The Merit System - Why it is fundamentally flawed

[Nerkata]

Hey everyone,

before I get to the point and explain my case let me please introduce myself. I'm a mid 20s guy who has been a long time lurker in this forum. In the last year I tried to learn as much about the blockchain technology as possible and that lead me to this forum and to cryptocurrencies in general. I've been a very sceptical voice when it comes to investing (aka speculating) in cryptocurrencies and ICOs, because I truly believe that 90% of the projects out there are just pipedreams trying to utilize blockchain in a project that doesn't need the technology in the first place.

Why the Merit System is fundamentally flawed

The merit system itself is highly controversial. It is dividing this forum into different groups. The main premise of the Merit system may be good. Users get rewarded for high quality content. And by gaining merit they are "promoted" and can hand out merit themselves. Now in theory that's a great system and we have seen similar systems used in other forums as well.

The main problem with the whole premise is that in this forum we have a financial incentive to NOT give Merit to new users and rather sell Merit or exchange it with other accounts. Financial incentive you ask? Yes! Signature campaigns in bounties are up to date the majority allocation of a bounty campaign. So why should I increase the competition for stakes in a bounty campaign by upvoting new users?

Furthermore the whole system creates a massive gatekeeper problem. Why should only high-ranking users decide who gets points? There are so many alternative systems better equipped to deal with this problem. One alternative could be giving accounts older than 3 months (or 6 months) one Merit to give away each day. This forum is growing every day and very often people who answer "newbie" questions are doing as much good work as someone who explains a highly technical question. It's just helping on a different level.

So to close my argument there are several points which make the Merit System fundamentally flawed:

• Financial incentives to not promote new members
• Financial incentives to sell or swap Merit
• Gatekeeping
• A lack of rewards for users answering "newb" questions

Thank you very much!

I'm looking forward to hearing your opinion on this matter.

[1715408572]

1715408572

[1715408572]

1715408572

[Jet Cash]

There are a number of flaws in your post.

We aren't all members of sig campaigns, and there is no incentive for me to hold back with my sMerit.

Abusers of the merit system could be fined with negative merit ( say -50) that would be a disincentive to sell merit ( should be a banning offence imho ), ot to abuse the system.

Some of us try to ( and have ) awarded our sMerit to post in the beginners forum.

Gatekeeping is the main purpose of the merit system. Without making good posts, the gate to higher ranks should be kept closed.

Spamming could be reduced if new members had to make their first posts on an introductory board, and tell us a bit about themselves.

[Nerkata]

Abusers of the merit system could be fined with negative merit ( say -50) that would be a disincentive to sell merit ( should be a banning offence imho ), ot to abuse the system.

Some of us try to ( and have ) awarded our sMerit to post in the beginners forum.

Gatekeeping is the main purpose of the merit system. Without making good posts, the gate to higher ranks should be kept closed.

Spamming could be reduced if new members had to make their first posts on an introductory board, and tell us a bit about themselves.

Thank you for your response and I agree with you in some of your points. An introductory post would be great and would lead to a better picture "who" is talking there and what his/her goal is on this forum.

But I disagree with the gatekeeping argument. Why should only a few decide which content is good and which is "not worthy enough". Why not giving out a portion of Merit to every account older than 3-6 months and let the masses decide?

[tranthidung]

Exactly! The forum users has been and will be divided into two categories. One higher-category includes contributive users, whom usually/ always write constructive, high quality threads to contribute to the forum with meaningful discussion. The other one, called lower-category includes the rest of users, whom usually spam the forum with tons of shitty, non-sense (one word, one line, etc) posts. Their posts covered high quality posts, consequently they need to be burried with merit system if they won't change.

It is dividing this forum into different groups.

Due to the reasons I stated above, merit system is, has been and will be a good system to control spammers, keep them in lower ranks in the forum (most of spammers might be stucked forever).

The main premise of the Merit system may be good.

