Those are strange criteria. As pointed out in previous posts, the vast majority of spam is coming from users using altcoin/bounty signatures. As asche has said, I also disagree with your "real" versus "not real" campaigns/signatures. Yes, bounty campaigns/signatures pay in complete trash, but they still contribute massively to spam, and that is what we need to address here.

Still, you can easily find examples of your criteria, for example: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5065979.msg49447865#msg49447865

Click for full size image. 4 useless posts back to back, all from senior+ members, all with earned merits, all with a bitcoin-paying signature.

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If that were true, it wouldn't be an issue. I just went to Bitcoin Discussion, clicked on the first thread with >100 replies, and went to the last page. Here it is: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5067162.160. There are 16 posts on that page, 14 of them with an altcoin signature, and all 14 of them completely worthless. I didn't have to search for that example, literally the first thread I clicked on. As someone who spends hours reporting this nonsense, I can assure you this spam is everywhere.

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Agreed. It would be difficult/impossible to implement any kind of system like this without simultaneously creating more of a "black market" for merit. It would certainly require a lot of vigilance over the merit sources to ensure no foul play was going on.

Oh my god, why didn't I think of this? Gimme gimme gimme (please).

No worries. I'll be able to rustle some ugly, overly complicated and frankly embarrassing code up on my own to achieve the same thing.

According to this tweet and your link, they are working on full integration with Nano S devices. A full version for the Nano S will only be available on Android, however, since iOS apparently doesn't support the use of the OTG cable.

I'll be using it as a "wallet watcher" in the meantime, since it can watch my actual addresses in real time without me having to manually input transactions like I currently do with Delta. Given that Ledger Live still doesn't support watching many of the coins/tokens that the Nano S can hold, however, I imagine many people won't use it for this function alone, and will be waiting until it supports the Nano S.

It's always quiet with the ignore button. If only I had one of those in real life.

Well anyway, I stand corrected. Maybe he did go on holiday after all. I genuinely hope it was enjoyable, he had a good time, and it allowed him to de-stress a bit. I worry about his blood pressure. Maybe if he does come back a bit calmer and a bit more rational I'll take another peek at his posts again soon. Hopefully I'm not disappointed.

Interesting that "turn" is one of the 2048 BIP39 words. Wonder if someone got hopelessly confused between passwords and mnemonic seeds? Or if it's just really bad security and purely a coincidence?

Have you checked all the other BIP39 words at any point? Is there a pattern at all?

An interesting suggestion.

As a seasoned reporter, it would make no difference to me. The comment box is pretty easy to autofill from the drop down list of previous comments that appears when I start typing. If I want to move to "Speculation" for example, I just type "spec" and then select the top suggestion. Similarly for plagiarism, I type "plag", select the top entry and change the source link. Check boxes would make no difference to my speed or accuracy of reports.

Having said that, you make a very valid point for junior members. I remember it being daunting when I first started reporting to know what kind of things to type in that box. Welsh's guide helped a lot, but I can see how some check boxes would be helpful for junior members.

Obviously, I'm not a mod so can't comment on that side of things, but I would image if people are all reporting the same thing in different ways*, a degree of standardization might make their lives easier.

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*Example:

This post is plagiarized, please see the following link as proof: URL
Copy and pasted. Source link URL.
URL. This is the source, post has been plagiarized.
Plagiarized post from URL.
Copied from URL. Please ban user.
etc

Damn. Guess I'm still not part of the inner circle yet. And after Foxpup invited me to his foxhole for some unspeakable deeds as well. I'll need to try harder.

Seriously though, that is in equal parts sad and hilarious. I've had him on ignore for several weeks now, so I had no idea it had gotten this bad. I'm sure someone else mentioned that he said he was packing for a holiday at some point? So either he is lying about his social life on an internet forum, or he actually went on holiday and continued to spam the forum the entire time he was there? I'm not sure which is worse.

Completely agree with "proposition 1" - we should make it an ongoing task to earn your signature, and not "buy 1 merit, shitpost for life" as it is now.

In terms of "tagging" accounts for shitposting as you outline in "proposition 2" - this is essentially the same as reporting, and so I don't think we need to introduce yet another new system to achieve this. I think what we do need is to be more liberal in the banning of shitposters, or introduce signature bans/removals/blacklist for repeat offenders. I keep on seeing the same names popping up in my report history, users who I alone have got 10, 20, 30+ of their posts deleted in the space a few days, but it is very rare (in my experience) for these users to actually get banned. It's pretty frustrating to have to keep on reporting the same user over and over when they are simply churning out a post a minute of garbled nonsense.

