Well, this is probably going to be the dumbest answer ever -or not.
I think the best way of creating good healthy habits is having a dog. Since they need their daily (quality) walk to be fit and healthy and there's no other option but walking with them, it has proven to be the best way for me to remain healthy.
Taking good care of others always provides some perspective about our own health. I think that taking diary walks improve your life in every possible way and playing with your dogs, spending time outdoors with them, taking care of their nutrition, will help you gain some consciousness about your own.
Of course, it only works if you take care of your dog properly, hehe.

Last week Jordan Peterson announced his resignation from the Toronto University due to several reasons. He claimed that the University is only admitting new researches as long as they belong to any minority, and that white young men have no opportunity whatsoever to get a position given the current situation. Peterson's claims went further, though. He also stated that his students have even less opportunities just because he was not regarded as "desirable" because of his ideas weren't atoned with the political thinking of the University.
In the same week, Neil Young and other artists demanded Spotify retire the Joe Rogan podcast based on alleged "medical mis and disinformations". Just because some of his guests spoke differently about COVID vaccines and other issues, he was asked to be suppressed from the platform. That didn't happen, at least for now, but it makes me think about freedom of speech, the cancel culture and how our society is stepping into a black hole.

In my country it is getting more and more difficult every single day to speak freely about many issues like feminism, race, etc. If you are against the mainstream thinking you are called names, and not beautiful ones. I am a woman who have questioned this new feminism many times, and been called many things just for expressing my opinion. Critical thinking seems to be becoming a dangerous activity.

In some other universities there were several cases which I tend to consider rather critical. That is the case of, for example what happened to Brett Weinstein at the Evergreen State College or to Nicholas Christakis at Yale. You can study these cases and many others in a very interesting book called "The coddling of the American Mind".

So I guess my point is: what are your opinions about what is going on right now in many places? Do you think that free speech is at risk?

Thanks in advanced for your replies!!

Bueno, por si no hubiéramos tenido suficiente todo este último año con ese tema, esa joya de la música basura reggetonera, esas maravillas acústicas en forma de ritmo y letras apabullantemente poéticas... tenemos ahora el "Despacito" del Bitcoin, una versión actualizada de esa tan bella composición...
Transcribo parte de la letra para que sufran esa mezcla entre ardores estomacales y risas ácidas...

"Si te pido un Bitcoin, ven, dámelo,
yo sé que estás pensándolo,
he estado investigándolo,
(...) sabes que el Bitcoin al sistema le hace "BAMBAM"
(...) Pasito a pasito, suave, suavecito,
lo fue imaginando,
aquel algoritmo.
Y cuando lo crea, con esa destreza,
se dio cuenta de que era su obra maestra.
(...) lo vamoai plantando, banquito a banquito..."

Y, sin más, les dejo con esta versión mejorada de Despacito a la que, aunque le falta un poco de sabor "puertoliqueño", al menos te hace reír mientras te provoca cáncer de oreja derecha:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hy9LdFbcOoE

sufran

Precisely. Plagiarism is a dangerous "mistake", but I also have a little doubt. Despite the fact of the act itself, meaning that any plagiarism is quite terrible, for you are stealing other's work, can the forum get into trouble for the plagiarized content in here? With the new EU policies about plagiarism as well as other further regulations, I don't know if this site can be even suited by posting plagiarized articles.

Probably the same answered 'till now. They don't believe in crypto and also they see the cryptocurrency world as something unsustainable, given the lack of support of "trusted enterprises". It makes me think a lot about how the people is actually scared of changes around here. One of the biggest arguments they provide is just about how to trust "the people". When you try to explain them that is actually people behind the technology and the uses it already or potentially has, is when they hesitate, so, maybe, the mean problem resides on how people are used to distrust others...


The country I live in was one of the very first in trying to accept crypto. Fellow Spaniards, correct me if I'm wrong, but lately, I've seen that this initial interest (well, probably not "initial" but "bumped" by last year hype) is getting lost. I haven't heard a lot of news recently about crypto but those ones dedicated to discrediting it. Whatever, I've been quite occupied and quite far from the crypto lately, but, even in my relatives, I've seen this change of mindset having a place: from interest/curiosity to absolute distrust.

