Merit & new rank requirements

[JayJuanGee]

Next week we have the reload of "new" merit sources, let's see what happens.

Have you meant that Merit sources are reloaded per month?
I think Merit sources get sMerit in 24 hours or something like this. For example, if merit source A send 3 sMerit to someone, s/he will be loaded those after 24 hours.

What coinlocket seems to be saying is that a bit more than 30 days ago, there were about 30 additional merit source members who added as "new" merit sources.

When a merit source spends his/her smerits, then those merits are replenished 30 days from the date that they are spent, so in essence coinlocket seems to be presuming that new merit sources would have been spending a decent amount of their smerits when they were first notified about their merit source designation, and therefore those spent smerits would be beginning to replenish (actually they would have already started to replenish around October 15/16 depending on when the new merit sources began sending out their newly received smerits).

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[S_Therapist]

~snip~

Because most of your posts are in ANN thread. Who will check thousands of posts for meriting only?
Also, you have a habit of quoting the whole posts and sometimes quoting some quotess which make people bore to read a post, at least it happens for me and I believe  so does for others.

[Tarlatata]

Because most of your posts are in ANN thread. Who will check thousands of posts for meriting only?
Also, you have a habit of quoting the whole posts and sometimes quoting some quotess which make people bore to read a post, at least it happens for me and I believe  so does for others.

You're right about not removing useless quotes. I mostly do it when on cellphone as it become a pain not to mess up what I actually wanted to quote. Guess I should take the habit to clean the unwanted stuff.

[JayJuanGee]

Because most of your posts are in ANN thread. Who will check thousands of posts for meriting only?
Also, you have a habit of quoting the whole posts and sometimes quoting some quotess which make people bore to read a post, at least it happens for me and I believe  so does for others.

You're right about not removing useless quotes. I mostly do it when on cellphone as it become a pain not to mess up what I actually wanted to quote. Guess I should take the habit to clean the unwanted stuff.

You characterized your post history as "decent contributions," and personally, I would take issue with your characterization, even if you might well be capable of making decent contributions, you may need to study a bit more into how other members are receiving merits, because receiving merits does not seem to be beyond your abilities.. You just need to spend some time actually making decent contributions, and for members to get to know you and to appreciate your contributions... that recognition is generally not going to come through threads in which the vast majority of participants seem to be engaged in pump and dump get rich scheming - those folks may not even have any merits to give... so there are a lot of other threads in which you can actually participate - including reading some of the prior posts in order to engage with current and relevant topics of the thread.

[SamReomo]

You're right about not removing useless quotes. I mostly do it when on cellphone as it become a pain not to mess up what I actually wanted to quote. Guess I should take the habit to clean the unwanted stuff.

Quoting some posts is not a problem and in fact it is necessary sometimes, but doing it too often, or adding too many lengthy quotes into your posts will bore most of the users. You should also remember that there are many threads where most of posts haven't received good merits or any merits at all.

As JayJuanGee said, that you should give some time to research and learning here so you can contribute some good stuff to the forum that will probably be admired by the active and contributing users of forum. You should also read the posts that have been merited most of the time so you can see which posts can get you merits for your contributions.

You can check  LoyceV thread https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5053587.0 where he listed most merited topics as it can give you some insight to posts topics that have been admired, and have gained the posters as well as other contributors some merit points.

[Direwolve735]

I just love the merit system and new ranks because it gives equal opportunity to every member of the forum to show their skills  by posting high quality posts.

I believe that the merit system not only creates equal conditions for writing highly qualified posts, but also radically changes the established hierarchy on the forum. Now it’s not enough to be a high rank user to enjoy the respect of other participants. Personally, I look at the number of merit first of all. And I think many others also evaluate this indicator. Now the rank itself doesn`t mean anything: if it`s not confirmed by merits, then trust in such a user immediately falls and his account begins to cause suspicion. We see a huge number of hero and legendary members who aren`t able to earn at least 1 merit, but on the other hand we see users of lower ranks who have proven that they really benefit the bitcointalk forum. A new elite is being formed at the forum, the foundation of which is not activity and rank, but merit-recognition from other members of the bitcointalk community.

I largely agree with you, Direwolve735; however, I will still quibble a bit with your various conclusions..  

