SebastianJu getting seduced by trust farmers - and he's loving it!

[EcuaMobi]

And what would be the sense in a forum empty of green trust?

Of course being extremist never makes sense. The trust system would be useless if nobody (or almost nobody) had green trust as much as if everyone (or too many people) had it. When I make a successful deal with some significant risked BTC then I almost always leave positive trust. When the risked BTC is zero or close to zero then it's very subjective. It depends whether the other party was very communicative and nothing at all was fishy; basically if my guts say the user is trustworthy. Of course it's OK to leave positive trust on several of those cases but not always and that's up to the person leaving the trust. It must be checked cased by case.

You are right. Though i state explicitly that i only escrowed, so its not that someone can think that i bought something from that user.

Yes and that's very helpful when people really check the trust. But something really important to consider is that even if we don't like it several newbies will blindly trust green accounts without actually looking at the actual feedback, +10 could look like a lot. Therefore we need to be somewhat strict when giving those away and check them in the future time to time for a possible rectification.

[Quickseller]

I talked to him about this in the beginning of June and his response was something along the lines of that he wants a record of the transaction.

I would not personally give positive trust this liberally as it makes it easy for people to farm trust which ultimately leads to bad things.

I did not say anything of a record, that makes no sense. I told you that i think the trust rating should show that someone is trustworthy to deal with. Might be some people use it for rating their friends or so but for me it shows that deals went well.

And yes, we spoke about that. And i agreed that i should be more strict. Thats why i only do neutral rating for values lower than $50.

By the way... you remember why i contacted you? Because i needed to hear your opinion regarding someone trying to gain illegitimate trust.

I believe that you said said (among other things - I think this is the most relevant and important of what you said):

It shows that the person did trade successfully without problems before. Thats what i think is the positive trust for.

You had contacted me because you were afraid that you were being targeted by trust farmers, and wanted advise as to how to proceed. I would say that your overall sent trust ratings has improved greatly since we spoke. As of now, I would not support your removal from Default Trust, and would probably oppose any push to have you removed.

I do like the fact that you have a minimum trade value that you will give trust on, although I think there is a good chance you are still being targeted by trust farmers. Tomatocage had told me that his minimum trade size to leave a positive trust rating is 1BTC, although even this may be too low. I personally like the policy that OgNasty follows (at least the one that others have posted that he has), that is something along the lines of that he won't leave trust unless he has done a number of trades with you.

I would also point out that I recently received a PM (I assume that he does not want his identity revealed because he specifically asked his identity be kept secret when he messaged me regarding other DT issues/threads in meta) saying that he passed on using you as escrow on a 20+BTC deal because you give out so many trust ratings saying "I escrowed one of his deals and all went fine... "

in my experience, very few people ask me for trust after I escrow a trade for them, and even when they do and I decline to give them trust, they still seem very happy that I was able to help them with their trade and still generally would leave a very positive review for my services. 
I think that PistolPete brings up a good point about a flaw in the trust system. It is not difficult to farm trust by using various escrow services. You are not the only person who often gives out trust after acting as escrow, and there is an argument to leave positive trust after you act as escrow. A large percentage of the escrow agents are also on DefaultTrust, as there is a relationship between a person's trustworthiness and the chances they are on DT (as someone is more trustworthy, there is a greater chance that they will be trusted with others' money).

Another point is the fact that almost all deals involve only one person risking any amount of bitcoin, and there is the question of when it is appropriate to leave positive trust when nothing is risked. This question also makes it complicated to say when exactly it is appropriate to trust someone with your money.

[criptix]

to be honest i do not think that it is a good idea to give trust as a escrow.

the partys using the escrow should give the escrow positive or negative trust.

the trust system here has quite a broad definition and i think the best way to give positive trust is if you risked x amount of money to someone and dont get scammed by that person.

the trust of someone who has nothing to lose is quite worthless in my opinion especially here where you can trade accounts and trust.

[koshgel]

I don't like the idea of positive trust for escrow transactions at all. Personally, I dismiss any trust I see relating to escrow and add DefaultTrust members that dish it out frequently to the exempt list of my trust. As has been proven by OP, it is easy to farm escrow trades from members.

If you want to keep record of a transaction, use neutral trust.

Edit: The same can be said about microloans -

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=trust;u=329895

positive trust for .02 loans 

[DiamondCardz]

I too am surprised when escrow providers leave positive feedback to the people involved in the transaction, especially when these people are on DefaultTrust. It definitely gives people a false sense of trust and degrades from those people's rating. I really don't mind when escrow providers give out neutral feedback or none after the transaction, since there is no trust involved on the escrow provider's end.

