Merit is a proof of brain concept

[Jet Cash]

I've read so many threads and posts about merit, and I've come to realise that the real problem with the merit system is that it rewards meritorious posters. Post count is just a simple count of the number of posts made, regardless of content or benefit to forum members. Activity is a limiter to control the rewards for over-active posters. Trust is a comment on trading morality, and the honesty of a member. Merit is a reflection of the mental ability of the poster, and his willingness to follow community guidelines on posting. If you don't have the ability or intelligence to construct useful posts, then of course you will see merit as discriminating against you. The sensible member will endeavour to develop his abilities to take advantage of the verdant pastures that surround the cesspit.

It isn't too difficult to improve your posting skills. The first task is to read the rules, and to read the thread before you post in it. The second task is to ensure that your post can be understood by your readers. This means you should check for typing errors and misspellings before you hit post. If English isn't your first language, then try to ensure that your sentence structure follows the rules of English, and isn't just a word translation of your local language.

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[mdayonliner]

I see a lot of posts in meta section moaning for removing merit or merit is not fear etc etc. Seems like they are trying to say, receiving merit is Impossible. Sure it's not easy but it not impossible, it's just difficult IMO. Guess what(!), it was suppose to be difficult or spammers would be receiving it very easily with their one line/ few words "thank you", "very good project" etc. type of posts. It would not have any difference with activity count.

Yes, your realisations make sense:
1. Activities to control number of posts
2. Trust is representing morality/ethics
3. Merit is a reflection of intellectual presentation

PS: I am having a feeling... I guess I exchanged slimier opinion in another topic long ago, not sure.
 

[hilariousetc]

Proof of effort.

I see a lot of posts in meta section moaning for removing merit or merit is not fear etc etc. Seems like they are trying to say, receiving merit is Impossible. Sure it's not easy but it not impossible, it's just difficult IMO. Guess what(!), it was suppose to be difficult or spammers would be receiving it very easily with their one line/ few words "thank you", "very good project" etc. type of posts. It would not have any difference with activity count.

Well it's probably almost impossible to achieve a high rank if you can't speak English or articulate yourself very well. People got used to just being able to rise through the ranks by merely posting whatever generic posts they could be bothered making over time but that was the problem. You could literally have as many Hero accounts as you wanted just by logging in once a day to claim a giveaway and 1.4 years later you'd have an arsenal of Hero accounts farmed to do what you want with. Now this isn't the case. Not only will you have to put effort into your posts they also have to stand out enough to be merited which isn't as easy as it sounds.

[Jet Cash]

First off - apologies for starting yet another merit thread, and I'll explain my reason for starting it.

I think we are entering a period of great financial and economic change, and I would like to be able to discuss this as the events start to unfold. Bitcoin Talk is probably the best place to do this, because of its associations with Bitcoin and crypto-currencies. Without a substantial improvement to the boards, BT is unlikely to attract many of the significant players in the emerging markets. I would like to try to help achieve this improvement, but I'm not sure of the best way to do this. I try to award merits to encourage members to prepare for this future, but I seem to find more members to ignore, than to award with merit. I've attempted to help posters to improve their communication skills in English, but I have had very limited success with this.

I have come to the conclusion that many posters have no interest in the stability of the forum, or in trying to improve their earning potential, and at some stage the forum will have to lose them. This can be done by banning them, removing their earnings through the board, or by educating them. I started this thread in the hope that some of the people complaining about the merit system will realise that their complaints just highlights their own weaknesses and inabilities, I had hoped that we could help a few of the new members to build their skills and knowledge, but you can't help people who won't help themselves.

[abiiiii]

   Higher ranking users kept saying we should shut up and stop ranting about the merit system but they did not experience it in the first place. Sure, having a merit system may reflect on the capability of a user to create useful posts, but how about the responsibility of those who own sMerit? Who has the eagerness to read replies in a thread and give merit? It's actually too hard and a matter of luck. No matter how you construct posts, if no one who has sMerit will recognize it, you can't get one.

[Talk merit]

OK - I'll be brutally frank. The responsibility of the senior members is to help to rebuild the forum, and pull it out of the cesspit that it was becoming. I understand that there are over 4.000 new registrations every day, our responsibility is to help prevent most of them from polluting the boards, and covering the good posts by potentially valuable members with weeds and rubbish.

