I guess it's time for someone to go ahead and make the price-of-pizza in BTC ticker/chart/widget.  It's obvious from the length of this thread that the people are intersted, who's going to make the widget?

By the way, when it says we have to remove "off-topic" posts from our post count, does this mean any posts in the "off-topic" subforum, or does it mean a post in any subforum which is not on topic for the thread it's in.  That is, if our posts in the off-topic subforum are on-topic, do we count them or not?

Perhaps some of you folks want to join the conversation going here:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=682802.0

Good luck comrades!

Apparantly things have gotten pretty bad over at the updown campaign.  Some folks continue to bear the signature while those who drop the signature in protest never get paid.  As long as some folks keep putting the signature on, then the OP gets free advertising.  Obviously this is a stupid business decision in the long run (I believe)---word will spread through the community eventually about how he fails to honor his contracts and then he will essentially have accomplished "antiadvertising" on this forum.  Anyway, it would all stop right now if the updown advertizers would simply drop the sig together until the situation was straightned out.

I read your argument as "fuck goddamn shit troll fuckface troll troll goddamn pretending mouthing mistakes shit shit troll lemmings spamming liar liar troll stfu shithell".  Maybe we can call this "anger salad", is that about right?

I just enrolled, or I think I did.  The situation is a bit confusing at the moment.  The form takes you to the claim page after you go through the enrollment page.  Then apparantly (according to others on this thread) you're supposed to click submit once more (leaving the claim form info blank) in order to be enrolled.  Indeed, I was then greeted with a "thanks" message which felt like things had finalized.  However, I do feel like I'd like some confirmation that I'm enrolled (do I really just have to wait for that post on the 370th page of this thread to be updated by hand?).  Presumanbly now that there's automated form, Stunna could provide some link to the updated results from that form so that we can feel at ease that everything went through ok.

Yes, xbtec owes me one remaining payment.  FWIW, I believe he will pay, he doesn't seem dishonest, only disorganized.

To the folks who say the system works well as things stand, I'd say you're only partially correct.  Sometimes the system works well, sometimes it doesn't.  If signature bearers with a little more solidarity, I think that advertizers would be forced to get their acts together more quickly.  Really I'm not trying to organize anything "official", I'm merely trying to facilitate a discussion about generating a culture in which certain kinds of abuses aren't tolerated by the community.


Zyborg, I think you missed my point entirely.  I have no power to prevent or "let" everyone make their own decisions.  Nor would I want such a power.  My question to you is this: what would you do if your campaign paid you and failed to pay someone else.  Do you just "let them get scammed"?  Or do you do something proactive under the notion that you may be the next person to "get scammed" by such a campaign?

By "tomorrow" you were referring 9 July, correct?

OK, but even if we all remove the signature today.  You still one more round of payments, as documented  in Yamamoto's most recent spreadsheet.  Can you comment about when you expect to send the final amounts?

Hi Yakamoto, I appreciate your punctuality.  However, although I may be mistaken, I thought you decided that PMs were due to you anytime on Tuesday.  Since it's still Tuesday in the far West, I didn't figure that PMs were due for a few more hours.

Sure.  I guess what I'm talking about is that I've seen it such that several people aren't paid, they start the scammer thread, but then others who were paid continue on bearing the signature.  Then others jump into the spots vacated by the people who got scammed.  Thus the sponsor can contiue to half-pay or pay when he chooses as long as he doesn't alienate everyone obviously, he can get a lot of free advertising.  I think what's ever worse is that when the next campaign starts, people start to think that this is the way things are (everyone for himself!) and things just get worse and worse for the ad-bearers.


You may be right, things are looking bleak there.  I'll probably drop a line in that thread and ask folks to consider my proposal (act together!). IMHO, it's a shame that a lot of hero and senior members are still wearing the ad.  If you ask me, they should all drop the ad immediately and demand payment in order to put it back.  Obviously, this only really works if people act as a unified front. If only a few remove the ad, up/down will prolly just say "see, they cheated, no payment for them..."