Edit: I just took a look through SJ's rating and it appears that he puts amounts in for all transactions he escrows. Probably just a pattern he follows but he should probably change that, considering he isn't the one risking the bitcoins.

I've posted about this previously. I feel like this is a serious problem and escrows on DefaultTrust who do this and don't even bother considering the consequences really need to have their position re-considered by whichever depth 1 person has them on their trust list. Escrows should not be giving positive feedback to the people they escrow for except in very rare circumstances - perhaps something like a very large mining farm escrow contract.

[criptix]

hm..  just checked the default trust and it seems atleast some escrows are doing this and even posting the escrow amount in the risked btc section.

this is serious bs and im actually thinking of deleting this ppl from my default trust.
also recommending this to everyone else.

also it would make the problem even more worst if the escrow would take payment for it, because this would be just plain trust selling.

i hope some other ppl will check the default list escrows too

[Blazed]

I often do escrows and do not hand out feedback for them unless they are large (normally over 5BTC). I was at one point giving some feedback for small loans (back in 2014). I will be removing all those feedback's..I see the account in question has feedback from me for that very thing! done...

I have been very stingy on the feedback left lately  

[master-P]

I don't have anything against Sebastian, I still believe he is one of the most trustworthy users and escrow providers here on bitcointalk considering the amount of funds he has handled in the past without a hitch. But I do agree that he should be less liberal with the amount of positive trust he gives out. I mostly only give out positive ratings if I had to specifically "trust" the other user with any value. There are definitely instances where I have also given out positive ratings when I did not have to trust the user with any value but I would usually leave the "Risked BTC amount" at 0 to help illustrate this.

Ever since being put on the default trust list (this was before I started my public escrow service) I've been very careful of when and who I give positive trust to. There are few instances where users would ask me to leave positive trust for a transaction I escrowed for but this is usually just something I end up ignoring (no offense to these people), simply because I don't believe that's how the trust system should work. It's not a "feedback" system like ebay where both parties leave a rating at the end of the deal.

There has definitely been some very obvious trust farmers who have contacted me but this just gives me another reason to be more conservative when leaving trust. I don't want people to use my escrow service only to gain a trust rating because then I'd rather not help escrow at all.

I don't see any other escrow provider to be "competition" because I don't do escrow as a business. This is not my way of making a living, this is just me volunteering my spare time on these forums to help make trading safer. So again, just wanted to make clear that I don't have anything personal against SebastianJu or his escrow service. He is very active and I am sure many of us can appreciate that. I have personally had to use his escrow service before at least once.

Not sure where I'm going with this anymore, the bottom line is I think Sebastian should definitely be more conservative in giving out positive trust ratings. Especially with the updated trust system where it's actually quite easy to get "green" trust with just one or two ratings. There are other/better ways to help keep a record of your transactions imo. In the end everyone has the right to leave positive/negative trust to anyone for whatever reason but being too liberal while on DefaultTrust can lead to trust farming/abuse.

[shitaifan2013]

while I do understand the issue, I doubt that such a lengthy discussion is leading to a conclusion.

the easiest/fastest way in case you feel that SebJu is giving his trust/reputation away to easily, is to exclude him from your own trust list by hand.

that's what I did, when he started to participate in signature campaigns of not trustworthy sites and gave away positive feedback way to easy. don't get me wrong, I think tghe person behind the account of SebJu is one of the most reliable/trustworthy german users, but I myself  simply don't wanna get fooled by the feedback he's given to people who would otherwise never ever make it into my trusted cirlces.

[koshgel]

while I do understand the issue, I doubt that such a lengthy discussion is leading to a conclusion.

the easiest/fastest way in case you feel that SebJu is giving his trust/reputation away to easily, is to exclude him from your own trust list by hand.

that's what I did, when he started to participate in signature campaigns of not trustworthy sites and gave away positive feedback way to easy. don't get me wrong, I think tghe person behind the account of SebJu is one of the most reliable/trustworthy german users, but I myself  simply don't wanna get fooled by the feedback he's given to people who would otherwise never ever make it into my trusted cirlces.

I've done the same thing. The problem is that newbies don't understand the trust system can still be gamed by these loan/escrow trust farmers.

hm..  just checked the default trust and it seems atleast some escrows are doing this and even posting the escrow amount in the risked btc section.

this is serious bs and im actually thinking of deleting this ppl from my default trust.
also recommending this to everyone else.

also it would make the problem even more worst if the escrow would take payment for it, because this would be just plain trust selling.

i hope some other ppl will check the default list escrows too

Please list any users you find on the DefaultTrust freely giving out positive trust for microloans and escrow service.

