Ugh, those flags.  Just my unsolicited opinion here, but those just complicate an already byzantine system of trust feedback.  I'm not claiming they're not useful at all, but if you wonder why a lot of members don't understand said trust system it's likely because they'd have to spend an inordinate amount of time figuring out what to do in what situation and why some things are appropriate and other things aren't--and to a newcomer (or even someone who's been here for months), I can see how everything might not be crystal clear, especially if those members haven't had the need to use the system before.

Yep, and this is why threads like this one are useful (JollyGood has had at least one similar to this).  It'd be nice if mr.relax would weigh in and let the community know if he got the message or not. 

I don't know how decentralized it really is, but IMO the DT system is much worse than it used to be even if only because so many barely-known members make it onto the list, and I'm not so sure that's a good thing.  At least before the system was extremely strict and it was hard to get on even DT2, much less DT1; now it's a free-for-all.  That's why I've cleared out my trust list entirely and don't pay attention to any of it anymore.

The feedback given here by mr.relax does look to be a misuse of the trust system, but even if I were inclined to ~ him, it'd take more than one wrongly-given feedback to move my hand.  That was true for Vod and/or Lauda (can't remember) when one or both started a pattern of bad trust page paint jobs.  Anyone can screw up once or twice, but that doesn't mean they should be bumped off of DT at the drop of a hat, you know?

Yep, although I'm not exactly sure what good stuff you think you've missed out on as far as the forum goes.  Assuming bitcointalk will be around for many years to come, and if you stick around long enough, you could easily become an old-school member that newbies will call "sir" and state that they're afraid to send you a PM and so forth.  Lol.

But you're making some damn fine contributions now, and IMO that's really all that's important.  Plus I'd add that at least you've got the technical background to make said contributions.  I'm still stuck being the automobile driver who's got no idea how things work under the hood, if you know what I mean.  I could probably spend time studying the fundamentals of cryptography and the mathematics that are the basis for bitcoin, but I'm afraid my brain couldn't take it at my age.

I'm in the same boat, and I've been into bitcoin for longer.  You know how many times I've publicly flogged myself for not buying bitcoin at $200 or not holding the bitcoin I bought when it was well below today's price?  If I spent any more time thinking about what could have been, I'd go insane. 

I firmly believe that bitcoin will eventually hit $100k.  Not sure if you feel the same, but if that's true then anything you buy around $23-25k is a steal.  Keep stackin' them sats, and it'll pay off.  You're still young, so you'll see in time.

I seriously doubt that's true, not even for the members who've been here for years.

And if you've been into crypto for a while, you'll know that crashes have happened before--and really big ones at that--and they'll happen again.  Me?  If bitcoin were to crash to $1k today, I'd sit back and watch the drama unfold.  That's because I've seen what the market has done and could do without warning, and I don't have what little wealth I've accumulated all in btc. 

That would be an extremely risky thing to do, even if you're young.  These people who've gone all-in on bitcoin are a little bit nutty if you ask me.

Normally I wouldn't post in a thread like this, which is bound to be full of shitposts but your comment about the apartment you've got regrets over reminds me of a similar situation I was in over 10 years ago.  It's not so much a financial regret as it is a comfort one, but man....if I had to make a list of all the financial fuckups I've made in my life, I'd run out of paper, patience, or emotional energy. 

I've got so many regrets regarding money that I try my best not to think about them.  If I did, it'd just drive me crazy since at this point there's nothing I can do except to move forward as best I can, you know?

OP, talking about regrets isn't likely to be a fruitful topic here.  Even if people have 'em, all you're going to get are a bunch of general statements (like mine except even less productive), since everyone values their privacy and/or just wants to plop down a post to get paid.  I'd lock this up if I were you.

Fuck this, Amph is a member who's annoyed me with his drivel since I first registered here and frequented the altcoin section where he posted the most.  There's enough evidence here that he's trying to sell his account to justify a negative trust (which I just left).

Amph, whether you dump your account or not, good luck to you and don't let the door hit ya in the ass on the way out.

Aw, I got left out.  I got a request from another member a few weeks back asking me some questions that were kind of related to some of the ones here, but I've yet to reply to him.  I definitely have some strong opinions about forum-related matters, though I'm pretty sure I've made them abundantly clear across much time and many threads and I doubt anyone wants to read any diatribes from me.  Heh heh.

I am enjoying the responses that I obviously missed from last year, and it does surprise me that you've gotten so few members taking you up on your offer to be interviewed.  I'd like to read what others have to say about these particular questions, so perhaps the bumping of this thread will light some asses on fire...?

And there's an American adage for those who do the exact opposite: "OK chumps, let's do this.  Leeeeroy Jeeeenkins!!".

But I get what you're saying and you're right.  It's unfortunate that some newbies think this forum doesn't have rules or even etiquette as far as how things should be handled.  Hell, I think I've called Theymos names before but I was only 1/4 serious and it was only after I'd been here for years.  Lol.

A lot of scams originate from Russia from what I hear, but their targets aren't Russian AFAIK.  So while a scammy section like that would seem appropriate in the Russian board, it kinda doesn't.  Nor is Russia the only place where scams are prevalent.

Ratimov, I support your request 100% and appreciate your description of a section that I never visit because I don't speak the language.  I often forget there are lots of local boards with their own unique communities.

Sounds to me from what Ratimov said that the whole section is not only bot-infested but pretty much dead anyway.  The best option would be to just nuke it, no?

Oh shit....I just checked, and I didn't have the button checked off that allows newbies to send me PMs.  I know I intentionally unchecked it (or made sure it was that way) a long time ago, because a lot of newbies were bothering me about feedback removal but I just fixed that. 