I would assert that merit remains one additional indicator, besides other indicators, to look at yet there can be a variety of reasons why ongoing activism on the forum may or may not result in members receiving merits, so I would be careful to ascribe too much weight to merits, even though ongoing receiving of merit does become an additional factor - especially to show that a member is active and that the member (especially if earning a lot of small number of merits from a large number of users) has gained some respect from other forum members through their ongoing participation in the forum.  

Of course, there are some members (such as Satoshi) who are no longer active, but received a lot of merits for historical posts, and even though the vast majority of merits seem to get sent for current active posting, there are some merits that have been distributed to historical contributions and it is likely that such distribution of merit for historical posts will continue to take place (at least on a smaller scale), which also does seem to be helpful to identify respect for some historical contributions or contributors (even if the member might no longer be active - or even dead).  

Yes, I agree that merit cannot be universalized, and we shouldn`t evaluate only this indicator. But I think that of all the factors (activity, number of posts), the most significant is precisely the merit, since it demonstrates how much this member of the forum is valued by other users. The cons of merit - its subjectivity - becomes its pros, since the main goal of the forum is communication, and it`s never objective.

I don`t think that a significant amount of merit, sent for posts that were written a long time ago, is a shortcoming or flaw in the system (even if these users are no longer as active as they were before). After all, the quality of the written comment doesn`t depend on the activity / inactivity of a member of the forum during a given period of time. Merit`s designed to evaluate a specific post, and not the history of the user as a whole.

[hilariousetc]

got it tnx! made some article about coin.. but i bet its only beneficial to that coin thats why i dont get merit

Keep making those posts and the merit will surely come.

It is indeed simple but that doesn't mean its functional or the most efficient way to distribute merit. Let's give the man some credit for at least presenting something out of his "ass", instead of just whining and trolling like others do.

But if this was the system theymos actually implemented then people would be crying about that and probably much more so than they do with the current system because it is incredibly more difficult to earn merit. People are so against this system they'll propose anything just so they can oppose it in some way.

I agree with all of your insightful responses hilariousetc, yet I would like to elaborate on this one correct point that you made.

Of course, KingZee seems more than capable of earning a lot of merits, so long as he put forth the efforts.  He has decent language skills and decent abilities to connect facts and logic.  Surely part of his problem remains his exaggeration, his whining and his negativism, so surely, this system is designed to make it more difficult for  whiner-tards like that to rank up without first going through the motion of contribution and even a significant amount of contribution before they are going to be able to reach the highest of forum ranks. 

Even though some of us, including yours truly, remains quite unwilling to send any merit to such a member, there are other members who are similarly contrary and similarly jaded who are ready, wiling and able to give merits to such seemingly "undeserving" members.

By the way, even though my current mindset is to block myself from giving merit(s) to KingZee, I am not necessarily stuck in my ways, because if, in the future, I see interesting and or contributory posts coming from him/her, then I am not the kind of person to hold a grudge, unless the negativism is so stuck in my head that I have to see meaningful changes in the consistency of the member to contribute to the forum. 

Rightly so, each of us have differing thresholds in determining whether and how much to send merit to other members, but I do believe that even seemingly fucktard members can concentrate on their efforts and posts to the forum and transform themselves in such a way that members will change their minds about NOT giving merits to them after they begin to read "better" contributory posts from such previously blocked member.

He doesn't even need any additional merits to join the campaign he keeps trying to; all he needs is to make decent posts, but I'm not going to merit people just for complaining at the system, especially when they're suggesting something much worse, but wouldn't have an issue in meriting other posts of his. He's just needlessly whining because he's not automatically a Hero or Legendary and this prevents him earning maximum in most campaigns but is irrelevant to Chipmixer so if I was him I'd just concentrate on my posts rather than anything else.

[Thekool1s]

But if this was the system theymos actually implemented then people would be crying about that and probably much more so than they do with the current system because it is incredibly more difficult to earn merit. People are so against this system they'll propose anything just so they can oppose it in some way.

That is why I said that we can't allow butthurt people to dictate terms but we as a community need to acknowledge that a system can be improved and we should be open to hearing everyone's thought. Just take your community suggestion thread as an example. 1 Merit rule came out of it and I am sure theymos will bring out another membership soon. We can't block out people who are genuinely interested in making the system better.