[feryjhie]

feryjhie got sold in an auction today. No biggie, account changes hands like cards in a deck in the org named Bitcointalk. The seller, a new account rolled to just sell the account even got a default trust from SebastianJu who was escrow. Apparently the escrow somehow risked 0.255BTC and was so grateful to the Newbie for having the priviledge of being the escrow that he couldn't wait to give a default rating.

No biggie again, the Legendary Escrow Service is the middleman of choice for all sorts of traders angling to get that coveted feedback as a quick glance through the sent feedback reveals. What was concerning in this particular case was that the sold account itself received a rating. This seems to be a new policy for the popular escrow, who has seen a sudden rise in business coinciding with him doling out default feedback.

What do you do if you want to buy an account here? Make a new account, use SebastianJu to escrow the trade and ask him to provide the feedback to the new account and voila! you are the proud owner of an account which is going to turn green in 5 months.

But then, escrow fortunes rise and fall with the everchanging landscape of default trust. devthedev was the most popular at some point but was discarded like a stale bread when escrow.ms wielded his axe. bitpop had a few days in the sun but that was cut short quickly. Now master-P, who has worked so hard to buld up his rating is the only viable rival, but his insistence in being a miser in the sent feedback means he is left eating SebastianJu's dust.

Dude you have no proof of your guess which was made from envy or hate, I don't know what previous owner of the account did to you , although he wasn't a scammer or a bad guy at all but you must to know that I have nothing in common with him.


You're wrong and I can prove this , I'm the first owner of account conteaza(which I sold few months ago) and somebody might knows me as a signature designer.
I have the BB code of a signature that I made a year ago which was not shared with nobody,here's the link

You've got another participant here  
I hope 3D effect is clear enough

and code

Code:

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I can show more code examples if it's necessary .

I fully agree with Sebastian's policy and I don't think big volume of a trade must be the main criterion to give a positive feedback . I know guys which are not so rich to make trades with let's say 10 BTC but they are very trustworthy ,  they are few but they are ..

[SebastianJu]

And what would be the sense in a forum empty of green trust?

Of course being extremist never makes sense. The trust system would be useless if nobody (or almost nobody) had green trust as much as if everyone (or too many people) had it. When I make a successful deal with some significant risked BTC then I almost always leave positive trust. When the risked BTC is zero or close to zero then it's very subjective. It depends whether the other party was very communicative and nothing at all was fishy; basically if my guts say the user is trustworthy. Of course it's OK to leave positive trust on several of those cases but not always and that's up to the person leaving the trust. It must be checked cased by case.

Thats mostly how i do it too. I mean a $50 trade is significant already, i think. And when i think something is fishy then i would not give green trust. Only then i give green trust.

On another level, giving green to one but not to another raises questions by the one that did not get it. Then you need to explain.

Luckily these cases happen very seldom.

You are right. Though i state explicitly that i only escrowed, so its not that someone can think that i bought something from that user.

Yes and that's very helpful when people really check the trust. But something really important to consider is that even if we don't like it several newbies will blindly trust green accounts without actually looking at the actual feedback, +10 could look like a lot. Therefore we need to be somewhat strict when giving those away and check them in the future time to time for a possible rectification.

The steps from newbies doing trades without escrow, from learning what trust is to checking out the trust from someone they way to trade with are rather thin.

I agree that this should be handled carefully.

[SebastianJu]

I talked to him about this in the beginning of June and his response was something along the lines of that he wants a record of the transaction.

I would not personally give positive trust this liberally as it makes it easy for people to farm trust which ultimately leads to bad things.

I did not say anything of a record, that makes no sense. I told you that i think the trust rating should show that someone is trustworthy to deal with. Might be some people use it for rating their friends or so but for me it shows that deals went well.

And yes, we spoke about that. And i agreed that i should be more strict. Thats why i only do neutral rating for values lower than $50.

By the way... you remember why i contacted you? Because i needed to hear your opinion regarding someone trying to gain illegitimate trust.

I believe that you said said (among other things - I think this is the most relevant and important of what you said):

It shows that the person did trade successfully without problems before. Thats what i think is the positive trust for.

