The FIFA confederations cup should give us a glimpse of this as all champions from the different continents would get to play against each other.
I heard some news about FIFA planning to cancel the tournament and replace it with another, not sure if that plan has been put in motion yet.

Didn't check out the odd for D'tigers to win against team USA, but it would have sure been a massive one considering the line up of both teams, however since that victory and the second against Argentina; D'tigers odds to win gold at the Olympics has risen significantly and now only about five teams are considered by bookies to have a better chance than team Nigeria.

As the only African team at the tournament they would surely be getting lots of support from the continent and it would be huge if they return with a medal.

If you're going to copy and paste an article, you should put in the effort to find a recent one with accurate data;
Bitcoin's circulating supply is above $18 million, not 11 and the market cap is over $607 billion not 7.

Transactions are only irreversible after they are confirmed and for larger amounts one should wait for e-6 confirmations before concluding the transaction can no longer be reversed.

No, Jr member is the minimum rank that allows a signature; newbies were allowed to wear signatures before the enhanced newbie restrictions & requirements.
However most signature campaigns only take from full member up and a few allow member rank.

This forum is not a means of earning simply, it's rather a discussion forum for engaging with individuals who have an interest in Bitcoin. Judging from your post history, you've simply been spamming bounties, as that is probably not profitable, you wish to switch to signature campaigns.
Rather than look for how to earn, take out time to read and interact with other members, through this you'll gain more knowledge and as a bonus, a possible spot in a campaign.

Yes, you can make as many posts without much effort and get no merit.

So a situation where merits validate a post? I do not see the purpose of that, as merits, posts and activities are counted distinctly and you'll be notified once you get a merit.

Yes, the rules changed a while back to reduce account farming and users simply spamming to rank up.
You need at least one merit to rank up to Jr member - https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=2818350.msg28856522#msg28856522

In addition to not getting paid, participants of such campaigns usually divulge personal information like email and social media profiles which could be linked to their forum identity, or worse case scenario gets to the darkweb and becomes a tool for target scams.
Anyone would be better off just posting regularly on the forum and sharpening their knowledge of the Bitcoin technology.

In addition to consolidating your inputs, there are address types like Segwit, which are customized to attract lower fees than others; it's preferable you consolidate your inputs to to those addresses as it will reduce the cost when you're later transferring those coins to some other address. You may pay a slightly high amount now, but it will save you lots in transaction fees in the future.

CMIIW, but majority of the development for the new forum software has already been done and the cost has already been invested in, at this point it's just a case of when does it officially get released, not a question of whether or not to release it, as the forum (admins and the community) have already invested a lot into it.

Also, the forum isn't particularly profit-based and the primary purpose of the new software is not to attract more users; That's the job of the Bitcoin network which will attract individuals to itself and by extension this forum, the new software is meant to address some of the issues users have discussed over for years such a 2FA, a mobile friendly website etc. I have no issue with the way the forum is, but some others want those features and it should be available to them and I can choose not to use them.

You make an important point about the evil fee, it's a system that does not work adequately and should be reviewed. I've once been on a forum where users from a whole country were tagged to a single or very close IPs and registration was made difficult for everyone, it created a bad situation, discouraging many from joining.

There are several links on merit and ranks, but in summary;
• Users merit you for posts they find quality,
• For every merit you receive, you get half in smerits, so 1 merit would produce 0.5 smerits but you can't spend this till you get another merit taking your smerits to 1,
• You can send your smerits to posts you find quality, it does not affect your merit count,
• Merits an activity determines your rank,
• Do no focus to much on either, rather concentrate on the discussions and available information on the forum.

If you suspect a user is farming accounts, you could avoid sending merits to them to not support them, but besides that, it's no longer a major forum issue. Such members would eventually run out of merits to cycle as it progressively decays.

About meriting someone that merited you in the past; users are free to use their smerits the way they please, as long as it's not sold, they are not cheating the system.

There is no guarantee in any investment and buying Bitcoin does not mean you'll get "good profit" back, regardless of how much you have to put in.
Also, when the market is bad not so attractive and many people are skeptical about investing, that's usually the best time to buy and not during a FOMO when the price is skyrocketing.

For one, maybe do not make posts with different colors except it's absolutely necessary to the message you are trying to pass.

There are so many helpful links around, focus on stickies on boards that interest you as it contains valuable information about that subject.

Those member who post advices on how to get merit and behave in the forum while not doing what they suggest were most likely hunting for merits which would enable them collect higher pay in bounties. The probably had seen other members get merits for similar posts and decided to try their luck.

Meta is for forum related issues, this post is about bouty hunters which is not directly concerned with the forum; it fits better here or in reputation board.

Southgate should not have made his team sit back after going infront, which ironically is how the Italians play. England's strength is more in attack and they could have posed far more threats if the team wasn't sitting back and hoping to scale through.
It's still all level though, with plenty of time for either side to win this before the end of possible 120 minutes of football.

This contradicts one of the popular rules of investment; only invest what you can afford to lose.
Investing funds you actually need (or would need in the near future) puts you in a tight spot as you'll be more likely to cut your loses at price drops.
Only invest amounts you can afford to lose, you could also DCA;
• Start a real life business,
• Apportion a part of your regular profits to buying Bitcoin,
• This would be a fixed amount at a fixed time, such as weekly or monthly
This way you build your portfolio over time with less risk.

The burden of the final decision rests on you and do not view any reply here as financial advice.
You do not lose funds invested in Bitcoin unless you sell at a loss

This is the most important takeaway from this thread for me and should be the fist thing a new member considers. If a user focuses on learning about Bitcoin and the forum, they would be able to gather enough information on how to navigate through the forum, post quality content, manage campaigns etc, as so many posts has been made on these topics.

The forum software has been requested many times and various features which have been requested here are expected to be functioning on the new software, furthermore, I do not think general opinion actually matters as the project is already too far gone to be halted with so much money being invested already.
If the holdup is due to low testing, I believe there could have been an alternative solution beside getting volunteer testers for the website.

Being at the top of a thread gives more visibility than lower pages, but beyond that it does not increase merit chances, and just doing the barest minimum would not get you merits simply cause you're starting topics, rather, your account could begin to stand out for posting hackneyed topics and put you in some ignore lists.
Lots of too users like o_e_l_e_o rarely start threads, but still gets lots of merits for quality contributions.

While I agree we should be carful who we give that first merit as it could breed signature spam, we should also not be any more suspicious of newbie accounts than other ranks and they should not be generalized.
There are newbies who know the rules better than higher ranked members. And in the event we are wrong; worst case scenario, the user gets banned and the smerits decay, a far lesser consequence than making ranking up for newbies difficult, imo.

Reading the rules of the forum is encouraged, but one does not need the forum rules to decide that plagiarism is wrong, it's frowned upon in writing and most people who do it, have a bad intent.

Not necessarily. Putting a link to the source would indemnify the user from any penalty, it is however suggested to have your own opinion and not just regurgitate other people's content.

Anyone can form an opinion, it does not have to be a correct one, that's the reason the community exists; to assist users in understanding more about Bitcoin. Read, understand, inquire, read some more and repeat.

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+1 for the the link to the forum rules, also, following posts of most merited users would provide useful content, but I do not think users need to follow the most merited posts as they may not be informative, be in a different language, or not be of interest or a newbie. Users should find topics they are interested in and research more on those.