OP, just say whatever it is you're going to say.  It's annoyingly childish to tease a bunch of people with an implied threat against an apparently very trusted member in the name of not wanting to ruin someone's reputation.  If that was your real concern you wouldn't have even made this thread.

If someone has engaged in account sales recently, it wouldn't matter to me who they were.  I would tag them, as I said I would shortly after that iluvbitcoins mess when we all kind of came to the consensus that people have had fair warning and shouldn't be doing that and not expecting a tag.  So either tell us or lock the thread, please.

Spamming, definitely.  He is also trolling, albeit in an unusual way.

I've reported quite a few of his posts, but not in the threads he's created.  But now he's starting multiple threads which are (I think; I have him on ignore) basically the same anti-DT crusading that he's been doing for months with no results.  I do think it's about time he got banned.  I'm just tired of seeing either his posts or his threads pop up on my unread posts feed. 

He's so annoying, even the ignore function isn't enough.

Viruses aren't "alive".  They're just some genetic material surrounded by a protein coat.  They don't have organelles like cells do; they don't metabolize energy sources; and they can't reproduce outside of a host.  They basically hijack a cell's machinery to make more viruses. 

And I have no idea how you'd make a useful product out of a bacteriophage.  I do know that an entire field of pharmcology is devoted to drug delivery systems (pharmaceutics), and they've come up with some pretty incredible stuff like extended-release drugs and that kind of thing.  I had a friend who got his PhD in pharmaceutics, and he was working on liposomal delivery of some kind of DNA-based thing.  It's tough, because your body tries to get rid of anything foreign that it can't use. 

Ever wonder why you can't take insulin or a vaccine orally?  Ever wonder why there haven't been gene therapies yet?  That's all part of what they work on, and I would think that pharmaceutical science might be able to figure out how to use phages for infections, assuming they're useful and safe.  Bacteria are figuring out ways to get past most antibiotics, and it's just a matter of time before they're resistant to everything on the market.  If we don't start cranking out new classes of antibiotics, we're screwed.  Superbugs are going to emerge eventually which nothing will be able to treat.  That might not happen in my lifetime, but it *could* happen.

I took an elective course in virology back in 1999, and though I don't remember much from it, I do recall the structure of bacteriophages.  Their capsid looks like an alien spaceship with legs if I recall correctly.  Haven't watched the video yet.

Interesting concept, though I wonder how safe it is using a virus to kill bacteria.  Viruses do mutate, and I would think it'd be possible that a phage could somehow infect human cells given enough time.  That's my initial thought, but I'm no expert in viruses.

Why do you think big pharma wouldn't profit from this?  If indeed phages started to get used as medicine, someone would have to manufacture and distribute them to pharmacies and so forth.  I'd say it would actually be a big opportunity for them--but again, I haven't yet watched that video or read anything about this.  I'll look into it some and perhaps edit this post.

That may be so, but it isn't right.  And on top of all that, people are usually earning money when they plagiarize someone's text, which makes it so much worse. 

I'm not a big fan of Theymos's declaration that there will be some exceptions to the rule, but such is life.  I think if he's going to allow successful appeals, they should be granted only for exceptional members who've contributed a lot to the community and only rarely.  By rarely, I mean probably 3 cases per year.  Rank shouldn't have anything to do with it, nor am I sad when a Legendary account gets busted for plagiarizing something.  There are plenty of shitposting sig spammers who ranked up that much before the merit system.

Anyway, I don't think OP is the best candidate for a ban lift.

With all due respect, the community voicing its opinions is what these application threads basically are--that's what it's always been, and I think it's a good idea as well.  The other source application threads I've seen have had lots of posts giving either support or criticism of the applicant, which I think is entirely appropriate.  Yes, it is ultimately up to Theymos but the community ought to be able to talk about whether someone should be a merit source or not, as we all have to deal with it afterwards if the person gets accepted.

I said my piece on QS, and I'm not going to keep ragging on him for his past misdeeds.  They do need to be mentioned, however.  Some newer members might not be aware of his shady history, and it certainly is relevant to whether he can be trusted to be a merit source.

I took a look at it too, and I agree.  Everything I was able to view was a bunch of one-line nonsense, and it was clear he was probably looking to get his posts merited in Meta.  I'm sure everyone has heard that Meta is the hotspot for merits, and that's unfortunate.

OP, maybe you can earn merits in whatever local board suits you best, because I don't think English is your thing.  You're also going to have to put a lot more thought into what you write, and even if you do there's no guarantee you're going to earn any merits.  Even with the best posts, it's hit-or-miss.  In addition to all that, merit sources are generally reluctant to merit newbies until they've proven that they have at least a small pattern of making good posts and not just merit-seeking ones.

