Merit & new rank requirements

[MagicSmoker]

@Branko and @Samarkand

If you guys want to bash me about my merit that is received in Meta Section, then it is okay for me, i get it with my style and my work, so i hope you guys dont mind it like this.
...

You totally misunderstood the point Branko and Samarkand were trying to make: namely, that there is a problem with the merit system itself if the most merited posts are on the subject of merit.

I've also received most of my merits from posts here on meta despite that they constitute a small fraction of my post history and just as with Branko, I find this somewhat disappointing. Unlike Branko, I don't care all that much, since my only motivation for achieving a higher rank is to finally be able to wear my favorite avatar, a thumbnail of Banksy's StarWarsPulpFiction.

[1714905497]

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[athanz88]

Well then light me up. What is the problem if people giving merit to a merit discussion while the discussion itself is great, bring a new content, use a research to make, take a time to make, and has a lot of engagement with other members?

One question, did you open the link i gave? Well based on that statistic, off topic section gets merit too, why not making "off topic section getting merits" as a problem because it doesnt add anything at all to this forum and not on topic of cryptocurrency. The marketplace gets merit too, why not making "marketplace section getting a lot of merits" as a problem because why the hell people give merit to a buy and sale thread?

Please, enlighten me.

Ps. Why do people see the system is at fault while the one who is giving merit is the human? Human at some section just too stingy to give merits

@Branko
Well that is your problem. You think that your section is better than other section. It ia subjective. You can not force someone to like what you like or otherwise. If you follow your logic, then you should bash off topic and marketplace rather than people who talks about merit. Talking about merit still has a connection to this forum while off-topic is a big no connection and marketplace still have a little connection to thia forum main topic (cryptocurrency).

[Samarkand]

@Branko and @Samarkand
If you guys want to bash me about my merit that is received in Meta Section, then it is okay for me, i get it with my style and my work, so i hope you guys dont mind it like this
...

I explicitly pointed out in my post that I think that you are a good poster and many
of your posts are valuable contributions to this forum. I was rather praising you
than bashing you 

...
And please read this link https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=3093768.0, this is and old statistics, but you know, meta is not the only section that is getting merits a lot. You guys should stop talking merits received in meta section is not well deserved without a data.
...

Ok, let me back up my claim with some data.

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=4932684.0

This post is not an old statistic, this post from DdmrDdmr is from yesterday.

Take a look at the Subsection correlation matrix that he posted. You will see
that the Meta subsection is occupying one of the highlighted spots extremely
often.

...
I'd compare it with a general becoming general by speaking about military ranks, instead been on battlefields

Great comparison 

Think of it as a way to "game the merit system". You can post valuable contributions
to various Bitcoin subforums or Altcoin subforums and you hardly get a merit.
Alternatively, you could spend your time regurgitating the same kind of post about
merit or its ramifications over and over again (again I´m not personally referring to you
athanz88, this is more of a general observation) and be a Sr. Member in a month.

Well then light me up. What is the problem if people giving merit to a merit discussion while the discussion itself is great,
bring a new content, use a research to make, take a time to make, and has a lot of engagement with other members?

The merit discussions aren´t great for the most part, they are users regurgitating the same
kind of statements over and over again. Sure, there is the occasional quality post like the
one from DdmrDdmr that I linked above, but this is the absolute exception. My grudge
definitely isn´t directed towards contributions like this. Every single merit he earned
for this post is well deserved.

Apart from that, the problem is exactly what Branko was complaining about.

He started posting at Bitcointalk, because of a genuine interest in Altcoin Mining. Later
he also started contributing to the Croatian Local forum.
He genuinely enjoys posting in these subforums and obviously has a hard time ranking up
due to posting mainly in these two subforums.

You claimed:

...
Look on how i post and my made topic, or look to some of top merit receiver, and compare it to your post.
Learn from that and i believe you can rank up even in this sytem.
...

I disagreed with this recommendation as I outlined in my previous post. You have earned only
a single merit in the last 120 days (!) that was not somehow related to merit.