There is always a spike in activity on this board whenever there is a big change to the forum. We saw a spike with the introduction of merit, we saw a spike with the 1-merit-for-signature rule, and now we are seeing a spike with the new DT changes. Most of the merit spam has died down (in here at least) as word seems to have finally gotten round that all you will gain if you post in here with a thinly veiled plea for merit is someone thoroughly reviewing your post history and a ban for any plagiarism. As you say, thankfully the posts surrounding the DT changes are generally much more constructive* than any of the posts regarding merit or its changes. Expect another spike in activity in a few days with the second reincarnation of the new DT1 list.

*With all the trolls on ignore, of course. Highly recommended.

Wasn't it obvious? Just look at their avatars! Someone get Jet Cash in here to confirm this inner circle of abuse.

I had considered that, and I fully support the suggestion to show default trust scores to guests without an account, but OP's account was registered almost a year ago in February 2018. So unfortunately in this case, it seems just like a case of complete naivety, especially when it seems he was scammed twice in quick succession by two different users selling from auto-buy links in locked threads.

The only reason gold, silver, precious metals, gemstones, jewelry, etc, can be used as a store of wealth is because there are people buying, selling and trading these things. If suddenly no one in the world was willing to buy gold, then the price of gold effectively becomes $0. The same can be said of bitcoin, and to an extent, all money including fiat. If no one accepts it as payment for anything, then it essentially becomes worthless.

You can hold bitcoin for as long as you want, but without widespread adoption, it won't be going anywhere.

Both this user, and the other user you opened a thread about, are already tagged by DT, have been for months, and have "Warning: Trade with extreme caution!" under their usernames.

Furthermore, anyone selling from a locked or self-moderated thread should be approach very cautiously, since they can silence/remove negative feedback and leave themselves fake positive feedback..

You would be wise to do more due diligence in the future before trading.

You are absolutely right.

If you are willing to spend money in exchange for a good or service, be it fiat or bitcoin, there is someone out there who will accept it. Now, while millionaires can buy anything they like in bitcoin by throwing enough money at it, the average person here isn't going to be able to convince some big supermarket or chain to start accepting bitcoin, but they could certainly have success in smaller independent retailers or tradespeople. After me asking every week for a month or so, one of the sellers at my local farmers' market started to accept bitcoin, and now he isn't the only one accepting it and I'm not the only one spending it.

Stop waiting for retailers to accept crypto and start asking them to accept crypto. Holding won't get us anywhere if no one is spending.

This is the most peculiar reason I've heard in a long time. Still, you can quite easily write in the browser, and then copy-paste to Word/notepad/other periodically to save. Or download one of the several browser add-ons which will automatically save whatever you write in text fields. These are easy solution that would take literally seconds for you to implement.

I don't think doing that would be of any benefit to the hacker. The whole point of this attack was that it was stealing 2FA codes via the forum and using them to log in to exchange accounts. Keeping username and passwords would be no use unless the hacker had another way of stealing 2FA codes.


A bank is regulated and insured. Many crypto exchanges are not. Of course they should compensate the losses, but there have been many hacks in the past that haven't. It's by no means guaranteed.

Totally, but its probably less hassle for them to just have a blanket policy for all sales rather than an arbitrary cut-off. Presumably there would be at least 1 person somewhere who would try to "game" the system by buying $1 less than the cut-off every day. With the fees as they are, they obviously aren't interested whatsoever in helping to push adoption or anything like that - they just want profit.

You are still well above average. You've earnt merits faster than you have earnt activity over the last year, and so even if you were not legendary you would not have been hindered from ranking up at all.


I am always on the look out for good newbies who aren't getting the merit they deserve. Unfortunately such posts are hard to come by, and when I do come by them, I find there is usually about a 50/50 chance that they are plagiarized. Still, if you or anyone else does come across any such good-but-unmerited posts, post a link to them over here: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5093271.0.

This was a man-in-the-middle type attack on individual users' accounts, stealing their 2FA keys via the forum to log in to their LBC accounts and transfer out their funds. There was no hack on the main LBC wallets or databases, so your personal information won't be affected. I would encourage everyone, however, to think twice before performing KYC with any service online. Just because your documents weren't accessed with this attack, doesn't mean they won't be accessed in the future.


According to this reddit post, one of the affected users has already had his lost balance reimbursed.

Their website (here: https://www.coinme.com/coinstar) does say they will accept up to $2500 per person per day, although I struggle to believe anyone spending that amount of money is going to be happy losing 20% of it to these ridiculous fees, or not be able to figure out a better way of buying bitcoin that involves far less fees and potentially no KYC if they are interested in that.