Even though the merit distribution is, of course, related to good posting behaviour, I do think that there are some other several factors included. For instance, it has been mentioned that the merit data analysis are the most rewarded threads. Of course, they are awesome, and I totally agree with those ones being rewarded, but I don't think there are actually a single way of determining how a poster is good or bad. Obviously, a spammer is pretty easy to detect, but there are amazing posters on other sections that probably we are not aware of and whose posting behaviour can be amazing as well.
Merits are a good way to distinguish some good from bad users, but this is not the only way, for, as I said, the distribution can be based on what is "trendy". Let's come back a little an analyze some stats by DdmrDdmr, in order to determinate which boards are actually the most merited:


For instance, Serious Discussion is the most merited board per post. That means that conversations regarding free topics, personal opinions and some debates are getting more merits. Of course, we might include the fact that in the Serious Discussion board newbies are unable to participate -which can be pretty unfair if your idea is implemented.
Now, If we pay attention, we see that Meta follows the Serious Discussion when merit speaking. I am not surprised of that at all, for in here some good conversations about the forum are having a place. But, do you think that, in a Bitcoin-related forum, those two boards should be the most merited? Meaning: are the conversations having a place in this two even related to Bitcoin itself??

What I am trying to mean is that a good user cannot be really measured because of the merit/post count ratio. If you are in a signature, probably you will post far more, if you are engaging a technical discussion, probably the same will happen: lots of posts and no such relation between merit and post.

So, there are more factors, from my perspective, than merits to determine which one is a great user and which one is not. By establishing this banner you propose, we only will be able of seeing which one has more merits per activity, but it isn't related to the "amazinest" of the poster at all.

(Notice that English is not my first language and I suffered a lot trying to explain myself jajaj  ).

You can always activate the "show post count" in your profile, so the real number of any user posting activity will be shown. Now, about generating more "branding", well I think this is absolutely unnecessary. All here know who are good and bad posters, and each board has their bests and worst. I mean: not all the boards are equally merited and it doesn't mean that the poster is worst. For instance, the technical one, the more dedicated to bitcoin is used to receive far less merit than Meta, despite the users knowledge about the technical stuff. So, the quality of an user cannot be measured by the relation between activity and merit, but by your own personal preferences.
This is impossible, then, to create a system to determinate the quality, for many factors are included and it goes far beyond numbers under a profile's name.
From my perspective, the merit is kind of "trendy-based" and yet, some of the most-rewarded subjects can be just a result of that trend.  

Late for you?? Maybe all the information, knowledge and experience that you have grabbed for all the last year can be useful to somebody. I think everything matters if you know how to explain it.
I know nothing about ICO's, for instance, don't even have any intention of joining any signature, but I am a complete ignorant about the ANN board, for I haven't spent a single second on it. Is there anything interesting there besides bounties? Have you learn about any project you find to be, at least, original??
Besides, I'm sure that you now know how a campaign is run, for instance. What mistakes the managers do and who are responsible to the BT forum, et al. Whatever you've learned from the past year, I'm sure that nothing is in vain. So just find your new path in here!! Maybe you can talk about your own experiences following ICO's, or maybe the trends, the rules, I don't know, whatever you consider that can be useful for others. 

Well, this is not exactly the way you're reading it. The merit sources are actively searching for newbies to merit. The issue here is more about the quality of the posts, this is difficult to find some quality posters nowadays.
Of course, after some interaction between the people, seniors members are used to merit those ones whose posts they find to be qualified for the task. Of course, this is a matter of probability: if you have been in here for a long time, and you are active and aware of the forum issues and circumstances, that's more probable for you to write something of use to the community. This is fairly normal, then, that senior users are the more rewarded ones.
But it doesn't mean that there are personal preferences, in fact, newbies should be more rewarded, for there are many people out there just looking for some newbies to reward. The problem is that there are few, actually, deserving it.

Some videos should be nice, I guess. There are some, like this one, made by a BT user some time ago: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B6DZkUmSnHQ&t=33s

It has been made with Animaker, if I remember correctly, an online platform to create son animated videos.  Check the animaker web in here https://www.animaker.com/

To be able of doing that, merit should have an economic value, meaning:
- the merits should be listed somehow in a platform like coinmarketcap or similar.
- also, the receivers should be able of exchanging them, either for cash or whatever coin they want.