Yes. I believe the trust ratings should show that the member traded on bitcointalk successfully before without problems arising. Its not for my personal record keeping, though maybe i understood your sentence wrong. Its a record of trades on the forum that can show a person viewing it what this account did. The more info the better the image a viewer can get about that person. Of course, when a rating says that an escrow was involved then the risk was not much. But still i would want to read about past trades rather than having a blank trust page.

You had contacted me because you were afraid that you were being targeted by trust farmers, and wanted advise as to how to proceed.

Thats correct. The case was a person with multiple accounts, not even small ones. At least staff knows all details and they observe them.

I would say that your overall sent trust ratings has improved greatly since we spoke. As of now, I would not support your removal from Default Trust, and would probably oppose any push to have you removed.

Thanks. And im open to how trust rating should be handled.

I do like the fact that you have a minimum trade value that you will give trust on, although I think there is a good chance you are still being targeted by trust farmers. Tomatocage had told me that his minimum trade size to leave a positive trust rating is 1BTC, although even this may be too low. I personally like the policy that OgNasty follows (at least the one that others have posted that he has), that is something along the lines of that he won't leave trust unless he has done a number of trades with you.

A number of trades would only slow it down when someone really is clever. What would happen would be that a trustfarmer would use escrows that dont do it the same. In case all escrows handle it the same way he would simply adapt and do a couple of trades.

Saying that... i dont give green trust when i think it might be strange somehow anymore since i got cautious.

I would also point out that I recently received a PM (I assume that he does not want his identity revealed because he specifically asked his identity be kept secret when he messaged me regarding other DT issues/threads in meta) saying that he passed on using you as escrow on a 20+BTC deal because you give out so many trust ratings saying "I escrowed one of his deals and all went fine... "

Must be a combined escrow with many trades then since i did no trade in that high since many months. And i would only give one green trust in that case.

in my experience, very few people ask me for trust after I escrow a trade for them, and even when they do and I decline to give them trust, they still seem very happy that I was able to help them with their trade and still generally would leave a very positive review for my services. 

Yes, i think thats correct. Though i think the trust system should be used for showing that trades happened successfully. I would rather suggest to give trust so that other members can inform about the past trades of a person. It is simply a difference to see an empty trust or a trust that shows that some trades happened. If these trust ratings need to be green or neutral might be another question.

I think that PistolPete brings up a good point about a flaw in the trust system. It is not difficult to farm trust by using various escrow services. You are not the only person who often gives out trust after acting as escrow, and there is an argument to leave positive trust after you act as escrow. A large percentage of the escrow agents are also on DefaultTrust, as there is a relationship between a person's trustworthiness and the chances they are on DT (as someone is more trustworthy, there is a greater chance that they will be trusted with others' money).

Yes. Its somewhat standard. I know though that not all escrows are do it that way.

Maybe account buyers should add a new question. Green trust from escrows only?

Another point is the fact that almost all deals involve only one person risking any amount of bitcoin, and there is the question of when it is appropriate to leave positive trust when nothing is risked. This question also makes it complicated to say when exactly it is appropriate to trust someone with your money.

Exactly...

[SebastianJu]

to be honest i do not think that it is a good idea to give trust as a escrow.

the partys using the escrow should give the escrow positive or negative trust.

the trust system here has quite a broad definition and i think the best way to give positive trust is if you risked x amount of money to someone and dont get scammed by that person.

the trust of someone who has nothing to lose is quite worthless in my opinion especially here where you can trade accounts and trust.

But with that definition you could never give trust when you use an escrow. The risk with an escrow is very low, so in theory no party should get a trust rating, except the escrow maybe, because he was a "risk" at some level. You trust him with coins. That would mean that no trust would be given for trades that happened with escrows involved. Which would render the trust system relatively useless since the only way to risk for buyer and seller is when they dont use an escrow. And i dont think thats something that should be supported since i had to learn that on the forum are really scammers that would scam for less than $10...

[SebastianJu]

I don't have anything against Sebastian, I still believe he is one of the most trustworthy users and escrow providers here on bitcointalk considering the amount of funds he has handled in the past without a hitch.But I do agree that he should be less liberal with the amount of positive trust he gives out. I mostly only give out positive ratings if I had to specifically "trust" the other user with any value. There are definitely instances where I have also given out positive ratings when I did not have to trust the user with any value but I would usually leave the "Risked BTC amount" at 0 to help illustrate this.

Though the risked amount is no value that is flowing into the calculation of trust. So putting an amount into that field would be purely informational and together with the rating text it would become clear what the value is about.