We don't have any responsibility to any new members, but we may choose to help those who are interested in the forum and in crypto. As a new member, your responsibility is to respect the forum, and to respect the members who have spent many years in helping to build it. Put aside your greed, and your desire to freeload on our efforts, and stop and think what you can offer to the community.

[seoincorporation]

  Higher ranking users kept saying we should shut up and stop ranting about the merit system but they did not experience it in the first place. Sure, having a merit system may reflect on the capability of a user to create useful posts, but how about the responsibility of those who own sMerit? Who has the eagerness to read replies in a thread and give merit? It's actually too hard and a matter of luck. No matter how you construct posts, if no one who has sMerit will recognize it, you can't get one.

No, man. What JC is speaking about is just that: he, as many of us, spend time reading and searching for useful posts, for something that contributes us in something, either because this is an interesting insight or an informative post, etc. There are many sMerits to give up but few to deserve it. Also, if you take a look at the most merited ones, some of them are relatively new users, as DdmrDdmr, for instance. He had obtained more than a hundred merits in less than 2 months.

Maybe you are right in one point: the luck, but this is also related to the matter of being "wise". If you post in spam sections, or in mega threads, you are unlikely going to earn any Merit. Just learn from others and be patient. JC here is making some good points. Read to him carefully.

Besides, taking a look at your posting activity, this is the third time you copy-paste the very same words in three different threads. Copy-pasting is against the forum policy, so it is going to be difficult for you to earn any merit.

[chocopapaya]

You are over complicating things way too much.

Bitcointalk really turned to shit last year.
Of course, something like this would be implemented because so many spambots were using it to get money.
So just make it so that spambots can't rank up and they will change or go away.
It's totally fine.

But, on the other hand, all of these whining posts do come from somewhere.
Merit is incredibly difficult to get.
Supposedly, you get merit just by, "Doing what you are supposed to do and making quality posts"
The reality is that there just is not enough smerit to go around and their are boards where there are hardly any smerit being passed around at all *cough cough altcoin discusion

The merit system is not some revolutionary proof of brain concept.
It is just a system to try and regulate a forum but has turned out to be arbitrary at best.
That's all.

[The Sceptical Chymist]

This means you should check for typing errors and misspellings before you hit post.

I agree with this, but you're asking way too much of the average Jr. Member who only wants to crank out the maximum number of posts for his weekly altcoin bounty.  There are even buiilt-in spellcheckers on a lot of devices that could be used, but the fact is that most members who are only here to earn money could care less about spelling.  It's a major achievement if they even get the grammar correct in one of their typical sentences.  I really don't think they're interested in improving the content of what they write, much less the little things like spelling, punctuation, and the rest of the variables that make the written word beautiful.

ou could literally have as many Hero accounts as you wanted just by logging in once a day to claim a giveaway and 1.4 years later you'd have an arsenal of Hero accounts farmed to do what you want with.

And I'm so happy those days are over.  Let the noob shitposters bitch and moan about the system, but they'll either adapt to it by upping their game or give up.  Either outcome is a win for the forum as a whole.

Bitcointalk really turned to shit last year.

No, it wasn't just last year that it turned to shit.  One of the first things I noticed even before I registered here in 2015 was that a lot of writing sounded like it came out of the Bizarro-Superman planet, and also that no one replied to any post other than the OP in a thread.  It was obvious very early on that there was less discussion going on than people churning out posts without reading anything in turn.  There are a lot of threads that ask a basic question, and if you read the replies you'll see the same answer duplicated dozens of times--and it's not necessary.  That's been going on for years.

[Hans17]

I've read so many threads and posts about merit, and I've come to realise that the real problem with the merit system is that it rewards meritorious posters. Post count is just a simple count of the number of posts made, regardless of content or benefit to forum members. Activity is a limiter to control the rewards for over-active posters. Trust is a comment on trading morality, and the honesty of a member. Merit is a reflection of the mental ability of the poster, and his willingness to follow community guidelines on posting. If you don't have the ability or intelligence to construct useful posts, then of course you will see merit as discriminating against you. The sensible member will endeavour to develop his abilities to take advantage of the verdant pastures that surround the cesspit.