Wrong! Newcomers don't have chance to compete with those ones, not only because merits but also due to newcomers don't have as good skills, knowledge and experience as high rank users. Older users (good ones) will help newcomers (good ones); newcomers will rank up but most of them will never be able to compete with older users. That's the fact

Yes! Signature campaigns in bounties are up to date the majority allocation of a bounty campaign. So why should I increase the competition for stakes in a bounty campaign by upvoting new users?

No, actually not. There are lots of normal users (not merit sources) who are readily to give their sMerits away (by which receivers will get both Merits and sMerits).
But please note important point, those users only (remember only) send their sMerits away if they feel happy, satisfied with posts (constructive, creative, high quality ones) they read.
They will never give their sMerits away for spammers, for shitty posts, spam topics.

Furthermore the whole system creates a massive gatekeeper problem.

Merit system has both negative and positive effects. However, in general this one is good for the forum and make the forum better. It has massively shown great impacts on users, so it has almost met original and basic objectives of merit system.

It has positives and negatives. Sadly the biggest farmers are the ones that will find it easier to abuse whilst genuine users with just one account will struggle or at least take some time to achieve, though on the flip side it opens the farmers up to being spotted as many farmers won't be able to resist leaving themselves merit because it's so hard to get in naturally.

Conclusion, in merit system I believe and will support it.

[Jet Cash]

But I disagree with the gatekeeping argument. Why should only a few decide which content is good and which is "not worthy enough". Why not giving out a portion of Merit to every account older than 3-6 months and let the masses decide?

Because most of the masses are spamming nuisances, and they are the reason the merit system was introduced.

The "few" who decide which content is good, are the ones that the community has decided are merit worthy, and that isn't just the "high ranking".

[joniboini]

But I disagree with the gatekeeping argument. Why should only a few decide which content is good and which is "not worthy enough". Why not giving out a portion of Merit to every account older than 3-6 months and let the masses decide?

I wanted to clarify some issue here. I believe when you said "few", what you meant by that is the smerit sources right?
As far as I understand, smerit sources should be limited to some qualified users that have the ability to judge whether a post has a quality or not. Without this, then the entire system won't work as spammers, account farmers, and etc can easily give merit to their "own" account.

You can apply to be the merit sources if you wanted to. No exclusivity here.

[Alone055]

The merit system itself is highly controversial.

Nothing in the world is controversial by itself, but people make controversies about the things that bother them I guess. That is what happened with Merit System here.

It is dividing this forum into different groups.

That's true. Shitposters and quality posters are separated by the system. People without any Merits are obviously not contributors and that is how it has divided the forum IMO.

The main problem with the whole premise is that in this forum we have a financial incentive to NOT give Merit to new users and rather sell Merit or exchange it with other accounts.

That is not a valid point at all. An ordinary user cannot generate Merits, and thus they will run out of sMerits if they sell or trade them. And then they will be out of business eventually.
And, people give Merits only to quality posts regardless the rank of the posters.

Furthermore the whole system creates a massive gatekeeper problem. Why should only high-ranking users decide who gets points?

Who in the world said that only the high-ranked users decide who gets points? Any user having any rank is the owner of its decisions as long as he/she carries sMerits. If you have Merits, it is you who decides where to give them away.

There are so many alternative systems better equipped to deal with this problem. One alternative could be giving accounts older than 3 months (or 6 months) one Merit to give away each day.

What will be the use of it then if an account older than 3 or 6 months starts getting Merits everyday and ranks up eventually after reaching the point required. That is how the forum was working before with Activity system and that is why Merit system has been implemented so that no one ranks up automatically, without making any efforts.

This forum is growing every day and very often people who answer "newbie" questions are doing as much good work as someone who explains a highly technical question. It's just helping on a different level.

I don't think it depends on the type of answer or question, but it is more about the quality of what you are writing. Someone writing shit on a technical discussion would get the same response which someone writing non-constructive posts in beginners section get. If you make efforts on answering a question no matter on what topic it is based, you will surely get rewarded for it, if it is spotted. And making no efforts in posting even in technical threads would earn you nothing.

