Merit is the best thing that happened to new users

[lok8nusa]

The world for a bucket of sMerit.

Not that I was looking before, but I've seen more cogent, rational posting on this forum today than in the entire rest of my term of membership. If I had sMerit, I would have merited more than I did.

Very short view: some improvement.

[suchmoon]

The reason I don't understand how this stops account farmers, is consider this:

Assume an account farmer with an extremely large number of accounts has roughly the same number of mean Merits per post as a normal user.
If he gets 100 Merits, he also gets 50 sMerits. He then redistributes these 50 sMerits amongst his accounts. Assuming he has planned this well, he should be discreet about it, and in the end he'll get 25 more sMerits to distribute.

Once you calculate the entire thing, you realize that for every Merit the account farmer receives, he gets close to a total of two Merits across his entire group of accounts, once you account for sMerits.

Counterargument:

Also it will be pretty easy to detect such collusion as everyone can see who you give your merit points to.

I think this might just be the Toupee Fallacy.
You only ever notice that bad colluders are performing collusion, so you assume that everyone who colludes will be readily noticeable.
When collusion goes well, and with the merit system, I think it might be easy to hide, you will not notice it... and hence assume that the only people who collude, are the ones who obviously collude.

So in the end, account farmers get twice the merit across their accounts for the same quality of posts.... which is an issue, but I guess it's not the worst.

You're answering your own question up there. In the olden days, an enterprising account farmer could rank-up ALL of their accounts by posting useless crap with very little effort. Create 10 accounts and gain 10x more rank-power than a comparable single-account user.

Now they can only DOUBLE their merits (e.g. rank-up up to two accounts at the same pace) compared to an otherwise identical single-account user. And it would require some extra effort to launder those merits without getting caught.

It won't solve the problem completely but it's a significant hurdle for farmers.

[FrueGreads]

You seem to have gathered all the positive aspects of the merit system, and if it works, we will get exactly what you have described, and that is a good thing. I do have one concern about the system, that I have already posted in the "Merit & new rank requirements" thread.

Since you decided to use your thread to make a comment on some popular concerns, I will leave a link to my post and I hope I can hear your opinion about it, because my concern is not on your list.

Like I said in that post (link bellow), I do believe that this system will give us the ability to judge content, and that is a good thing, but since it's hard to get sMerit points to spend, we might lose the ability to give Merit over time. Even if we don't lose that ability, since we get half the Merit we receive as sMerit, we might end up "censuring" some content.

I will try to explain this part better, so I don't get misinterpreted:

If I give merit to you, that means that I like what you wrote, and this probably means that we are similar somehow. Now you have more sMerit to spend, and since we probably have a few things in common, chances are that you will give merit so something that I also like. Even without knowing it, we are probably promoting similar content. I don't think this is a stupid thought, and part of the "matchmaking systems", and "content suggestions" from google, facebook etc, are based on this principle (people like similar things, and they end up rating similar things the same way, and you can match them that way).

So this leads to the problem I've mentioned. If we have a small number of merit sources, and if a user doesn't have a chance to get sMerit by himself, in order to keep promoting the content he likes, we might end up "killing" diversity without even knowing it.

Don't know if I was clear with my thoughts, and if this makes any sense to you, but I would like to hear your opinion about it.

Here is the link to the post I've mentioned (with a few suggestions to minimize the problem I've mentioned):
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=2818350.msg28980629#msg28980629

[Jaya912]

For the most part I happen to agree with your long term conclusions.  If I had any Smerit I would give it to you.  The implementation was a bit faulty cause many members got screwed during the switch.  Some were 2 activities away from a new rank that has been here 6 months and is now the equivalent of someone who just got the same rank yesterday.  My personal feeling is that for something this drastic just give everyone the next rank and I think most people would have been fine with the change.  Doing it this way feels like a kick to the teeth to the people who played by the previous rules.

 

well, actually i am not good poster so this merit system will put me in problem anyway. but in other case, i agree this system can kill spammer from their non quality post that can make this forum useless. so i think this good system for every member in this forum to learn how to make high quality post.

however, i also agree with vegita, the merit amount which was credit to the account should be not the same for new rank member who have just 60 activity and old member rank who have 119 activity. i think it will be better if the merit of old member rank higher than new member rank.

i am sorry for my bad english.
thanks

[radeone]

I just logged back on and now I see this. Where's the link so I can figure out what the deal is with these merit points?

[suchmoon]

I just logged back on and now I see this. Where's the link so I can figure out what the deal is with these merit points?