Of course Branko could start rambling about merit all over the Meta subforum, but again I believe
that this is neither what this forum needs nor what Branko would enjoy.
My problem is not with your merit history @athanz88 (I actually find it great
that you ranked up), or your posts (they are valuable contributions for the most
part), but rather with the way that the merit system incentivizes users to post
about stuff like the merit system instead of the stuff they genuinely enjoy
or are knowledgeable about.

The merit system fucks up the incentives and therefore users like Branko (there are many other
users in the same situation) are faced with a quandary:

1. He could try to "game" the merit system by starting to make many merit-related posts
2. He can continue to make contributions to his favorite subforums and hardly gain any merit at all or
maybe earn merit at an extremely slow-rate in the best case

To sum up, I disagree with your suggestion that he should follow your example, because you
are precisely an example of why the merit system is not working as intended as evidenced
by your last 4 months of merit activity and as evidenced by the data provided
by DdmrDdmr.

[tactac]

I think merit system is very useful for judging the reliability of a post.
And I think it would be nice if there is a function like a “like” in Twitter, in case that the post is not good enough for send a Merit but would like to show appreciation feeling, or  want to send a Merit but not have a sMerit

[Joel_Jantsen]

I was wondering for a long time that was I the only one have that concept about "quality" in mind. According to my observation, most of the merits are given in Meta board. Those merit-received posts only meet "constructive" criteria and I don't see many really "high quality" ones. Sometimes, to match the "constructive" criteria, people deliberately lengthen posts & topics. This confuses their readers.

Exactly. To be honest, we need more bitcoin/blockchain sort of discussions on the forum. And not bitching about the system in Meta. Most of the top merited posters are not even close to writing a single informative post outside of Meta.

I'm not a regular visitor of Development & Technical or Project Development and I think either are merit sources. Btw, Bitcoin Discussion is becoming as trashy as Altcoin Discussion so we shouldn't expect from it. Serious Discussion should be instead.

You should be if you are keen on keeping your knowledge up to date.

[vlad230]

I was wondering for a long time that was I the only one have that concept about "quality" in mind. According to my observation, most of the merits are given in Meta board. Those merit-received posts only meet "constructive" criteria and I don't see many really "high quality" ones. Sometimes, to match the "constructive" criteria, people deliberately lengthen posts & topics. This confuses their readers.

Exactly. To be honest, we need more bitcoin/blockchain sort of discussions on the forum. And not bitching about the system in Meta. Most of the top merited posters are not even close to writing a single informative post outside of Meta.

Both of you guys are right!
 
Merit is awarded mostly in meta or reputation and I also created a post complaining about the fact merit is awarded mostly for merit analysis/statistics here: Has the Merit faucet dried up? Solutions? which is sad...

I'm not saying it wasn't hard to create these stats and what not but the main focus of this forum should be about BTC & altcoins. Don't you?

I am creating a lot of posts where I try to help people or come up with ideas for the forum but these aren't really in focus of the merit sources... Sometime it is a bit discouraging to see this but what can you do? 

[MagicSmoker]

Well then light me up. What is the problem if people giving merit to a merit discussion while the discussion itself is great, bring a new content, use a research to make, take a time to make, and has a lot of engagement with other members?
...

The problem is pretty obvious I would think: this forum is called bitcointalk, not merittalk... Merit is a system/feature on the forum, and giving merits to others for talking about merit - while being the very definition of meta - kinda misses the point of the forum overall, which is to discuss bitcoin and crypto in general, not merit.

Like Branko and Samarkand, I'm not commenting on your posting quality or whether you deserve any/all the merit you have received, so quit taking this personally. It really isn't about you.

[athanz88]

snip

Could you please tell me how do you read the table on the link you gave?