[JayJuanGee]

It is indeed simple but that doesn't mean its functional or the most efficient way to distribute merit. Let's give the man some credit for at least presenting something out of his "ass", instead of just whining and trolling like others do.

But if this was the system theymos actually implemented then people would be crying about that and probably much more so than they do with the current system because it is incredibly more difficult to earn merit. People are so against this system they'll propose anything just so they can oppose it in some way.

I think that you are giving too much benefit of the doubt to true disgruntledness of whiners.  Just like the BIG blockers.  They whine for the mere sake of whining, and likely based on pretextualized exaggerations.  After one or two substantive responses in which you can point out logic or even that the new merit system is NOT as bad as it is made out to be, they keep up with their bullshit whining about unfairness... rather than figuring out some way to rank up, if their true intention was to rank up (and start to question intentions, too when there is so much whining accompanied by exaggerations).

I agree with all of your insightful responses hilariousetc, yet I would like to elaborate on this one correct point that you made.

Of course, KingZee seems more than capable of earning a lot of merits, so long as he put forth the efforts.  He has decent language skills and decent abilities to connect facts and logic.  Surely part of his problem remains his exaggeration, his whining and his negativism, so surely, this system is designed to make it more difficult for  whiner-tards like that to rank up without first going through the motion of contribution and even a significant amount of contribution before they are going to be able to reach the highest of forum ranks. 

Even though some of us, including yours truly, remains quite unwilling to send any merit to such a member, there are other members who are similarly contrary and similarly jaded who are ready, wiling and able to give merits to such seemingly "undeserving" members.

By the way, even though my current mindset is to block myself from giving merit(s) to KingZee, I am not necessarily stuck in my ways, because if, in the future, I see interesting and or contributory posts coming from him/her, then I am not the kind of person to hold a grudge, unless the negativism is so stuck in my head that I have to see meaningful changes in the consistency of the member to contribute to the forum. 

Rightly so, each of us have differing thresholds in determining whether and how much to send merit to other members, but I do believe that even seemingly fucktard members can concentrate on their efforts and posts to the forum and transform themselves in such a way that members will change their minds about NOT giving merits to them after they begin to read "better" contributory posts from such previously blocked member.

He doesn't even need any additional merits to join the campaign he keeps trying to; all he needs is to make decent posts, but I'm not going to merit people just for complaining at the system, especially when they're suggesting something much worse, but wouldn't have an issue in meriting other posts of his.

Actually, there is likely little to no harm in giving a few charitable merits, here and there, and even making a few mistakes in giving merits when they were barely deserved because ultimately, the good posters are still going to shine through and the disingenuine posters are going to have difficulties keeping up appearances, even if they get a few charitable posts.  And, every once in a while some seemingly undeserving members will start to improve themselves (and they just get through the negative transition and start to meaningfully contribute to the forum by helping other members). 

He's just needlessly whining because he's not automatically a Hero or Legendary and this prevents him earning maximum in most campaigns but is irrelevant to Chipmixer so if I was him I'd just concentrate on my posts rather than anything else.

Actually, there are some members who seem to take this whole ranking up system too personally.  A member can have all kinds of status in the real world and still be a very low ranking member in the forum.  Such discrepancy should not matter too much because forum rank does depend, in part, based on contributing to the forum rather than being a wonderful, credible and even powerful person IRL.  In any regard, sometimes the strength of actual IRL experiences will sometimes show through forum posts, too., and if forum members value those kinds of sharing of information, merits will likely follow.

I agree with you regarding the more elite of the signature campaigns, you cannot just rush and get into them, because the elite ones are at that status kind of by definition and their paying of higher rates allow them to be selective in their choice of new members (even existing members) because they either they pay above and beyond the rest or they have some real world status that also attracts more higher ranked members wanting to join.

[LoyceV]

In another topic, theymos commented on Merit. It's relevant to this topic, so I'll quote it:

Theymos gave me instructions to try and do my best to distribute all of it. I'm doing the best that I can; yet have already had complaints.
~quote shortened~

If they complain about amounts, tell them to complain to me. It's best if sources try to exhaust their source allocations, even if it means giving posts higher amounts than is typical. If you have 150 source merit and you only see 3 merit-worthy posts in a month, then I'd rather you over-give each of them 50 merit than let the merit expire. That way there are more people capable of sending merit, and the "merit economy" is less top-down.