However, I would advise any newbies to really evaluate whether they think I'm likely to merit their posts before contacting me.  If a member has been here for a few months, has been posting regularly, and still hasn't gotten any merits then I'm probably not going to find anything in that member's post history that's good--and if that started happening regularly, then I'm going to block PMs from newbies again without a second thought.

Lol again.  This time I didn't forget; I fell asleep.  But thanks for the thought, and with that I'm going to lock this bee-otch of a thread and see what's going on with the rest of the forum today.

LOL.  I unlocked this thread last night and was going to do an update but got distracted and never did.

Just a message to those who've PMed me in the past 2 weeks or so:  right now I'm just waiting for my sMerit allocation to replenish and then I'll pick up wherever I left off with the reviews, and I apologize for the delay.  Again, just be patient and I'll get to you ASAP.

Now I'll leave this open for a few hours and hopefully I won't forget to lock it.

Ah, that explains it.  I was wondering where all of that dude's hostility was coming from, and getting busted for ban evasion would certainly do it--and most likely if you rely on the forum for a paycheck.  Even though this guy is bragging about all of his wealth, I seriously doubt bitcointalk and his place in its community means so much to him that getting banned is enraging him like this.

I don't know; I think that should just be something that's understood unless afterwards it comes out that the story that was told to get the donation(s) was fraudulent.  Donationsxp did something that's just fucking retarded, and there's no warning you can give to prevent something like this.

Oh come on now, you must be new to the world--lonely hearts scammers have been around since the beginning of money or love, believe me.  And if you don't believe my claim, then they've been going on for at least 100 years because I read a true crime case from the 1920s (Albert Fish) who was trying to find sugar mommas before he started doing much worse things.

My point is that this elderly woman being the target of a scam because of her quest for a lover isn't evidence that the world is in a state of terminal decline.  It's not even that interesting except for the bitcoin aspect, which I assume is why it made the news.

Seriously.  Older women know what they want, and this one was probably just looking to get her nut off if she was trawling the internet for D.

Yeah, I was wondering whether Theymos would see that as a valid reason to change his name, and the sole reason I figured he might have a chance was Theymos's respect for privacy.  I assume (but don't know for sure) that Theymos wouldn't just grant a name change for any newbie who requested one, else he'd be inundated with PMs asking for them.  And who knows, maybe his inbox is blowing up daily.

Still, it took me a PM, a thread dedicated to my request, and over 2 years in order to have my username change granted....so yeah.

I don't know...even if you inscribed a serial number on a bar, I'm sure it still wouldn't satisfy those who'd claim it could have been altered or whatever.  Plus there are people who don't want any way for their metals to be traced--I think that's why some bars have serial numbers and some don't.

I haven't read the whole thread yet, but some of the silver bars by Geiger are absolutely beautiful and come with serial numbers and some kind of ink over them with which you can verify authenticity (they claim) using a black light.  It's just too damn bad the premium is so high for the Geiger brand stuff.

And yeah, I've been into metals since right before the big crash in 2011.  Fortunately I also didn't have money then and thus didn't go hog wild only to then see all that value disappear in the years after the crash.  And what a slow but steady decline it was.  Anyone here remember that?

Just about bitcoin?  Are you referring to any sections in particular?  You've been here longer me and it was so much worse prior to the merit system, and you're just now complaining about sig campaigns?

The latter point is absolutely true, but I very much disagree with the former one.  I think if campaigns and bounties were banned, and if there wasn't a monetary incentive to post here, sections like Bitcoin Discussion and a few others would have a lot higher signal:noise.  The shitposters wearing adverts in their signature space greatly outnumber those excellent contributors you referenced, I'm afraid.

Yeah, same as the rest of the thousand shitcoins flooding the space.

I looked at the website for this coin, and the English is absolute shit.  Anyone developing a serious coin and creating a website for it really ought to look into an editor (a service which I've done before), because the impression I get from looking at what's written is that this is just a sloppily put together clonecoin with minimal thought or effort into actually attracting a community.

Ugly times ugly.

It's a good thing that moderators remain unbiased when it comes to non-moderators, no?  You wouldn't want them playing favorites or choosing sides when disputes happen or anything like that.

Yahoo62278 is not only being supported by DT members; I've seen plenty of comments from members who are low-ranked or otherwise not on DT, so that's plain false.  And keep in mind that if you include DT2, the list of members on DT is quite large and many of them know yahoo62278's rep because they've been here for years and I'm one of those who don't happen to buy your story that he just happened to start donation-scamming. 

By the way, I sent a relatively small donation to him and it didn't get acknowledged either.  I wasn't expecting it to be either, since he would have had no idea whose wallet it came from.  That bitcoin anonymity, boy.  Gotta love it.

Just to clarify, Theymos implied in his PM to me that I didn't need to wait nearly as long as I did before he granted my name change (which was over 2 years I think).  He told me I should have been more persistent in reminding him, which I basically just did none of.

But to OP here, I'm thinking that just deleting all of his posts and creating a new profile should do the trick.  That name is common enough that I doubt anyone is going to associate the person behind it with the bitcointalk account.  Theymos might grant his request, but I'm not sure he does name changes for trivial reasons.

Congrats on achieving the last rank you'll probably ever see (that's a hint, Theymos ol' bud)!

If I may make a completely unsolicited suggestion:  you obviously know how important it is to earn merits in order to rank up and yet out of the 1015 merits you've earned (which gave you 507 sMerits), you've only sent 187 to other members, most of which are already high-ranking ones.  So I would humbly suggest that you pay forward what's been given to you and in the process keep the merit system running smoothly.

In any case, keep up the great work--you're not only Legendary but on DT2 and have dark green trust per BPIP.  Sweet.