In my point of view, Altcoins has 5 subboard and if you sum them up, you got 8094 nMerited user from all 18.738 total distinct users and its about 43.19% while meta only has 1.231 distinct users and it is about 6.57%. I know i do sum up the Altcoin board as one thing, but they can not be divided, like, speculation on altcoins is still altcoin topic or altcoin mining is still altcoin topic, but you can not make Meta as the same thing as other "Other board" because they are definitely talking about different things. We dont have the exact updated number of total merit given on altcoins board and meta board, but if you see the table from that Ddmr's statistic, it looks like merit in Altcoins is diversed to many members while in meta it is just more concentrated to same people. And by looking at the number of distinct users, it needs about 6-7 merits per distinct user in meta board to match the total number of merit given if the distinct user in the Altcoins board only get 1 merit, which is probably not, so i bet total merit given is almost the same, but Meta looks different because you guys just look in to the same person who gets merits because the distinct user there, is small.

You only looked up to 120 days merit of mine and you say im a precisely perfect explanation of users who only gets merit in meta? Well you are wrong and look again friend. look at the time of the post too did i was active in this 4 month? And you did miss a little thing in the link you gave to me. Ddmr give a spreadsheet about how many board do a person get merits and well i score 7 while you are 8.

Better read your sources first before saying things like "you are precisely an example of why the merit system is not working as intended as evidenced by your last 4 months of merit activity and as evidenced by the data provided by DdmrDdmr.

Do you even read Ddmr's data about mine in spreadsheet??

snip

The problem is pretty obvious I would think: this forum is called bitcointalk, not merittalk... Merit is a system/feature on the forum, and giving merits to others for talking about merit - while being the very definition of meta - kinda misses the point of the forum overall, which is to discuss bitcoin and crypto in general, not merit.

Like Branko and Samarkand, I'm not commenting on your posting quality or whether you deserve any/all the merit you have received, so quit taking this personally. It really isn't about you.

Well once again, if you dont get the merits because of your hard work, doesnt mean other people in your board doesnt get the merits, and dont blame people outside your board because it is a different story then. look on the number of distinct user on altcoin board vs meta and you will know why.

Well if you follow your logic then we dont need altcoin board (or any other board) in here since the name is bitcointalk, because nothing is being said about altcoin or other crytocurrency in the name. It really is not about you, and the funny thing is, you made a reasoning to include cryptocurrency and altcoin in to your "bitcointalk name" logic. I can clearsy say it out loud too that this is bitcointalk, not altcointalk or cryptocurrencytalk or merittalk too. Boom.

[Real14Hero]

I think merit system is very useful for judging the reliability of a post.
And I think it would be nice if there is a function like a “like” in Twitter, in case that the post is not good enough for send a Merit but would like to show appreciation feeling, or  want to send a Merit but not have a sMerit

It is ofc not same as like in facebook and upvote or something else on some other social site.
First - They are limited , Second - The have more substantial value than a like as they get summed up in your total merit points.

[DdmrDdmr]

This is becoming a trend now of a kind: attack the merit system through those merited talking about the merit system (I should know right)?
Various things I’d like to say before I bugger-off for a stroll:

1. Venezuela is living one of it’s most disruptive times, with tremendous consequences on its population. The epicentre of talk is about the crisis, and more specific for the past months how the Bolivar and the Petro are devaluated day by day and how that is changing people’s lives for the worse at a speed they has never imagined.
Taking a (very large) leap, the forum’s equivalent is Merit, being it’s impact on the forum and on ranks in the minds of more people than fit in Wembley Stadium, Santiago Bernabeu and Camp Nou together. It is affecting peoples “forum life” and therefore it is a core topic to talk about, and I suspect will still be for some time.

2. An interesting exercise to do would remove all the top 50 merited forum members (let’s consider them outliers), and see the distribution of merit per subsection. We can get back to that if needed at some point, but in order to see merit distributed per board the easiest way is to see it on the Merit Dashboard (go to the Tab labelled Section Subsection and check the graph on the top right – apply filters such as Date range or Month to delimit the information to a narrower timeframe).

