 posts he makes, that does not mean he is a shitposter or he should not be allowed to post on the forum. This is a place were freedom of speech is respected and should be.

There are many flaws in this.

1. People who are new here mostly don't get merits even after posting 100+ posts.

2. Most of the people are unmerited even after writing quality posts as they are just not detected by someone with smerits.

3. Some of the people just tend to post updates about there services here so that posts are obvious to get no merits.

4. If you check marketplace section much of the people just use there accounts to bid on some stuff there, so they usually earn less merits.

Much more...

All this things can make much worthy people of the forum to be banned from posting.

So, I think its not a good idea to put merit requirements to the forum members to post.

Most members don't fit in that, and it is not an an indication of quality posts by any means. your idea will help fight shitposting but it will also stop good posts when everyone is paranoid of not getting merit,therefore running out of posts. the knowledge sharing on the forum will drop along side with the shitposting.

there are also many off-topic posts and market place that supposedly go un-merited for a simple reason.

I asked sometime ago for another new "score" which calculates together the air-doped merit, received merit, post count, deleted messages and activity.
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=4603181.msg41553497#msg41553497
Nothing new there...

@vod could you do something on your site?

Posts since merit system/merits received = meritworthyness?

That would totally change the purpose of the Merit system. The system is not supposed to stop people from posting, but it is to stop them from ranking up without any efforts.
If someone joins the forum to earn money through it by joining campaigns and bounties, then they need to rank up first by contributing something in the forum and earning Merits, but if someone joins it for another purpose as mentioned earlier, they don't need to earn Merits and they can continue doing what they want to if they don't really care about ranking up.
Besides, as said by LoyceV, a person's contributions towards the forum are clearly seen by the number of posts they've made and the number of Merits they've managed to get so far.

Take a look at my last 20 posts. Do I seem like the average shitposting scum? Well maybe yes because I post in sections where no merit source visits. But does that make a difference to me? No. Because I care about what I post about and not as an attempt to gain merit.

If you look at my posts in Bitcoin Discussion and Trading Discussion, I always try to usher in a good emotion among people whom I feel are becoming sore after having to hodl through times of bear runs. Thats what we should all do as a part of this community in order to garner the support for bitcoin and crypto in general.

My posts in Project Discussion and Lending go out for calling of scammers who attempt to fake themselves - I feel I am just doing my part in protecting possible victims.

What I dont like is trying to make new topics everyday farming away merits trying to catch the eyes of every merit source and then refreshing the profile page every 2 minutes to check how many new merit one could get by their last "ass-licking" attempt.

No offence to OP though. This was not meant for them anyway. But those who do this know that.

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Participate in the forum. Forget about merit. Stop being obsessed with merit and its application to everything. You guys are forgetting what this forum is about.

I disagree (-1), this is just like saying if I post 20 times on facebook and I don't get a share (or maybe like)  I should be stop from posting. Actually most of my post don't get shared/liked on facebook because they are seen by those who aren't inform about bitcoin and blockchain in general but that's why I make those posts to inform them.    

Back to the forum. If I see a technical post especially those ones with all the codes,  I just move on because I don't understand them, Just like my facebook friends do.

That's why I agree with this user when he said,  
But there's a solution Report unmerited good posts to Merit Source (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5093271.0/) i have been using it and so far the results are positive.

Not agree with OP. The current merit system working fine enough. Don't make it more difficult. It's already very hard to earn 1 merit for new user especially for spambie. If you restrict them then forum will be empty. Lol.
However from beginning even me was not a good poster or even I will not angry if you call me spambie. But day by day I has been learning from forum. Still I am learner and gain enough merit. If your intention is good enough then you can earn merit from the forum. If you just bounty spammer means he never expect merit.

So better just keep the current merit system.

See https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5051725.0 for examples.
I'll add OP when I'm back at my desk.

0.05 Merit per post is far too steep as a requirement.
Spammers won't even reach a fraction of that, and spammers are the only ones who should be stopped by merit requirements.

Well put it at 0.005 then. ANYONE can reach that ratio if there is just a slight beginning of correct English.

That's 1 merit every 200 posts.

Can anyone point at someone making decent posts not getting that?

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=profile;u=732010

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=profile;u=933326

There and many more such examples you should try checking in other sections too.

Thanks for proving my point xD

First user: Complete shitposter. His posts are ONLY participations in free lotteries in the forum or airdrops. Never written anything but his name or a btc address. How is that a useful member for the community?

Second user: made less than 30 posts in the last 2 years.

FFS check the 1st page of that cunts posts - you are a manager and you think that level of posting is ok?

Check the last one too...

This is exactly what a ratio would avoid. Don't put it high so it doesn't harm users that just like to talk a lot, but a very small one will avoid this.

Fuck that, peteswhoobviouslyisnttheman actually needs a tag - he shouldn't be allowed to do business on this forum for that post alone

Yes, they are unworthy posts in a views of a bounty manager or a poster like you here but, the point is that does not mean he should be banned from posting as he has earned no merits. If they are banned it would just make a decent crypto collector unable to post on best crypto forum in the world.

