1. So if investing in ponzi schemes arent illegal, why are we giving negative trust for investing?
Because he didn't just invest in a ponzi, he promoted it and condoned it's use. He is trying to trick users that could not know how schemes such as this work into investing and possibly being scammed. As dooglus said:
I suspect that you received negative trust for promoting the ponzi, not for participating in it. Posting on the forum about how you played the game and made a profit isn't just playing the game, it's promoting the game to others, even though you know it's a scam. You're free to do that if you like, and others are free to leave you feedback drawing attention to how you are promoting a scam.
2. But the person who got the neg isnt running a ponzi, you shouold look into the matter more
My apologies, I misread your original message. Regardless, my answer is very similar to the above. He isn't just investing, he is promoting a known scam. I would say this justifies a negative trust.
3. Maybe some of them dont know, im pretty sure he didnt get those refs from bitcointalk hence why i dont see the need for the negative rep on his profile
That's irrelevant imo. If I were found to steal from people IRL, I shouldn't be shown as trustworthy on a forum simply because my conduct there was acceptable. Whether he is promoting it here, on another site or on a giant billboard in his city center, he is still promoting a scam openly and deserves the repercussions for doing so.
First of all I am not against warnings at all, quite the opposite actually and I never lured anyone in promising great profits or anything. I made them aware of the system and the pits they can fall in but only when asked.
Personally, I think this is the problem. I am glad that you are open about the way that such services work, but I believe that this should be given to them along with the initial announcement of the thread. I think that it is fair that people understand what they are investing in without having to ask.
I even think that the subforum should be renamed Ponzi's Pyramides and HYIPs just to make it even more clear.
I can agree with this, though it is debatable that people should do their own research before investing in anything and understand what they are getting into therefore not needing such an obvious name.
Well for some in here it is not about the long time member presenting it as legit service. It is about everyone that is joining a Ponzi in the subforum and according to their account everyone who is joining is proving they are a scammer hence the cute red warning:
snip
But in my opinion that is tagging the noobs too, like you say they are not the point in this discussion. As said warning explains they will tag everyone that is joining noob or not.
Personally I can't say that I would persecute users for investing in a Ponzi, though it is definitely immoral if you understand how they work. However, promoting an investment similar to the way that OP did - whilst knowing exactly how the scheme works - is definitely worthy of a negative trust.
The problem they cause by this I explained here:
It is really not that hard to explain. A red trust is a warning. Warnings make you aware something is up. They work because they aren't always around us. But when every participant has the same warning on their profile it loses it's message.
When a noob googles bitcoindoubler and comes to the subforum and sees everyone with with negative trust it is nothing special anymore and I doubt they will check it.
A negative trust, a warning should not be giving lightly in my opinion for that exact reason. It should stand out when visiting a page. And it will lose its message in that subforum when everyone wears that tag.
So by them tagging everyone, you have to agree that it will even become more obscure for a newcomer to see the legitimate negative trust on the ones organizing as everyone is wearing the same tag.
I do agree, yes. The problem comes in that without negative trust tags, a newbie has no possible way to see that such services are immoral and will eventually scam (even though trust can only be seen by logged in members, which I believe should definitely be changed). I believe that what you have described here:
So I have no problem what so ever with a warning in every new thread, it could even be an automated message that gives an ever clearer warning than the standard warning above the sub. I have no problem with tagging every operator deep in the red and explain it in the topic itself. But I do think it will miss it's goal if you will tag everyone.
Is a good way to deal with the problem of ponzi
operators and negative trust, however this is again not the subject that this topic describes.
I think that the negative trust on OP is justified even if he may not be
running a ponzi simply because he is giving his word as a "Hero Member" that such a service is safe to invest in and will continue to pay, which we all know it won't. Whilst his rank may not mean much to those acquainted with this forum, to a noob this rank may be misinterpreted as something trusted and take his word; possibly causing them to be scammed.
IMHO anyone participating in ponzi signature campaign should be given a benefit of doubt.A member can not be held responsible for wearing a signature of a service or website which later turned out to be ponzi.How is one supposed to know a potential ponzi? and if a member wearing a signature is expected to know,the forum staff should delete the signature campaign thread itself
This isn't relevant to the topic. Please at least read the thread before spamming for your bit-cents.