[speem28]

But I disagree with the gatekeeping argument. Why should only a few decide which content is good and which is "not worthy enough". Why not giving out a portion of Merit to every account older than 3-6 months and let the masses decide?

I wanted to clarify some issue here. I believe when you said "few", what you meant by that is the smerit sources right?
As far as I understand, smerit sources should be limited to some qualified users that have the ability to judge whether a post has a quality or not. Without this, then the entire system won't work as spammers, account farmers, and etc can easily give merit to their "own" account.

You can apply to be the merit sources if you wanted to. No exclusivity here.

He is not only talking about the smerit sources, members who has a lot of sMerits are also included in that "few". I think what the OP is trying to point out is the inability of lower ranks to give merit to posts that are worthy of getting merit. They can't send merits unless they will receive some from others members, but that should not be a problem if they have the ability to post a helpful and informative one.

[Nerkata]

But I disagree with the gatekeeping argument. Why should only a few decide which content is good and which is "not worthy enough". Why not giving out a portion of Merit to every account older than 3-6 months and let the masses decide?

I wanted to clarify some issue here. I believe when you said "few", what you meant by that is the smerit sources right?
As far as I understand, smerit sources should be limited to some qualified users that have the ability to judge whether a post has a quality or not. Without this, then the entire system won't work as spammers, account farmers, and etc can easily give merit to their "own" account.

You can apply to be the merit sources if you wanted to. No exclusivity here.

He is not only talking about the smerit sources, members who has a lot of sMerits are also included in that "few". I think what the OP is trying to point out is the inability of lower ranks to give merit to posts that are worthy of getting merit. They can't send merits unless they will receive some from others members, but that should not be a problem if they have the ability to post a helpful and informative one.

Thanks for explaining it so well. Was struggling to put it into words. Very often I want to "merit" posters for helping me or just asking a very thoughtful questions in general. But because I "own" no merit to grant to other people, these quality posts will just drown in an ocean full of spam. It is a shame.

[hilariousetc]

Financial incentives to not promote new members

I really doubt this comes into the mind of most people. Most higher ranked accounts care little to nothing about merit. It is useless for me to hoard it. I would rather give it out to those that deserved it and help reward quality contributions thus cleaning up the forum in the process.

Financial incentives to sell or swap Merit

Anyone caught selling merit will have their reputations ruined by negative feedback. No respectable member is likely to bother engaging in sales.

Gatekeeping

Only trusted users can really be trusted to be a merit source and hand it out en mass. If we just gave it out to everybody and anybody then people would just exploit it which defeats the purpose. You suggested that every account over 3 months gets a merit point every day but people would just create hundreds of accounts, wait 3 months, then distribute the merit between their accounts or sell them on themselves.

A lack of rewards for users answering "newb" questions

People shouldn't be getting merit for the same old newb questions that have been asked and answered hundreds of times before. Most info can be found by searching or reading the stickies anyway which they often don't do.

[malikusama]

Your first paragraph is not related to your topic and post.

The main problem with the whole premise is that in this forum we have a financial incentive to NOT give Merit to new users

Unfortunately jealousy is natural but unprofessional, and yes may be some users on this forum are doing exactly what you are stating but you can't deny that majority of the users are using their power in right direction.
If every member on this forum have the same negative mentality to restrict new users on lower rank then how "nullius" earned merits more than 500?

Financial incentives to sell or swap Merit

Users who are involved in these type of activities are being tagged with negative trust by DT members after getting caught.

Why should only high-ranking users decide who gets points?

So you believe a new member with just few posts and activities would be able to judge quality posts on this forum?, Simply illogical.

A lack of rewards for users answering "newb" questions

Not lack of rewards, i guess lack of skills of the user who is answering the questions.
A good answer which covers all the aspects of question in a precise way would never stay unrewarded.