If you don't have anything constructive to say in Meta, it's better to just stay out of it.  Too many members are posting here with no real interest in the forum and nothing to say.  They're here because of what I mentioned, that a lot of merits are handed out here.  That's true, but it's never for posts like yours and not usually in threads like this.

This is crypto.  All predictions are uninformed, because there's no way to analyze bitcoin (or any altcoin) to say with relative certainty what the price should be.  At least with stocks you can gauge what something should be selling for based on income, dividends, etc.  With bitcoin, there's none of that.  Anyone's guess is as good as anyone else's.

But the feeling of euphoria when the price starts to shoot up like this is exactly the same.  Every time it does, there are going to be threads like this, and I'm just waiting for the really insane ones where people post about selling their houses to buy bitcoin and whatnot.  Those are entertaining.  This is mild in comparison.

And OP, we're only at $4992 as I write this.  It's way too early to go off the rails about Lambos--I'm sure you remember 2017, right?  We were at 5x where we're at now with bitcoin.  There's a long way to go before it even gets back to the old all-time high, and no one knows when that's going to be.  But I agree with the assertion that we're not in a bubble.  Maybe it was a mini-bubble in 2017, but not a big one.

What the hell is he advertising, though?  Is CH even wearing a signature?  If I were any less lazy and actually had signatures unblocked I would check, but I seem to recall that he wasn't using avatar or sig space to promote anything.  Anyway, I think he's just an attention whore.  You can't seriously keep making the same irrational arguments time and time again with zero support--and it's not like he's just writing short posts, either--and not come off as a big drama queen.

If CH got banned and evaded it with an alt account, I'm fairly sure it'd be easy to detect, assuming he kept writing in a similar style.  His command of English is certainly good enough that he could probably write differently if he chose.  However, I see that he has a compulsion to write extremely long posts and I don't think he would stop doing that.  I don't think he's able to.  He didn't get banned, did he?  Never mind, I just saw that he wrote another rambling screed.

Edit:
WOW.  I did not realize he was that prolific.  I've probably made way more than that in Meta but over a much longer period of time.  His posts are all probably in the past few months, and that's a hell of a lot.

Lol, that's exactly what came to mind after reading the first 5 lines of his first post here.

OP, do some reading in Meta.  Everything you want to know is there, probably within the first 10 pages of the section--and it's interesting reading as well.  Lots of drama.  Also, people who can't speak English who post generic nonsense is basically the epitome of shitposting.  Most of that happens in sections like Bitcoin/Altcoin Discussion, Economics, and Speculation.  It's unfortunate that the most important section is also the most polluted, but such is life.

You already got good answers regarding the merit abuse issue and the conspiracy theories surrounding merit gangs, DT, and such.  I would advise you to view that stuff with a skeptical eye.  There are lots of people jealous of what they think is great power around bitcointalk, when in reality it isn't.  You'll figure it out.

For some reason I thought Quickseller was made a merit source back in September when Theymos tapped a bunch of members who hadn't applied.  Guess not.

As far as this goes:

....obviously QS is still in denial about whether "self-escrowing" is actually a legitimate thing (it's not) or a scam (it is).  Nowhere in the world where honest people dwell does anyone do this, which is why QS did not inform the victims when he was doing it and presumably hasn't done it since.  And it's not true that no one has accused him of scamming.  Lots of people have for the escrow shenanigans.

Despite that, I have mixed feelings about the merit source application.  I think QS knows what constitutes a good post and he might not use his sMerits for political reasons.  The only concern with him (and all potential merit sources) is trading/selling it.  With his spotty past, which includes account selling in addition to the escrow stuff, I just don't know.  But hey, it's not up to me.  Good luck, QS.

You're not asking for it directly, just like you're not making this thread because you're disgruntled with the trust system...right? 

Come on, what you're doing is transparent.  And it's also kind of passive-aggressive, which I can't stand on the internet along with not being able to easily interpret someone's tone anyway.  Just be upfront.  You're angry about the negative trust you got.

Yep, and again, if OP had ever visited Meta or Scam Accusations this thread wouldn't even exist because he wouldn't have plagiarized a whitepaper--or would have expected the consequences.  And he'd know this suggestion is old territory.

I know account hacking is a big problem here, but I think 2FA is going a bit overboard unless it's optional.  Staking an address ought to be sufficient for account recovery if need be IMO.  All of the security features on Binance, which I've been using more of lately, have soured me on all of the steps necessary just to do simple things.  2FA is active by default, and I think I'm going to disable it.

What was my feeling about the KYC thing on bitcointalk?  Well, I've been here a few years so I was expecting an April fools day joke.  Plus I've read Theymos's quote about implementing KYC only when hell freezes over and thus knew that was part of the joke. 