No, and theymos would never do this as he is against restricting people from posting too much. There are so many users and posts and so few merit sources that it won't be uncommon for average posters to go unmerited but that doesn't mean they should be prohibited from posting. You can certainly use their posts to merit ratio as a barometer if you want but that shouldn't restrict them from contributing. What happens if you just make posts in the marketplace trying to sell things but don't really contribute anything elsewhere? That's fine but in your system without merit they would be prohibited from selling here. If someone is truly a terrible poster or even worse being disruptive then they should be dealt in other ways but automatically restricting people isn't a good idea for reasons I've just stated.

Yeah well after the DT changes he even has a fucking 42 green trust score xD


You're wrong. The user is actually just farming and abusing lotteries on the forum. He's most certainly someone having alts and trying to post multiple times on lotteries hold by good guys.

What Value or entertainment does he provide on this forum? how is he a "decent crypto collector" ?

just to confirm - https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=profile;u=732010  this is the user I am discussing

Something is fishy here.

I would be against this suggestion in its current form.

While I agree that most of the users affected by a 1-merit-in-200-posts restriction would be spamming newbies, there are bound to be false positives in there. I wouldn't be surprised if some of the denizens of Politics & Society and Off Topic such as notbatman or BADecker hit that ratio. While these users' views are (in my opinion) insane, we shouldn't be seeking to silence people we disagree with. I could also foresee a situation where people stop being helpful and responding to newbie's/simple questions, as they are unlikely to get merit for these posts, which is not something we wish to encourage.

A suggestion I did see in another thread, which I would prefer over this one but has a similar outcome, is charging users 1 earned merit per activity period (2 weeks) to display a signature. If they run out of earned merit, they lose their signature until they earn more.

Again I might be wrong here but I don't see how anyone with an average level of posting could get less than 1 merit for 200 posts.

If someone only post in the marketplace then if he respects the daily bumping rule he will most likely never get to the 200 posts anyway. And if he does and is a good seller or buyer he will most likely get a few merits by then. Look at the number of merits dropped in the collectibles or goods section for people selling genuine art, collectibles or legit items.

I haven't seen anyone making anything decent reaching below the 0.005 merit per post ration.

Back in October 2018, I calculated the merit per day, in order to get a general idea of how many people were keeping up with the 1 merit per day, which is sort of the equivalent of being able to rank-up without merit slowing one down. The number of people with or above the 1 merot per day ratio was of 109, which represented at the time 0,5% of all merited forum members (disregarding recently created accounts in order to avoid noise in the data).

The main core of forum members earn an average per day lower than 0.1 merits. Restricting people from posting with low averages, be it on a per post or per day basis, would have very negative effects. To start with, only 25.809 people have received any merits at all.

That would mean that, all the rest of currently active posters have earned 0 merits per day (and per post), leaving the vast majority out from being able to post. There are also plenty of people who post sporadically and/or in boards that are not showered with merits, and who may well be decent content generators when they post.

Wrong here, they do reach this ratio and quite easily ^^

Simply because even if I agree considering their views are... Batshit crazy... They still display from times to times enough quality to get a few merits.

But I quite like the other suggestion that seems to be a good fight against sig spamming.


Just... How do you do that? Oo
How do you find a 2014 message so fast?

But do those 26k people have reached the 200 posts limit? Seems normal to me that a newbie with 5 posts might not have received any merit?

Vast majority of users are probably not even active. But if you make the same calculation with a merit/post ratio I doubt you'll find 90% of user under a 0.005 limit.

Yes, I confirm I am talking about the same account.

Yes, I already said I support you that he does not add any value and in no way entertainment to the forum but please read the post I quoted for the examples. Again @m0gliE is suggesting to not let the posters who don't receive 1 -200 merits to posts ratio to post on the forum. The user in no way promotes any spam here or does scams so I don't think he should be banned for just not reaching the goal of 1-200 merit to post ratio.

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Please stop trying to put unreasonable doubts. That was the time when I quiet up with the crypto suff here but the love dragged me back here. :-*

No, I do not have a record of old posts.

@TMAN

Please check my my previous post I was letting the OP know that such type of users should not be banned from posting. Please remove your negative trust it has no basis here.

Huge posting gap with this one; it was easy to find by just going into the history because of this.

Can you or can you not sign a message from an old address?

This one for example.

Actually the trust might be appropriate given your statement, given the posting gap and you labeling yourself as a BM (while making such statements).

No, I cannot as I mostly convert the crypto to fiat and used different address. Still I can sign one from the recent one from which I signed a message already.



No

There are many people here who have posting gaps that does not mean they should get a red trust on the basis.

My trust stands i am afraid, you have no right being a manager if you believe that those posters are "decent crypto collectors". Your Judgement is flawed and I am pretty sure it wont be the 1st tag you see by the time you answer the posting gap question!