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=2818350.0

[engrdaver]

I agree. At least now there will be a filtering system that will separate the serious posters from the rest. When I started recently, I just posted away. But reading through the posts made me realize that there are those that are really serious with what they do. Having this merit point system will greatly affect the quality of posts people will be sharing.

[Cot]

decided to change the rating system? yes, the time has come, only it was necessary to warn all forum participants about this, so that everyone was ready. and so everything was done on the eve of January 20 - the day of recounting the ranks...

[lok8nusa]

You know, I see a direct correlation betwixt hashpower and Merit.

Posting replies is the equivalent to mining BTC with a CPU. It does something, but not much.
Creating original posts of quality is equivalent to mining with current generation gear.


I'm sure there's an analogy for the traders and speculators, too.

[shushanika]

What an awesome post by a new member and it is nice to see the encouragement he got from other senior members. This is how things should go on here. Instead of complaining about the demerits of the new system, we should try to improve our skills. It would be nice to see who among the newbies and junior member is first to reach higher rank like Hero. May be there are more changes to this system as well. I am in for this and will try to be on topic and detailed with my posts hereafter.

[kaar]

You seem to have gathered all the positive aspects of the merit system, and if it works, we will get exactly what you have described, and that is a good thing. I do have one concern about the system, that I have already posted in the "Merit & new rank requirements" thread.

Since you decided to use your thread to make a comment on some popular concerns, I will leave a link to my post and I hope I can hear your opinion about it, because my concern is not on your list.

Like I said in that post (link bellow), I do believe that this system will give us the ability to judge content, and that is a good thing, but since it's hard to get sMerit points to spend, we might lose the ability to give Merit over time. Even if we don't lose that ability, since we get half the Merit we receive as sMerit, we might end up "censuring" some content.

I will try to explain this part better, so I don't get misinterpreted:

If I give merit to you, that means that I like what you wrote, and this probably means that we are similar somehow. Now you have more sMerit to spend, and since we probably have a few things in common, chances are that you will give merit so something that I also like. Even without knowing it, we are probably promoting similar content. I don't think this is a stupid thought, and part of the "matchmaking systems", and "content suggestions" from google, facebook etc, are based on this principle (people like similar things, and they end up rating similar things the same way, and you can match them that way).

So this leads to the problem I've mentioned. If we have a small number of merit sources, and if a user doesn't have a chance to get sMerit by himself, in order to keep promoting the content he likes, we might end up "killing" diversity without even knowing it.

Don't know if I was clear with my thoughts, and if this makes any sense to you, but I would like to hear your opinion about it.

Here is the link to the post I've mentioned (with a few suggestions to minimize the problem I've mentioned):
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=2818350.msg28980629#msg28980629

This is a very good point which I didn't consider. While I wish that a well written post would get merit from people even if they disagree, I agree that this usually not the case. Going against the consensus is never easy, but from my (relatively short) experience here, the forum is pretty diverse. Yes there are posts, usually in the technical board, that are flamed by pretty much all senior members. Those posts though usually contain wrong facts or are simply just nonsense.

About your solutions, the first one is pretty unrealistic as this will create a total mess (cheating the votes will be a pretty easy task). The second kinda miss the purpose of the merit system as people will still be able to farm accounts, it will just take them longer to advance in ranks. Your third idea could have been great in another forum, but if implemented here people will simply buy sMerits to promote their accounts as this is a probably good investments (even now people already buy merits, imagine how many would if it becomes legal).

I honestly think that this problem can be solved (atleast partially) with a good selection of sources. If there is good diversity among the sources, the diversity of the forum would not be affected too much.

[FrueGreads]

Yes, maybe it will work. I read a post where theymos said that he wouldn't be surprised if there were 100-200 merit sources in a year from now.
With a lot of good sources maybe we will not face this problem, or maybe we will without even knowing it because there won't be any signs. It's very easy for these things to become popularity contests, and I never was fond of those (damn I don't even have a facebook account).

I like hearing different opinions, and I really like to lose arguments, because it means that I've actually learned something from it, and that's why I think diversity is important and I presented this concern.

We do have 49 merit sources now, and there are also some users trying to make good use of the sMerit they now have (link bellow).
Maybe this will work, let's give it time.

(The user I've mentioned)
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=2819141.0

[coloseum]

~

I wonder whether will abusement of merit sources in the near future. How to screen or control those merit sources to do the right thing, in terms of giving away sMerits (sendable Merits) to others?
In the future, I guess there will be huge demand of sMerits for ranking up from lower-ranked users. Those demands might lead to negative effects and merit sources should be controlled as strict as possible.