If a DT member tags you for something stupid involving merit (ie. probably anything less than selling merit), then they're not going to be a DT member for much longer.

Aside from that, if people complain about whether things deserve merit at all, then that's something to perhaps think about, but if you conclude that they're wrong, then that's that. You don't need to stress about it or defend yourself constantly. It's conceivable that someday you and I will end up disagreeing too much about this stuff and I'll remove your source status, but it's really not a big deal.
~quote shortened~

I've been ill for a few days, so my sMerit is piling up. Until now, the amount of Merit I gave for a post was more or less related to how much Merit I'd give to posts of similar quality. From now on, I'll give more if my supply is higher.

Note: suchmoon pointed out that theymos said this to a Merit source. I'm not sure if the same applies for other users.

[S_Therapist]

I've been ill for a few days, so my sMerit is piling up. Until now, the amount of Merit I gave for a post was more or less related to how much Merit I'd give to posts of similar quality. From now on, I'll give more if my supply is higher.

I don't know how it will impact the quality. Hope for the best but it will, at least, increase the productivity of sMerit. More people will be able to send sMerit. Thus, people complaining about the number of merit sources (some say we need more merit source) would be happy. Currently, most of the high ranked users don't give a fuck about merit. So, we are missing a lot of airdropped sMerit. If some people have the quality of gaining merit, s/he can probably have the ability to send Merit to qualitative posts. Thus, there will be more people for rewarding merits and as a result, the inequality for which some qualitative user may not get enough merit, will be fulfilled.

[Banemu]

No one cares if they are a Newbie or not. I will merit anyone regardless of their rank if their post is good enough. Actually, I prefer to rank up low-rank because it "helps" them.

The problem is that finding a Newbie that deserves even a single merit is a hard task.

A quick read for you: MYTHBUSTERS: Only high ranked users are rewarded with merits

In my observation, quality post doesn't entirely guarantee a merit at the end of the day especially for the new users. Why I say this is, I have seen good posts/topics that has no merit yet I and so many new users learnt alot from it. It becomes a problem when a new user struggles to contribute in a way and it passes by without any form of recognition (merit) but what hurts the most is when one reads comments that indirectly makes it look like you are try to give quality only because of the merits(of course, the merit is part of the reason) however, there was a good struggle and lots of reading and research in other to produce that quality post that is being tag as 'desperately looking for merits'. That hurts so much.

I have had friends here before me and I am the first that has some how gotten 1 merit. At the end, I look at the whole statement and ask if it is fair. I am beginning to believe that geo location can be an issue as well. As a nigerian, it is rare before you see someone here that has fair and credible knowledge in the cryto space despite the fact we already have investors in bitcoins and it's counterparts. The first day I created a topic, I got so many questions from my friends asking how I got so much information and able to comprehend this forum in general and I tell them to read and patiently observe. Yes, this seems to be the good thing this whole merit system has brought--patience and acquired knowledge over time.

Most of the issues new users have comes from other new users. my short time here, I have also seen shitposts and so many complains that already has a solution. As a newbie, which I am despite having Jr. Rank, i acknowledge that I previously came in here for the bounties/signature campaigns but alone the lines, I have dropped the idea for now because I subconsciously noticed that shouldn't be my focus and I had a long way to go here which is more than sign- campaigns right now.


My point is, I don't see much of an issue with the merit system rather the problem is with the users. I once read a thread that is asking for new merit source but I don't think that will take away the issue of meriting good posts. If we had a clean forum, less shit posts/spam/repetition/ and more innovative contents, meriting won't be so much of an issue because users with smerits will be able to quickly identify good posts and threads as well have the easy desire to go through the forum with being mentally harmed or annoyed by bad contents and overcrowding topics.

[cryptovigi]

...
In my observation, quality post doesn't entirely guarantee a merit at the end of the day especially for the new users. Why I say this is, I have seen good posts/topics that has no merit yet I and so many new users learnt alot from it. It becomes a problem when a new user struggles to contribute in a way and it passes by without any form of recognition (merit)
...