It isn't too difficult to improve your posting skills. The first task is to read the rules, and to read the thread before you post in it. The second task is to ensure that your post can be understood by your readers. This means you should check for typing errors and misspellings before you hit post. If English isn't your first language, then try to ensure that your sentence structure follows the rules of English, and isn't just a word translation of your local language.

OP explain it a lot though i agree because english is not my literature or should i say not my mother tongue so now it's giving me a hard time to say what i wanna say but then again this merit really serve me as a motivation to strive more , i'm not taking it as a hindrance to leveling up.

Now i'm improving myself to be a better poster though , and it's not how intellect you are , you just need to be a good listener and also don't be lazy to read.

And now i'm reading some books and also some thread too that can help me , to be honest my vocabulary is limited now i'm trying to expand my vocabulary.

[MadZ]

This thread is a proof of arrogance. Equating command of the English language to mental ability is an extremely elitist viewpoint, not to mention completely incorrect. Merit is an excellent addition to the forum, but it shouldn't be used to justify your narrow-minded world view.

[shahzadafzal]

If you don't have the ability or intelligence to construct useful posts, then of course you will see merit as discriminating against you. The sensible member will endeavour to develop his abilities to take advantage of the verdant pastures that surround the cesspit.

Well I don't have any problem with merit system as I'm not part any bounties, yes I did try in the start but found it waste of time. I'm happy or pretty ok with it what I have received in terms of merits. Yes of course not to all my posts have received merits but i would say 40% of them.

Here I strongly disagree with you on "useful posts" some thing constructive and useful to me may not be as useful to you. You have your own measurement standards and others have their own. Your measurement standard is not the only yardstick to value the posts.

Also we should keep in mind may be someone genius one field but zero in other. That's why we have various boards on Bitcointalk. You can't judge someone but his single post.

The first task is to read the rules

and to follow those rules.

That should be end of all merit discussions. I will quote this comment again

Simply stated, you have to adhere to the rules and policies of the forums, not the other way around. Bitcointalk does not have to cater to you. Being here is a privilege, not a right.

Edit: @Jet Cash I have doubts if I'm on your humongous ignore list 

I seem to find more members to ignore

[Baoo]

Everyone must surpass the phase of giving opinions about merit through some threads . Plus, I think the majority of users have accepted the merit system   ( except some newbies and Jr members ). And  it is certain that this update  helped a lot to improve and develop many things in this forum and even the behaviours of users.

In my opinion, this is the way to get merit:

Hopefully that I do not see other topics,  talk  about merit.

[suchmoon]

This thread is a proof of arrogance. Equating command of the English language to mental ability is an extremely elitist viewpoint, not to mention completely incorrect. Merit is an excellent addition to the forum, but it shouldn't be used to justify your narrow-minded world view.

Where do you see that equation? It's not wrong to expect forum posts to be coherent in the target language. The only mental ability needed here is to understand one's limitations and not post Google-translated garbage.

[Jet Cash]

This thread is a proof of arrogance. Equating command of the English language to mental ability is an extremely elitist viewpoint, not to mention completely incorrect. Merit is an excellent addition to the forum, but it shouldn't be used to justify your narrow-minded world view.

Step back and think about your post, and what I said. Nowhere have I said that command of English is related to intelligence. What I did say is that if you are posting on an English board, then you should make an effort to communicate with your readers. If you do try to communicate with minimal English, and you complain that you aren't lauded for your efforts, then that is an indication either of low intelligence, or a distorted view of self-importance. I wouldn't attempt to post on the French board without first learning French, so please learn English if you hope to communicate on the English boards.

[bitart]

   Higher ranking users kept saying we should shut up and stop ranting about the merit system but they did not experience it in the first place. Sure, having a merit system may reflect on the capability of a user to create useful posts, but how about the responsibility of those who own sMerit? Who has the eagerness to read replies in a thread and give merit? It's actually too hard and a matter of luck. No matter how you construct posts, if no one who has sMerit will recognize it, you can't get one.