Depending on what kind of information was required, I probably would dox myself in order to remain a member here.  But there's no way any discussion forum anywhere on the internet needs to have anyone's personal data.  To my understanding, financial institutions are the only entities that need KYC protocols, and they probably wouldn't even bother with them if they weren't legally required to.  It's to prevent financial fraud and other criminal activity, and obviously bitcointalk would have no need for that data unless it was going to sell it to spammers, advertisers, and whatnot, and Theymos isn't going to do that (I hope).

Yeah, but how much personal data are we talking about here?  Name & address & photo are pretty much public information that I wouldn't consider too much to give out (if the reward was big enough).  Phone number/e-mail are iffy.  Anything beyond that, like social security number--hell no.  I've never done this for a giveaway, so I'm wondering if it's easy enough to give them false information and still get whatever it is they're giving away.  I'm sure plenty of freebie-hounds are at least trying it.

What the hell is "penny money" anyway?

Me neither, but as I said it all depends on how much info is needed and how personal it is.  And in some countries, those 'pennies' have a lot more buying power than others.  I've often heard the phrase 'signature campaigns pay pennies', but that just isn't true.  There are places on this planet where you can feed yourself for less than $1/day, so I'd imagine people in them would do a lot for what we'd consider very little.

Yeah, it's unnecessary but what can you do?  I would also suggest that there are probably enough merits to go around right now, but there aren't enough posts deserving of merit.  Some people--bounty hunters in particular--couldn't care less about meriting good posts.  I believe the only value the merit system has is in them getting the merit, not giving it to others.  Thus they throw it away on the OP of a campaign they joined or are trying to join. 

My point is, it's not something to get outraged about.  You probably weren't going to get merits from the members who merited a campaign manager anyway.  If people want to do that, let 'em.  They're not going to get banned, they're not going to get tagged by DT members, and there aren't going to be any consequences for doing that sort of thing.  Just let it go.

I'd love it if the joke was that Theymos was banning signature campaigns and bounties, effective immediately.  The outrage, confusion, and chaos that would ensue would probably get my physically aroused, if you know what I mean.  It would be deliciously evil.

The problem is that most members know a joke is coming, and it's not a shock anymore when April 1st comes around and strange things suddenly happen.  New members might get fooled, though, and that might be enough for day's worth of solid entertainment.

That might be a good one, but I don't think it would fool many people or create a shitstorm in Meta.

Oh FFS, that has absolutely nothing to do with your issue, and the fact that some posts got merited doesn't mean people are tagging you or ganged up against you in order to earn merits.  That's on you if you're outraged.

Have you never read any of the scam accusations against ICOs and their plagiarized whitepapers?  Just take a look at the Scam Accusation section's first page, and I bet at least half of the threads are about this.  It's that rampant, and lots of people are paying attention to it.  Had you noticed this before putting together your whitepaper you probably would have taken a little more time to state concepts in your own words.  But obviously you did not, and that also is on you.

It's a tough call on this one--nobody knows if bitcoin is going to stay at these prices or sink back to the god-awful range it was trading in for the past 8 months or so.  Personally, I would just hold what you've got.  I've always thought that bitcoin would break out of the range and go much higher.  This could be the beginning of that or it could be a false pop.

What you can be sure of is that you made a profit if you cash out now, and there's nothing wrong with taking your profits off the table.  Every trader does it at some point, and I think it's healthy for the markets.  The obvious problem you face is that if you sell now, you might miss out on making a lot more.  That's why I'd say sit tight and hope for the best.

You asked this in another thread:

....and you don't seem to understand what plagiarism is, and I'm not sure you will understand or take responsibility for what you did, which is to write text, the content of which was conceived by another person or persons, without citing where you got the text from.  It isn't your own.  Even though many other whitepapers do the same idiotic thing, that doesn't give you a pass. 

The fact is that this happens a lot.  Sometimes my unread threads feed is filled up with scam accusation threads of the same nature.  You cannot convince me that you had to copy-paste any words from somewhere else and pass them off as your own.  You could have paraphrased.  You could have written basically the same paragraph(s) in your own words.  It's lazy and it's wrong to create a document that plagiarizes content, which is exactly what you did.

The price has to pretty much always remain constant across all exchanges, because arbatrageurs make it efficient like that.  Yes, bitcoin might sell at slightly different prices between exchanges, but that doesn't last for long as traders exploit the discrepancy.  Mt. Gox was a notable exception to this rule, and we all know why that was.  Stock exchanges are even more efficient than crypto ones, though there are far fewer stock ones and so that makes sense.

I think whales started it.  I don't think this was a collective action on the part of all the small players in the market, but who knows.  Ultimately I don't really care what kicked shit off--I'm just happy the breakout was upward rather than downward.