Ever since being put on the default trust list (this was before I started my public escrow service) I've been very careful of when and who I give positive trust to. There are few instances where users would ask me to leave positive trust for a transaction I escrowed for but this is usually just something I end up ignoring (no offense to these people), simply because I don't believe that's how the trust system should work. It's not a "feedback" system like ebay where both parties leave a rating at the end of the deal.

There has definitely been some very obvious trust farmers who have contacted me but this just gives me another reason to be more conservative when leaving trust. I don't want people to use my escrow service only to gain a trust rating because then I'd rather not help escrow at all.

I don't see any other escrow provider to be "competition" because I don't do escrow as a business. This is not my way of making a living, this is just me volunteering my spare time on these forums to help make trading safer.

Yes, thats very true. Sometimes i think people think being an escrow is some form of earning money. I would suggest doing signature campaigns instead since being an escrow is really no way to earn a living.

I do it because i think the community is haunted with scammers and a solution needs to be there. I spend a lot of time of these things and the reward is mostly seeing the people being happy at the end. Sometimes donations happen of course. That makes me happy of course since it shows that people are happy with what i did. And as far as i was in contact with you i think its similar with you.
But its not something to do as a business. Maybe services like escrow.ms are different when they do it in masses? Dont know.

So again, just wanted to make clear that I don't have anything personal against SebastianJu or his escrow service. He is very active and I am sure many of us can appreciate that. I have personally had to use his escrow service before at least once.

Not sure where I'm going with this anymore, the bottom line is I think Sebastian should definitely be more conservative in giving out positive trust ratings. Especially with the updated trust system where it's actually quite easy to get "green" trust with just one or two ratings. There are other/better ways to help keep a record of your transactions imo. In the end everyone has the right to leave positive/negative trust to anyone for whatever reason but being too liberal while on DefaultTrust can lead to trust farming/abuse.

[criptix]

to be honest i do not think that it is a good idea to give trust as a escrow.

the partys using the escrow should give the escrow positive or negative trust.

the trust system here has quite a broad definition and i think the best way to give positive trust is if you risked x amount of money to someone and dont get scammed by that person.

the trust of someone who has nothing to lose is quite worthless in my opinion especially here where you can trade accounts and trust.

But with that definition you could never give trust when you use an escrow. The risk with an escrow is very low, so in theory no party should get a trust rating, except the escrow maybe, because he was a "risk" at some level. You trust him with coins. That would mean that no trust would be given for trades that happened with escrows involved. Which would render the trust system relatively useless since the only way to risk for buyer and seller is when they dont use an escrow. And i dont think thats something that should be supported since i had to learn that on the forum are really scammers that would scam for less than $10...

uhm thats my point, only seller/buyer should rate the escrow.
the escrow should not rate them besides a neutral because they were friendly or whatever.

the trust system is to help people not getting scammed and i dont think this will change something.
people that trade directly with each other can still give each other trust or just use a trusted escrow - which would be a good think because it will help a lot against scams.

but i gotta say i can uderstand your point there must be some balance around it :/

but i hope you can understand that someone who could have scammed you but didnt is much more trustworthy then someone who could not steal anything anyway

[SebastianJu]

Ok guys... i see many see it differently but it seems there is no opinion that is valid for everyone.

I can handle it differently from now. For example only giving neutral trust generally.

Though i really would like to have a policy established so that all forum members can use the same rules. I know the trust system is free to use but at the same time forum members can decide on rules if they want.

So i think something like a poll should happen in where forum members can say what the rules should be for giving neutral, red and green trust, when to fill the amount, special rules for escrows and so on.

At the end all forum users should use these rules then. If someone is not handling it that way then he can get informed and other members can act if needed.

Well... when i write this then it sounds like a surveillance society.

Anyway. For now i think the points are valid but i would like to have equal rules for all. The topic came on the table now so maybe its time to negotiate rules.

I think a normal poll on the forum wouldnt be very usefull since it doesnt say if the users were newbies. And trustfarmers would most probably be account sellers. They voting with tens of accounts would not make sense.

Like i said, im open to discussion. For the moment i will only give neutral trust for escrows i did. That would not change the trust rating and still would inform other users of trades that happened. I think the amount would be an important information so that i think its better to include it. It would have purely informative character.

If the majority of established members say i should delete my past green ratings as an escrow and replace it with neutral ones then i would like to do that. Of course some users might still get a green trust when i traded with them alot and or have the impression that they are very honest persons.

Give me your opinions and i act on the consensus. It doesnt make sense to me when some persons removed me from their trust list because they dont agree with the way i give trust.