3. If there are under-merited subsections, these need to cry-out and state the reasons why they believe they require a merit source, be it dedicated or shared with other boards. The cry-out part should, in my opinion, be founded on proof, so that the case can be seen both numerically and quality wise.
A subsection can have a low amount of merits due to it being not too active, the posts not being too great in general, or nobody meriting them when they are worthy of it.  If my local board were to severely under-merited, I would be investing time creating a thread with all the links to under merited posts to state my case. Time consuming, but at least I would try to prove my point with or without the help of others.
Technical topics can play against merits sometimes I figure, since they are understood by fewer people than the average Joe. That has it’s toll somewhere in the awarding process too.

4. The Analysis - Merited on multiple Subsections and the Correlation Matrix shows us quite a lot. The basic idea is to show us when people that are good in one subsection, what other subsections they tend to be good at (using merit as the link to derive this information).
It is therefore interesting, but focuses on correlation (I prefer the Dashboard for actual Subsection thorough comparison).
Note: we cannot add all the Subsections together for a given Section on the Subsection Correlation Matrix, since people merited in multiple subsections will be accounted for twice.

5. It would be smashing if Bitcoin were to be the main driver of Merit (it has 9% approximately of all awarded sMerit). Nevertheless, there are many more sections here on this forum, and despite it’s name (Bitcointalk), it has many more areas of engagement. Merit could have been created specifically for Bitcoin centre conversations, but it wasn’t, so any decent discussion anywhere on the board is a valid candidate for merit.
Some other “feature” could be created to display bitcoin knowledge and it could even be tied to the ranking system as a fast-track, but we know it’s not going to happen, less of all when moving forward on proposals is extremely slow and limited for multiple reasons.

In summary, I think under-merited subsections need to cry-out somehow, proving their case not by comparison to others really, but by showing that there are ever so many un/under-merited cases on the subsection. There is a procedure for becoming a Merit Source, and part of the process is precisely showing these unmerited cases that deserve merit. Stepping-up is a way of proving the above, although on a limited set of 10 posts, which goes more for the candidate’s ability to select that to say that a subsection is un/under merited.

[athanz88]

Highlighted part based on the last post by Ddmr :

A subsection can have a low amount of merits due to it being not too active, the posts not being too great in general, or nobody meriting them when they are worthy of it.

Low engagement. My theory can applies too, that if you dont get merit doesnt mean other people on your section doesnt get merit. It is proved in the below calculation with so much merits on the Altcoins section but you dont get the merits.

We can get back to that if needed at some point, but in order to see merit distributed per board the easiest way is to see it on the Merit Dashboard (go to the Tab labelled Section Subsection and check the graph on the top right – apply filters such as Date range or Month to delimit the information to a narrower timeframe).

Surpirsingly, after seeing the data from what you have said, i found this :
1. From the day it was released, 24 Jan 2018, there are 209.060 merits has been given up to 17 August 2018 1:56 AM
2. Do you know what? Meta only gets 19.592 merits while Announcement (altcoins) alone gets 26.037, and if we combine all the altcoin sub-board, they get 47.669 merits and it is 22,8%.
3. Even if we combine all sub-board in Other section, merits given is only at 28.786 and it is about 13.76%
4. Only Economy board gets bigger merit than Altcoin. Recorded 48.643 merits from all the sub-board
5. Even the name of this forum named bitcointalk, this section only gets total of 19.225 merits.
6. Altcoin gets merit bigger than Meta, even bigger than Off-Topic section
How do you explain it @Samarkand, @MagicSmoker @Branko? Please can you tell that Meta is the most board with merit? Why dont you blame the Economy board now? Based on someone's logic, should we change the name of this forum to economytalk since bitcoin section doesnt get a lot of merit?

Conclusion is, it is not a good thing to compare to other section, especially when the topic is different and cant be made as a true (on point) comparison, and you dont have enough data or statistic to back you up. Secondly, the "bitcointalk name" reason is very funny if we have to decide merit is only worthy for all bitcoin related talk while the point of merit is for quality post.