In addition, there is also a cycle of Merits-sMerits in the forum, from users to users. It might be a big problem, too. For example, I can send my 10 sMerits to my friend, then he will get 5 sMerits to send them back to my account. In my turn, I will send those 5 sMerits to other friends, who will send back 2 sMerits to my account again. For those two two-side rounds, my account will get 7 more Merits. I can even get more than 7 if repeating the process with more accounts. How to control the negative sending/ receiving behaviours?

[Fondago]

I do not agree with № 1. I know several people who have studied the world of crypto currency, started working on exchanges, traded and held, but at the same time created their accounts on the forum much later, and they write their posts much more interesting and useful than many old men (this results in your No. 2 - about useful posts). At the same time, nobody will give their s-merit, no matter how beautifully you write. This results in your №4, where you write that it's only better for bounty members. Many campaigns make stricter conditions where you need to have a rank on the forum, not lower than Full Member. A person who is not a newbie on theme of crypto currency and understands this well, puts his earned money into some currency, but already has no opportunity to participate in the bounty because hi have small rank on the forum.

I am not criticizing you in any way, you wrote a very interesting post in a positive way, which now can help not to panic to many people.

With point number 3, I fully agree. Sometimes it is very difficult to find from the whole topic, really useful information, as many begin to deviate from the topic. 

[The Cryptoclast]

I agree on this point, the only real pity is that the merit system has not been implemented already a year ago, before the demographic explosion of the the alts accounts - I guess for reasons of bounties. To procrastinate further the adoption of this necessary measure could have been fatal for the forum.
On the other side, if I may joke on that, merit the worse thing that happened to old high ranked users who were about to rank up

[djangocoin]

Honestly am not sure if i agree with this or not.. i think a lot of new users (almost all) would disagree with you, but i gave you merit for the good write up on the topic

[FrueGreads]

~

I wonder whether will abusement of merit sources in the near future. How to screen or control those merit sources to do the right thing, in terms of giving away sMerits (sendable Merits) to others?
In the future, I guess there will be huge demand of sMerits for ranking up from lower-ranked users. Those demands might lead to negative effects and merit sources should be controlled as strict as possible.

I think we need to trust the mods for doing this control. Don't forget we don't have those many merit sources. Right now we only have 57 so it's easy to keep an eye on them (you can see that in the merit stats https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=merit;stats). Of course that few merit sources could be a problem in my opinion, for the reasons I've mentioned.

In addition, there is also a cycle of Merits-sMerits in the forum, from users to users. It might be a big problem, too. For example, I can send my 10 sMerits to my friend, then he will get 5 sMerits to send them back to my account. In my turn, I will send those 5 sMerits to other friends, who will send back 2 sMerits to my account again. For those two two-side rounds, my account will get 7 more Merits. I can even get more than 7 if repeating the process with more accounts. How to control the negative sending/ receiving behaviours?

This will not be a problem. Don't forget that you can only spend half the merit you received. So in your example, after you've sent 10 merits, that user can only send 5 back, and you now can only spend 2 more (since you received 2.5, and you can only send round numbers). So you can't cycle.

[Jet Cash]

 there are also some users trying to make good use of the sMerit they now have (link bellow).
Maybe this will work, let's give it time.

I don't believe that that is a good use of sMerit, all it does is highlight the fact that posts are getting swamped, and the ony way to fix that is through moderation.

[FrueGreads]

 there are also some users trying to make good use of the sMerit they now have (link bellow).
Maybe this will work, let's give it time.

I don't believe that that is a good use of sMerit, all it does is highlight the fact that posts are getting swamped, and the ony way to fix that is through moderation.

But what would you suggest? Moderators deleting the supposed useless posts and threads? I agree that it would probably be an easy decision in some cases, but this could be easily compared, or at least confused, with censorship. Mods already created the serious discussion board, and now they can try to promote a "subjective metric" (because it's still based on opinion, but there is no way to do it in any other way) on how good or valuable are the users contributions in terms of contents to this forum.

[cramcram21]

Great post I have been really not in favor in this merit system when I first saw it but when I read something about it I found out that this is a really good thing for all of us,
For all of the forum users this would really lessen those spammer,account farmers and other's who are abusing the forum.
These would make the forum much more informative I was here because one of my friends told me about this forum that I could learn somethings about crypto currencies by this forum,
And I learn how to trade what to do in crypto's and learn to be patient.