So I consider myself as a higher ranked user, as I'm at the Hero rank right now. (I haven't told anyone to shut up (yet), if they moan about the merits system). The point is, I do experience the merit system, because I was just 1 or 2 activity periods away from the activity minimum of the Legendary rank when the merit system popped up. Now I need to gather 500 merits to become a Legendary, but that's life. I've already managed to gather 10% of the merits needed, and I can tell you that it's not easy (it's difficult) for a higher ranked user as well.
I think the difficulty to gain a merit for a post is totally the same for a newbie and for a higher ranked member, because they need to deliver quality content in the post and it doesn't matter if the user is a newbie or a Legendary, the only thing that counts is the quality of the actual post.
There are also merit threads where sMerit holders do post reviews and they give away some merits for those who deserves that, and those few merits are usually enough for a newbie to rank up in time to jr. or even to member rank. If you really think that you don't get merits because noone is interested in giving out the sMerits, you should try those sMerit giveaway threads, they will be happy to analyze your post quality and will give you a merit if your post quality is fine for them.

[Cobalt9317]

When the merit system was introduced it really brings so many generic post however one or two quality post could be read sometimes.

I agree with this, but you're asking way too much of the average Jr. Member who only wants to crank out the maximum number of posts for his weekly altcoin bounty.  There are even buiilt-in spellcheckers on a lot of devices that could be used, but the fact is that most members who are only here to earn money could care less about spelling.  It's a major achievement if they even get the grammar correct in one of their typical sentences.  I really don't think they're interested in improving the content of what they write, much less the little things like spelling, punctuation, and the rest of the variables that make the written word beautiful.

You can't blame them if they have an upcoming (monthly) liability henceforth what you wrote really implied that most of the newcomers were just here to earn airdrop money in which case always had been the looped.

It is most likely that a fraction of registered new members is genuinely interested in bitcoin as a general (peer-to-peer) payments not a place where oneself could have an insatiable temptation to create a new account for the sole purpose of ripping this forum off.

[MadZ]

Where do you see that equation?

Mainly from the following quotes:

Merit is a proof of brain

Merit is a reflection of the mental ability of the poster

If you don't have the ability or intelligence to construct useful posts

I don't see how those sentences can be construed otherwise?

It's not wrong to expect forum posts to be coherent in the target language. The only mental ability needed here is to understand one's limitations and not post Google-translated garbage.

Like I said in my first post, I completely agree that merit is a great addition to the forum. Spammers and Google-translators are a huge problem, and merit does a good job at combating them. That being said, I disagree with the connotation that low merit = lower intelligence, which the OP is pretty explicit about (see examples above).

Merit is essentially predicated on one's command of the English language, since only a small fraction of merit sources are actually active in each foreign language board. Should users not be allowed to rank up just because their native language isn't English? Members like Jet Cash act like the only people who complain about merit are the spammers you mention above, when in reality this isn't the case.

Take for instance this thread, a prime example of your average "the merit system sucks" thread. Notice how the OP actually makes the vast majority of his posts in the French sub-forum, not English boards. Reading through them, they look to be of pretty decent quality, however, he has only received 20 merits for the 400 posts he has made since the system was added (all from the French sub-forum).

I feel like a lot of the more prominent members are ingrained in the mindset that low merit = third world shitposter. As the example above shows, this isn't necessarily the case. All I'm trying to point out is that there are numerous reasons why a positively contributing member of this community might have low merit, and it is understandable that such a person would feel frustrated by the system.

[Jet Cash]

@Madz

I don't see why you highlight my points. To be brutally frank, If you post in incomprehensible English on an English board, and complain because the majority of readers don't think it is brilliant, then either you have a limited brain, or you aren't using it.

[MadZ]

@Madz

I don't see why you highlight my points. To be brutally frank, If you post in incomprehensible English on an English board, and complain because the majority of readers don't think it is brilliant, then either you have a limited brain, or you aren't using it.

And I agree those people deserve to be called idiots. What you (and a lot of other prominent members) fail to realize is that there are plenty of members who make quality posts in their native language on local boards, yet receive no merit because each board only has one or two merit sources. They have a right to come to Meta and complain about the system when it actually does discriminate against them. In light of that, it's laughable to dismiss every complaint by saying the user is simply too dumb to make posts with comprehensible English, which is what you're doing. The issue isn't that simple.