Last but not least, try Ddmr's solution, gather as one and try to be Merit Source whom can be active on some specific board, or you can work as a group of initiator to promote and increase about merit awareness by engaging to people in the specific board you talk or discuss.

 

[Branko]

How do you explain it @Samarkand, @MagicSmoker @Branko? Please can you tell that Meta is the most board with merit? Why dont you blame the Economy board now? Based on someone's logic, should we change the name of this forum to economytalk since bitcoin section doesnt get a lot of merit?
 

Easy....2000 altcoins barely managed to get more merit than single one (bitcoin)...that means average altcoin in which you're involved has about
1000 times less chance to get you merit...thats pretty big difference and good example how I can turn statistics to favor my agenda the same
way you do all the time, although you're missing the point whole time (I missed it with my BTC/altcoins merit comparison too, but it was deliberate)


Edit: 17 million posts in all altcoin subforums got 47669 merit

230 000 posts in meta got 19592 merit

That means average post in meta gives user 30 times more merit than post in any altcoin section,
meaning some people did homework and post where it really matters (if you want to earn merit)

Real eye opener, and explains me why I limp behind some people...I never liked statistics  

[athanz88]

How do you explain it @Samarkand, @MagicSmoker @Branko? Please can you tell that Meta is the most board with merit? Why dont you blame the Economy board now? Based on someone's logic, should we change the name of this forum to economytalk since bitcoin section doesnt get a lot of merit?
 

Easy....2000 altcoins barely managed to get more merit than single one (bitcoin)...that means average altcoin in which you're involved has about
1000 times less chance to get you merit...thats pretty big difference and good example how I can turn statistics to favor my agenda the same
way you do all the time, although you're missing the point whole time (I missed it with my BTC/altcoins merit comparison too, but it was deliberate)

Haha you are becoming more of a troll now and just making fool of yourself, and why is that :
1. You dont even grasp the concept of merit. Look, based on the data shown above, total merit is greater on Altcoin board, and each of them convert to half of receiver's sMerits. You think Meta board could ever match up to the number of Altcoin board merit potential?
2. Mostly people only talks in same board, only few of them roaming around to other board (you can see Ddmr's stat about subsection), and if people talks on the same board, why is that your Board's merit is not growing faster? Simple, because people there doesnt give merits often and it is not other boards fault.
3. You can not deny the fact that Altcoin is getting more merit than Meta, that is why you are bringing up other value so you are not looking like a crybaby, but the fact that your board has lower chance of getting merit is none of others board problem or people in there. Say, like you, which hates people talking about merit, will you give merits to them? No right? So if i make an excellent post about merit and if you dont give me merits, then i blame you because i dont get merits? Of course no, but this is what you do, you blame people who maybe doesnt even come to Altcoin board or doesnt support altcoin and only buy bitcoin for not giving you merits for your "excellent" post about altcoins.
4. I dont even care im not on point because you cant even accept the fact that Altcoin is getting more merits than Meta (which the talks is not all about merit)
5. Well it is right that data can be made to favor some of the agenda, i can not deny that Altcoin board has lower rate of getting merit and my agenda is not wrong at all, but it is a funny thing to blame other board which has a higher rate of getting merit. You can not blame your rich and monthly high-paid neighbour for your low monthly payment even if you work in the same company. It is just funny.

Ooh now you talk about the number of posts? Funny. Do you think with 17 millions post there are so many worthy posts there? There is a reason why this forum has a lot of spam and maybe you want to ask that to the 17 million posts from Altcoin board.

[Branko]

Ooh now you talk about the number of posts? Funny. Do you think with 17 millions post there are so many worthy posts there? There is a reason why this forum has a lot of spam and maybe you want to ask that to the 17 million posts from Altcoin board.