But again... i believe a common rule should be found so that escrow generally can follow it. At the moment there is no rule and it seems thats not the best way because it brings controversy.

[SebastianJu]

to be honest i do not think that it is a good idea to give trust as a escrow.

the partys using the escrow should give the escrow positive or negative trust.

the trust system here has quite a broad definition and i think the best way to give positive trust is if you risked x amount of money to someone and dont get scammed by that person.

the trust of someone who has nothing to lose is quite worthless in my opinion especially here where you can trade accounts and trust.

But with that definition you could never give trust when you use an escrow. The risk with an escrow is very low, so in theory no party should get a trust rating, except the escrow maybe, because he was a "risk" at some level. You trust him with coins. That would mean that no trust would be given for trades that happened with escrows involved. Which would render the trust system relatively useless since the only way to risk for buyer and seller is when they dont use an escrow. And i dont think thats something that should be supported since i had to learn that on the forum are really scammers that would scam for less than $10...

uhm thats my point, only seller/buyer should rate the escrow.
the escrow should not rate them besides a neutral because they were friendly or whatever.

the trust system is to help people not getting scammed and i dont think this will change something.
people that trade directly with each other can still give each other trust or just use a trusted escrow - which would be a good think because it will help a lot against scams.

but i gotta say i can uderstand your point there must be some balace around it :/

but i hope you can understand that someone who could have scammed you but didnt is much more trustworthy then someone who could not steal anything anyway

Of course i see your point with "someone who could have scammed you but didnt". I only wonder if the chance for that should exist. I mean how many trades on here happen without escrow? And how many trades that happen without escrow end in being scammed? So either there would be practically no green trust happen anymore, because no one would want to risk something, or members take risks and be rewarded by having a high chance of getting scammed.

I only say that i dont see much place for the trust system anymore in that scenario.

Anyway... my post above this post is important i think.

[TECSHARE]

For now i think the points are valid but i would like to have equal rules for all. The topic came on the table now so maybe its time to negotiate rules.... i believe a common rule should be found so that escrow generally can follow it. At the moment there is no rule and it seems thats not the best way because it brings controversy.

The entire reason there are no rules is so those in control of the trust system can pick and choose who they enforce these unwritten rules upon, giving those closest to them the best trading advantage possible via selective enforcement. There is a direct monetary incentive to do this as there is a direct incentive for people to trade with those on default trust so they can get a bump in their trust rating visible on default trust. Its like a funnel of money aimed at the default trust. The ones that wash balls get supported no matter what, the ones who do their own thing are swarmed with people vying to please their overlords. Welcome to the club.

[SebastianJu]

For now i think the points are valid but i would like to have equal rules for all. The topic came on the table now so maybe its time to negotiate rules.... i believe a common rule should be found so that escrow generally can follow it. At the moment there is no rule and it seems thats not the best way because it brings controversy.

The entire reason there are no rules is so those in control of the trust system can pick and choose who they enforce these unwritten rules upon, giving those closest to them the best trading advantage possible via selective enforcement. There is a direct monetary incentive to do this as there is a direct incentive for people to trade with those on default trust so they can get a bump in their trust rating visible on default trust. Its like a funnel of money aimed at the default trust. The ones that wash balls get supported no matter what, the ones who do their own thing are swarmed with people vying to please their overlords. Welcome to the club.

I agree. The trust system is not fair. And i agree that i should not give green trust to any trader above >$50 trades. In the future i will only give neutral trust as this would be purely informative about what this user did in the past. That is better then having an empty trust page. You can see what happened and when you trade with him using an escrow then you can be relatively sure that a trade, by using an escrow, will end well again.

Saying that... im not so sure if the default trust is a way to riches. I think those on default trust are often enough on the list because they are early adopters and thats the reason they mostly have money. Of course only when inept businessmans and scammers didnt make the burden of lifting all these coins a lot lighter... or even worse. And me being on default trust did not let me get into a secret society of whale bitcoiners. So no riches from that.

Though trust is no one way ticket. I remember disagreeing with Quicksilver on the red rating for _Whorhipper. Though i wasnt the only one and at the end it was expensive for him. I think that shows that the crowd could disagree and act as a crowd. So if the community could agree to terms how the trust ratings should be handled then im sure the crowd could enforce it. Sorry Quicksilver for taking you as example. (By the way i asked the only one who could get to 20 bitcoins in trades totally and he didnt say such thing. I wonder who told you i escrow a 20 coin deal for him. The last time i escrowed something in that height was start of november 2014.)