Unfortunately not each good post will bring you a merit, but if you wrote ten of them, the probability that you will be rewarded increases very much ...
This system isn't perfect... It isn't also always fair... sometimes poor posts receive many merits and great ones remain without any reward...
But as long the solution is based on people/users the system would be only as good as people involved in it...

as one said: "A chain is no stronger than its weakest link"

...
but what hurts the most is when one reads comments that indirectly makes it look like you are try to give quality only because of the merits(of course, the merit is part of the reason) however, there was a good struggle and lots of reading and research in other to produce that quality post that is being tag as 'desperately looking for merits'. That hurts so much.
...

Yes, but it's very often true... ;-)
There will be always a spotlight on the Newbies but there's one solution - don't bother and do your job, when you wrote 5 - 10 - 15 good posts - I'm sure that other users stop comment your post that way...

[guybrushthreepwood]

I think the admins should consider making everyone start on an equal playing field with zero merits and then everybody has to earn them from scratch. It's true that many people probably haven't earned their rank and got lucky just by signing up at the right time but then should Newbies be on the same starting point as someone who has been here for years and made a big contribution?

Yeah, Lets reset the whole bitcoin network itself too, I missed out in 2010, I could have mined shit loads of BTCs for myself. These whales don't deserve all those BTCs they mined for merely contributing their 'CPUs and GPUs' to the network, just because they were at the 'right place at the right time' isn't fair. I want a reset...  

I get what you're saying and there's two sides to the argument with pros and cons each way, but this is a little different. I don't think you could ever make everyone happy, though. I'm with you that newcomers should probably just learn to deal with it, but that certainly is easier to say when we're already "legendary" -- uggh, does anyone else cringe typing that out or is it just me? I do think older users do have more of a right with where they are now compared to newbies who come here and just want to get paid so they should probably just learn to just accept with it, but that obviously isn't going to stop people from complaining about it.

Of course, there are some members (such as Satoshi) who are no longer active, but received a lot of merits for historical posts, and even though the vast majority of merits seem to get sent for current active posting, there are some merits that have been distributed to historical contributions and it is likely that such distribution of merit for historical posts will continue to take place (at least on a smaller scale), which also does seem to be helpful to identify respect for some historical contributions or contributors (even if the member might no longer be active - or even dead).  

Satoshi will certainly be the anomaly here, though. I'm sure other more active users and even some of the most prolific would have difficulty having their older posts merited to such an extent. Most will be long buried and forgotten, whereas satoshi's will always have a spotlight on them. Even theymos doesn't post that much compared to the rest of the community but he is the most merited user here according to the merit stats and that's probably because he gets a lot for stickies and announcements of rules changes and so forth -- or people just like to suck up to him lol.

In my observation, quality post doesn't entirely guarantee a merit at the end of the day especially for the new users. Why I say this is, I have seen good posts/topics that has no merit yet I and so many new users learnt alot from it. It becomes a problem when a new user struggles to contribute in a way and it passes by without any form of recognition (merit) but what hurts the most is when one reads comments that indirectly makes it look like you are try to give quality only because of the merits(of course, the merit is part of the reason) however, there was a good struggle and lots of reading and research in other to produce that quality post that is being tag as 'desperately looking for merits'. That hurts so much.

Nobody is guaranteed any merits. You could write a thesis on bitcoin and it might not be merited for all sorts of reasons. The key is to keep making quality posts to increase your chances of receiving hallowed merit, but don't concern yourself with it too much and it will come to you over time I would think.

[Banemu]

I think the admins should consider making everyone start on an equal playing field with zero merits and then everybody has to earn them from scratch. It's true that many people probably haven't earned their rank and got lucky just by signing up at the right time but then should Newbies be on the same starting point as someone who has been here for years and made a big contribution?

I believe this is what you call 'equality'. Having the same condition passed out to everyone. I doubt that would solve or even reduce anything. Even in reality, equality is still a big issue and comes with alot of criticism.

I also believe what the system experienced in your explanation is 'equity' conditions given out differ due to certain situations. I don't reject this. If some users here got merit by virtue of their availability at the right time here, then that is not much of a big deal(though I still see some heros and legendary ranks struggle with rules which is shocking to me), like they are being compensated for their time with the forum as it launches a new era or period. Taking this away or even giving more merits to some users currently would also bring about more issues and incoming new users will still complain about the unfairness of the system.

Generally, the system/rules WOULD NOT always suit everyone and every condition. However, if its positive purpose is achieved to the majority then I consider it as a success.