Again, you missed the point and think its personal attack, while I only congratulated you on doing good research
how to attain ranks faster than me...and its proven you were right, as your average post is 30 times more worth than mine
even before we take quality into account

I''m actually now feeling more proud, too, for doing relatively OK in such uphill struggle

I'm just surprised where all that merit comes from, looks like average Meta poster has 100 times merit at disposal to give, than average
Altcoin poster

Anyway, lost too much time here, going to investigate why tRRD=5 on Micron memory is so unstable, while Elpida has no problem with it

[athanz88]

snip

Again, you missed the point and think its personal attack, while I only congratulated you on doing good research
how to attain ranks faster than me...and its proven you were right, as your average post is 30 times more worth than mine
even before we take quality into account

I''m actually now feeling more proud, too, for doing relatively OK in such uphill struggle

I'm just surprised where all that merit comes from, looks like average Meta poster has 100 times merit at disposal to give, than average
Altcoin poster

First of all, i didnt even take this as personal attack. I am just giving a general point of view because lot of people attack the merit system through those merited talking about the merit system, while the talks is in a class of a high quality. Mostly it comes from people who are often hanging out in Altcoin board and others like bounty hunter. I am just saying it cant be compared because these 2 things is so different in many aspects.

Second, You should proud. Everyone who gets merit should proud of their self.

Last, some merit sources like to talks in Meta, which i cant be so sure if they are interested in Altcoin or not, so if they give merits, then it will be like a new merit which can be used and more likely be circulated in Meta section too. Two or three posts before this already stated that, you guys who loves Altcoin board so much can gather and propose yourself as a Merit Source (like Ddmr said) by finding 10 under merited posts which you guys has been said. So you guys can help increasing the circulating merit inside your board for the worthy posts.

[Pyrojason]

I wonder if the merit system could be blockchain based, allowing a merit coin to drag even more emotion from the whole thing.

///
I think the system is a decent idea despite not having any yet - I've never been the kind to just need points because they're out there.
Seven months of merit is enough time to get an idea if top members are happy with it, however I would suppose it would be the lower tier members who would be a better gauge if they are happy with the growth or not. (Not quite the 'The rich get richer' argument but just a viewpoint.)

If you power decent posts and actually earn the points it sounds like a good system. I don't know about the tips = points or friends first ideas that were also mentioned, but it should just work if people benefit from something you've said.

[Josiah Dave Leonor]

To achieve your dream in Bitcoin talk but friendly reminder :
1. There are always time and effort for everything
2. Don't rush and always follow the rules

There are two requirements to rank up the activity points :
1. The merit score activity points depends on your number of post where and maximum of 14 points can be achieved in a two week period for example you made a brand new account and total of a 29 quality post in two weeks you will get 14 activities for  that you got busy so you must make at least one post per two week in order to have  additional 14 activities another two week passed and you only made four posts your activity will become 34 that's the time you link up.

2. Now let's move to merit system so even though you made legendary like activities but you don't have any merits you'll just stuck in the junior rank . Merit system was just recently added by our respected and trusted administrator THEYMOS it is the solution for people to force them to post in high quality in order to rank up you can get merit to good quality post by giving them your spendable merits you can have spendable merits when someone merits your post you will receive half of the amount of merits they said spendable merits for merit sources are filled monthly members before the merit system update received a merit score equal to the minimum required for your rank they also received a one time use spendable merits based on their points earned over the last year you can also be a merit source first be somewhat established member then collect ten quality post and quote them in you read the thread the purpose of this is to test how good you picking high quality post.

[coinlocket$]

Hi guys I took a break in posting in this thread the various weekly updates is really too hot here in Italy (about 40 °C) and it is impossible to stay close to the PC for several hours a day.
The weekly merit is falling more and more, I think it is due to the fact that we are in August and many people in different countries in the northern hemisphere are on vacation, we are at about 3800 merit/week despite the merit source are increasing more and more. The charts will be back soon.

[coinlocket$]

Here some updates, keep in mind is summer around the world and most of people are on vacation raight now, hoping numbers will be better next month since we get more and more sources but the merit is decreasing more and more!

[Makkara]

I see the head and shoulders there, it may break out soon.