Right, so you can't sign from any old address and there are no other ways of confirming that the same user is still in control of the account? Very convenient.

Actually it can depending on what they try to do afterwards.

Firstly there is nothing like right to be a BM. And I am not supporting the user to be a very important member of the forum or anything else just trying to say that he has done nothing for which he should be avoided from posting on the forum.

And there should be some basis for the tag and I in no way did any thing which makes me untrustworthy.

I don't think I have done something scammy if I have please explain me.

I’ve drawn-up a quick merit per post ratio for forum members that:
-   Had been merited on the 25/05/2018 (oldest merit snapshot I have without getting into backups, but it serves or purpose with over 7 months of data).
-   Have created at least 200 posts since then.
I’ve created a merit per post ration for each of the above set of forum members (see https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1nyaHbaz31aVf6dnnTjiPOuCflZv1UOxNSWTQVMMUt68/edit?usp=sharing).

In summary we get:
-   There is an unknown (by me) number of users that have posted at least 200 posts since 25/05/2018 (unmerited ones I mean).
-   21.808 forum members had been merited on the 25/05/2018.
-   3.679 of those have posted at least 200 posts since the 25/05/2018.
-   1.219 of them have an average >= 0,005 merits/post.

So really, only 1.219 forum members meet the criteria of having 0,005 merits per post on over 200 posts since 25/05/2018 (*). That is a pretty reduced set …

(*) Well, really there is an additional set made up from those that had not been merited yet on the 25/05/2018, and have since then + created >= 200 posts, but I needed an initial snapshot to retrieve the post and merit count from.

Edit: One can also manipulate the merit per post ratio by deleting posts.

I don't like the ide to prevent an user for posting. First because he can create a new account and spam again, and also because of the censorship philosophy which I don't like.

A guy may never been merited  and is a complete shitposter like pethesteman friends... You can just ignore him.

However, I believe that signatures should be disabled for users which never earned at least a few merits.

You don't need to ban shitposters from posting, but they should never receive in incentive to shitpost.

Unlike torrent websites where you can make a ratio because you can create a torrent and seed, in this case, you won't be able to earn merits if you can't post.
So once you reach the quota/ratio whatsoever basically it's one false move and it's goodbye for that account.

In this way you won't silence spammers, you'll silence all the forum, in the end, the only one who would be able to post here would be theymos.



Introduce the merit decay while having a signature at whatever rate and we will get rid of sig spam.
They can still post and if they want to shitpost for free that's it, hit the ignore button but I seriously doubt they will.

Not all users here are Native English Speakers and you know about that. This forum is global so do not expect that all users could speak English language. Besides, even if there were local boards but still some of it are not that active and one should have to go to other sections like those SMT where they can reply posts in a simple way of manner of constructing English grammar which could not earn merits.

If we will going to have a ratio for the Source merits over the number of users in this forum then earning merit is just like difficult as hell.

This suggestion from o_e_l_e_o


and DdmrDdmr data


Clearly points out a better solution than the one I was proposing first.

Should I lock the thread? Or allow the discussion to continue on this new base ground?

I quite like the idea of diminishing sig spamming by restricting signatures to people managing to acquire merit. Do anyone see a problem with that? It would at least reduce spam while allowing anyone who just wants to talk do it.

I like o_e_l_e_o's proposal a bit better, but with more time allowed (e.g. 3 activity period at least) to earn that merit, because if you're on a holiday or have something to do in real life for a while, you should not lose your merits because of inactivity.
Or, if we count only those activity periods, when the user has posted at least 1 post. This would not burn the acquired merits if someone is inactive.

But the signature is still visible on all the posts they made previously. They could remove it manually before going on vacation if they don't want to be charged.

As I said, I read this on another thread, and I've since gone to the bother of looking it up. It was stompix's suggestion here: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5092399.msg49017143#msg49017143. His original suggestion includes what suchmoon is suggesting: 1 merit for each activity period in which you display a signature. If you don't want to be charged the 1 merit, then remove your signature.

Topic shouldn't be locked yet but you should edit your topic body and update it with o_e_l_e_o suggestions so the discussion can be based on it since his suggestions is more appealing. The topic can be locked when you notice the discussion are been diverted to something else (off topic).

It's an interesting topic, and I just changed my mind from disliking (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5097573.msg49243135#msg49243135/) the idea to liking it based on o_e_l_e_o quoted suggestion.

I definitely agree with you on this. The merit system is a nice regulatory initiative but I don't think its really working. I see it as the rich get richer scheme. Sometimes I get the idea that either good posts made by people are not seen by merit source or are just ignored. Looking at the nature of the merit system, its prefect to solve the spamming on this forum. 

I am always actively on the lookout for good posts by newbies or other more junior members to give merit to, but honestly, they are few and far between. If you are coming across any posts which you think are good enough to be given merit, but haven't received any, please link us to them on this thread so we can review them: [self-moderated] Report unmerited good posts to Merit Source (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5093271.0).