In a resume, merit should become an asset, a coin, and that's really far from the spirit of the merit system.
Why? Well, because the merit system was implemented as a way of saying the people "Good work". This is just like a way of creating an identity in here, as something more personal than economical. The forum reached a point where it was necessary to create a difference between good and bad posters, as you might know. So, obviously, it is far for being related to any economic value itself. Now, of course, by earning merits, you can rank-up and, by doing so, access to some of the opportunities of earning in here (if that's your interest), for you are demonstrating that you have something of value to the community. So, if merits become an asset, the mere spirit of the system will be lost.
 

I don't buy tokens, maybe that's  my ideology
Even though Monero can be used on the Darkweb, the use of the coin doesn't define how the coin is itself. Besides, Monero is also used in the "bright" one. If we take the principle of illegal transactions as a measure for not trusting a coin, then we probably will never use any asset of value, for everything can be used either for doing good or bad things.


That's your own opinion and that's ok, but, I insist, everything can be used either for good or bad. Money is money, technology is technology, what differs is just what person is using it and to what end, that's all. So, nop, I have no ideology when buying, maybe I focus on the technology and the biggest coins. 

Jajajaja. JC, is too early to be drunk!!!
About the thread, I think the best way to approach to an interesting newbie is by quoting his/her thread. To send a PM can be quite invasive for a first contact, from my opinion. Just comment his thread and congrats the guy and at the same time invite him to join FTt!!

And yep, probably from now on, maybe it is better if you avoid meriting before coffee.  

I think you should say that it is going to be done through the Fit to Talk project, or it isn't??
Besides, the languages we have in the FTT project, for now, are Filipino, Spanish and Japanese? Or there are other ones in the FTT project I am not aware of?

Also, the rules are not clear to me. Are we going to ask the users to try to make their own translation and then help them to improve them, as usual?

Anyway, the topics are interesting and it looks nice to me, just maybe we are taking for granted some information that should be included in the initial post!!! Let's see what happens!!!!

I was talking about Plato's Republic books: https://www.iep.utm.edu/republic/
Of course, Plato did mention Socrates in his books and shared some of his ideas because he was his teacher, but the point I was quoting is in Plato's Republic.
In fact, the video is about these books too, but, anyway, what matters is the idea behind the mind... and how old it is. Democracy has been sold to us as the ultimate system, like a synonymous of "evolution" and "progress". But this is just mind-controlling, again. Democracy, from my perspective, is the perfect circus, the perfect way to have the masses controlled. Easy cake, you just need to educate the voters.

I do believe that there are too many people in this world, to begin with. But, as far as I've been able to observe, small communities are needed. I think that humanity needs to develop a network of small communities with self-government, based on merits. Platon also spoke about a type of Aristocracy based on philosophy, in where the ruler should be a philosopher. The way he/she should reach the power was based on merits, and on a strong educational system preparing greedless rulers.

Well, in an over-populated community, this is impossible to achieve, of course, for, how are you going to develop a trust-system between millions of persons? Of course not. But in small communities, it can absolutely be done. But, again, in an overpopulated world, that's kind of utopic. I do see a dystopian future, though, based on a punctuation system, a meritocracy, but in where, probably, ignorance and appearance will be voted, instead of intelligence and greedless. Maybe you just asked a pessimist woman.

Platon wrote, more than 2,000 years ago that: "Democracy is the tyranny of the ignorant people".
I'm afraid he was quite right. Democracy is based on the equality of the desition, but, in a society profoundly manipulated, uninformed and idiotic... can even democracy be a Democracy? Or just a joke?
I tend to believe it is the second one...

Jajaja, yo también, ya pasé de los 30 y también mujer. Así que no, no todo es lo que parece, ni siquiera en el foro. 

I've also seen (and I actually had to look for the meaning) :
LMAO: Laughing My Ass Off
YOLO: You Only Live Once

Nice compilation!!!!

Bueno, cuando sangran los ojos o el mensaje es ilegible... pues la neta se entiende.


Mira por ello se creó el proyecto Fit to Talk que ya sabes que trata de ayudar a la banda a mejorar su inglés para que ese mensaje importante del que hablas pueda ser compartido de una manera más eficiente. Aunque concuerdo en que a veces la mamonería es too much, también es que la neta si te vas a expresar en otro idioma, mínimo deberías ser capaz de darte a entender, o aprovechar otras webs como FTT (https://fittotalk.com/english-talk/index.php) para mejorar lo que pretendes decir y convertirlo en algo digerible, precisamente porque no es tan sencillo a veces captar la idea y eso puede ser tantito abrumador.