Satoshi will certainly be the anomaly here, though. I'm sure other more active users and even some of the most prolific would have difficulty having their older posts merited to such an extent. Most will be long buried and forgotten, whereas satoshi's will always have a spotlight on them. Even theymos doesn't post that much compared to the rest of the community but he is the most merited user here according to the merit stats and that's probably because he gets a lot for stickies and announcements of rules changes and so forth -- or people just like to suck up to him lol.

I don't feel very comfortable with this..yes, Satoshi is a recognized figure here and otherwise. His posts are historic and has some form of direction and inspiration but continual meriting such posts doesn't seem very ideal to me. Reflecting on the past is good not continual compensation rather that should be used to focus on the present. This doesn't mean value in satoshi's post or works will reduce neither will meriting it increase its value anymore than it is.

You could write a thesis on bitcoin and it might not be merited for all sorts of reasons.

This is one of the reasons spamming/plagiarism/repetition is still a major issue the forum has to always combat. In as much as we all don't want to entirely admit it, we humans, always want recognition almost immediately at all point if possible. Yes, there are lazy users that has no interests in contributing positive but only after what the he/she can take from the system yet, there are still that few that don't mind contributing as long as the will get the recognition.

Now and then, I see posts of existing users on parma-ban for mostly plagiarism and I wonder if these long term users never read the rules or the chose to ignore and why... Some part of me feels this may be the reason coupled with other factors like the individual just being lazy. I know we can't go all a sore of meriting all quality posts and all that but we can always make efforts noticed even through our comments. I know alot of new users appreciates when hero/lengendary users comment and share ideas relating to the new user's quality post. It gives feelings that almost competes with the feeling that comes with a merit.

[S_Therapist]

All things considered, this system is pretty cool. It is a hassle to have to go to a separate page to give points to a post - is it possible to implement this within the thread itself?

I don't think it's a good idea. Also, I think it was discussed previously. Initailly the system was that like you are asking.
Imagine, you are observing a thread and got one post to send merit and clicked. You are being left the thread. It's boring. It's better to open a new tab and merit them. You don't have to quit the thread. Isn't it better?

And here it is:

I already don't like the way clicking on +merit takes you away from the thread.  Can you please have it open in a new window?

[Thekool1s]

but that obviously isn't going to stop people from complaining about it.

Hey if they come here just to whine about the system then fk them! But if they Present ideas or solutions to the "problem" they think there is, I will gladly hear them out.

newbies who come here and just want to get paid

Exactly! People weren't making money back in the day through signature campaigns. I remember there was only one campaign of primedice. People used to spam more than 100 posts per week to get their 0.25 BTC. People hardly cared about the signature campaigns as there were far better ways to make money by offering different services. I don't know why people have this mindset of making "Ez" money by posting garbage which isn't true btw If you post garbage for a few weeks you won't get accepted into a decent campaign as far as I know. But these guys think its otherwise. I mean look at how many users got blacklisted in SMAS. Wish Lauda got back to the "managing" business. He was doing a fantastic job if you ask me.

uggh, does anyone else cringe typing that out or is it just me?

Lol, Each time I read or type the word Legend wait for it "dary". This Dude comes to my mind.

Satoshi will certainly be the anomaly here, though. I'm sure other more active users and even some of the most prolific would have difficulty having their older posts merited to such an extent. Most will be long buried and forgotten, whereas satoshi's will always have a spotlight on them. Even theymos doesn't post that much compared to the rest of the community but he is the most merited user here according to the merit stats and that's probably because he gets a lot for stickies and announcements of rules changes and so forth -- or people just like to suck up to him lol.

Hmm interesting. It would be interesting to find out what is the average time for a post to get 'merited' and what's the chance of getting 'merited' after that average time has passed out. Obviously this stat will vary to different boards but still would be interesting. I hope DdmrDdmr can figure something out for this.

Imagine, you are observing a thread and got one post to send merit and clicked. You are being left the thread. It's boring. It's better to open a new tab and merit them. You don't have to quit the thread. Isn't it better?

You got that wrong, that's not what he suggested. He is asking for sort of a small "div" to appear when he clicks the merit button and send merit directly from the same page, instead go going on a separate page to merit the user. Just imagine reddit opened a new tab each time a user had to upvote or downvote a post.