I really think that quality of posts is orthogonal to this issue. Spam/low-value posts obviously clog up the board and make us all unhappy. What's more, advertisers who legitimately care about their image don't want to be associated with such antisocial activity.  IMHO, the scheme by bitmixer.io is really honorable, it doesn't encourage folks to post any more than they already would.  However, the rates are so low there that it's not very competitive.  Nevertheless, I think the problem of weeding low-value posters out of the campaign is not related to the problem of sponsors failing to uphold their contracts in a whimsical way.

I used the calculator again today.  I really appreciate it and the convenience.  This is so much better than years ago when people would just quote the mt. gox price as if it was the golden truth.

Sorry, this was premature then.  Pretend I said "after this is is closed".  

My idea is basically to start a culture whereby when this kinda thing happens, all the campaigners drop the signature at the same moment.   Let's call it the equivalent of a strike.   So, for example, perhaps as a staring point, I'd suggest that when a campaigner who doesn't pay all the participants by 24hours past the time agreed upon, all the campaigners should immediately remove the signature until the campaigner settles the debt.  If everyone acts in soldiarity, the campaigner would basically realize that he's not going to get away with any free advertizing, he needs to make everything right before anyone would be willing to bear his ad.

A stronger version of this, which I'm not 100% sure is a good idea, would be to place text over the ad which says "UNRESOLVED ISSUES WITH COMPANY X---DO NOT BUY".  I think this would be a sort of extreme measure.  Say after a campaigner has failed to rectify the debt for weeks and is not willing to negotiate to make it right.

Hello folks,

I've been involed in a few signature ad campaigns of the past few years.  By involved I mean that I've rented my signature space out.  To be honest, the first few campaigns I was involved in were completely professional and there were no issues regarding payment, payment-ontime, etc.  However, the last few campaigns I've been involved in have had serious issues.  Either payments weren't done on time.  Or they were done on time for some people but not for others.  Or everyone was paid but some weren't paid in full.

In my opinion, those who rent out their signature need to stick together on this front.  When a signature renter doesn't pay one of us in full, it's really a damage to all of us---that's because any of us might be the next one not to be paid.  I'm not trying to organize an official union or monopolize the labor market or anything like that.  However, I am thinking that there should be some basic "signature bearer's rights" and that signature campaigns who violate these rights for even a single individual in the campaign should basicially find their ad removed from all the campaigners by solidarity.  I think this sort of thing would force folks renting signature space to be respectful and professional and to fulfill their contracts.

The opposite of this sort of solidarity is what I'm seeing a lot now.  As soon as one person says "hey i didn't get paid" half of the newbies jump on him and say "well there must have ben some problem with your posts" or "well what did you do wrong" or "stop spreading FUD".  In any case, if the person really did have something wrong, that's one thing.  But I can reference specific incidents in a number of recent campaigns where folks left unsatisfied after basically bearing the ad in their signature for free.

I don't want to propose anything too concrete here, I just want to prompt discussion about solidarity among signature renters.  My opinion is that would drive signature campaign advertizers to treat their contractees with professionalism and improve the market conditions for these contractees.  What are your opinions?

Yes, after 7 days I sent a PM and then I received a payment just after that.  Sending the PM may have been a coincidence tho.  That is, maybe it was about to pay me whether or not I sent the PM, or it's possible that bitmixer.io fixed a glitch for me.

In any case, I may be back here soon because I'm going out of town for a while.  bitmixer.io is a good deal for people who don't want to post.

God, I sure hope so.  Is there a site where I can see CGB-BTC exchange rates in a single click?  I mean without having to click through the cryptsy markets?

Interesting, I never thought about enabling this.  I'm not sure if it makes me look good, bad, or the same

I was thinking the same thing, actually.  However, if this is closed, maybe OP can go ahead and lock the thread so that it doesn't keep jumping up on "updated topics" page.

I know I've heard of folks downloading malware on purpose in a sandbox (say a virtual install of Windows XP running on a linux box) just to claim the rewards in some of these shady situations.  Then, after claiming whatever reward, they simply destroy the XP install and repeat.