[Direwolve735]

Unfortunately not each good post will bring you a merit, but if you wrote ten of them, the probability that you will be rewarded increases very much ...
This system isn't perfect... It isn't also always fair... sometimes poor posts receive many merits and great ones remain without any reward...

When I hear someone declare that several good posts remain ignored and unrewarded, I immediately want to ask the question: what time frame are you talking about? If you`ve written a good post, it doesn`t mean it`ll immediately receive a merit. And don`t wait for it. Sometimes those posts are rewarded with merit, which, as it seems to you, have already been lost on the previous topic pages. But someone may notice and appreciate it. Don`t forget that merit is a completely subjective indicator. Your post can be differently evaluated by various people. And maybe it won`t receive merits immediately, but after some time. Every good statement deserves a merit. And your posts have no expiration date. Someone might like your other assertion and open your post history and stumble upon the observation you thought went unnoticed. Therefore, if someone hasn`t receive a merit within the first minutes after writing a comment, it doesn`t mean his post will never be rewarded.

[DdmrDdmr]

<…>

Just this week I was going over this question on a PM basis, and I drew up some summarized information from a global perspective on the gap between the moment you publish a post, and the moment it receives sMerit. This is a summary:

-   56% of sMerit TXs go to posts created within 24h (13,73% within the first hour, 10,05% within the second hour, and so on).
-   8,09% of sMerit TXs merit posts on the second day.
-   4,38% of sMerit TXs merit posts on the third day.
-   2,79% of sMerit TXs merit posts on the fourth day.
-   2,10% of sMerit TXs merit posts on the fifth day.
-   1,78% of sMerit TXs merit posts on the sixth day.
-   1,34% of sMerit TXs merit posts on the seventh day.
-   5,61% of sMerit TXs merit posts during the second week.
-   3,05% of sMerit TXs merit posts during the third week.
-   2,03% of sMerit TXs merit posts during the fourth week.
-   12,33% of sMerit TXs merit posts after fourth weeks (likely outliers related to posts by @Theymos, @Satoshi, merit abuse cover-ups, and so on).

The information above is derived from a post I created at the end of May 2018 (see Forum Merited Messages- Does size count?). Things may have shifted a bit since then, but it does give us a reference to what you were talking about.

[Direwolve735]

<…>

Just this week I was going over this question on a PM basis, and I drew up some summarized information from a global perspective on the gap between the moment you publish a post, and the moment it receives sMerit. This is a summary:

-   56% of sMerit TXs go to posts created within 24h (13,73% within the first hour, 10,05% within the second hour, and so on).
-   8,09% of sMerit TXs merit posts on the second day.
-   4,38% of sMerit TXs merit posts on the third day.
-   2,79% of sMerit TXs merit posts on the fourth day.
-   2,10% of sMerit TXs merit posts on the fifth day.
-   1,78% of sMerit TXs merit posts on the sixth day.
-   1,34% of sMerit TXs merit posts on the seventh day.
-   5,61% of sMerit TXs merit posts during the second week.
-   3,05% of sMerit TXs merit posts during the third week.
-   2,03% of sMerit TXs merit posts during the fourth week.
-   12,33% of sMerit TXs merit posts after fourth weeks (likely outliers related to posts by @Theymos, @Satoshi, merit abuse cover-ups, and so on).

The information above is derived from a post I created at the end of May 2018 (see Forum Merited Messages- Does size count?). Things may have shifted a bit since then, but it does give us a reference to what you were talking about.

Yes, your statistics confirm my words. And if we look at "sMerit TXs merit posts after fourth weeks" we can see a fairly large percentage. Analyzing your data, the question may arise: why do the numbers go from larger to smaller and again to larger? I think this is due to the emergence of a huge number of new topics. Few people go further than the first page to participate in the discussion. Many folks open the newly created topic, in which there are still not many replies (thus increasing the chance that their message will be noticed) and discuss it there. After 2-3 days, and even more so a week, such “one-day threads” are lost and replaced with new ones.

But there`re also more serious discussions that last not a day or two, and in which you can find many worthy posts. Most often, such topics are joined by high rank members of the forum. Sometimes there`s a pause in such a discourse, but if the topic is relevant and of current interest, the dialogue continues, sowing the field to get more merits.