Bitcoin Pizza Day - Why old members are no longer active here

[Heisenberg_Hunter]

I don't know why I didn't bookmark that thread, but I didn't.

Is this the one you were talking about or something older than this? Then there came an idea for a guy and most probably he may be the first Campaign Manager from 2011. Here are some of the old signature campaigns and how about this one

RitzGrandCasino
Payment period: Monthly, 1st of each month.
Minimum posts: 50 posts per month, Member level.
Payments: M: 0.0005 BTC per post, F: 0.0007 BTC per post, S: 0.0011 BTC per post, H: 0.0013 BTC per post. Maximum payable posts per month: 3000.
Miscellaneous: Constructive posts only.

which made people to spam 2000 posts per month to receive around 2 Btc/month.

Many people left because the forum is overrun by spammers.

This was one of sole reason for old members leaving the forum.

Some reputed members who left the forum:

sirius
SmokeTooMuch
Gavin Andresen
Mike Hearn
gmaxwell
Vitalik Buterin

and a lot more....

[1714177952]

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[audaciousbeing]

In addition to the spammers which is something everybody have agreed to, I think its also have to do with achieving some level of satisfaction and when that is achieved there is no longer a motivation. One of the motivating factor to come to the forum is ranking up which lots of them have gotten to the peak of it.

Again, a lot of them have become entrepreneurs that have created apps, set up businesses, create coins that what they focus their time on now is nurturing their business to a bigger platform. While others have moved beyond the youthful age to a more mature level that gave less time to be dedicated to the forum.

We still have a lot of old people around though but the ones that have left prepare the ground for what others are meeting today. Most of the topic, that a new entrant would discuss would be something they have seen over and over again.

[angel55]

Most people that are rich will not waste their time on an online forum.  I'm sure there are some outliers but they could be traveling the world doing funner things.

[pugman]

Why everyone blamed spammers.Rather than blaming others ,does anybody try to personally approach to them.

Why would anyone in their right mind approach spammers? Spammers aren't the only reason why old members left this place:

Being fair, I think the exodus of talent happened before the spammers moved in.  It was more related to the overall attitude of members here fostering negativity.  It became clear the goal of the average member was not to help or learn from the Bitcoin community any longer.

Most people that are rich will not waste their time on an online forum.  I'm sure there are some outliers but they could be traveling the world doing funner things.

This place is more than an online forum for some people. Of course,marinecoin shills like you wouldn't be knowing that.

[Tszunami98]

Old members have a lot of bitcoins and are now spending their gains on women and cocaine!

[mdayonliner]

1. Lack of innovation
It's been 8/9 years and bitcointalk.org did not evolve. It's still an old forum, old design, old fashioned, single point of failure (password), no notifications whatsoever, etc. I'm sure many of you may disagree with me but I'm a computer engineer and people get bored of seeing same thing after few years. All software companies have been updating their product on regular basic in span of 2-3 years. If you can't change anything... change the design. Give some new look and new feel to the users.

If we look around  linkedin, stackoverflow and quora how they have evolved in last few years. Responsive design, mobile apps.

What I'm missing most on bitcointalk is notifications. I should get notified when someone replies to my Topic, ok there is email but it's so damn difficult to track. Give me some notification bar or counter to let me know that there is something new going on. I want to know if someone tags/quote me, that's what healthy discussion is supposed to be "engagement".

Yes this was all ok back in 2010, but today no this can't work, bitcointalk has to change from it's old school. BTW where is the new software for the forum?

2. Lack of Management Involvement
Yes harsh but truth again. See the recent example of howeycoins, people were so happy to see Theymos is here. We are missing this so much. Why bitcointalk succeed back in days? Because Satoshi himself was here he was engaged in discussions with people. Yes I understand Theymos, Cycrus you guys are very busy. But buys in what? Please let us know in your busy schedule there is some space for bitcointalk also. Please keep us updated at least what is going on in the background for bitcointalk.

If Thyemos and Cycrus keep old and seniors members involved, I guess many of the old members would still be here and they will come back too.

3. Focus of discussion is diverted
Back in days bitcointalk was about "bitcoin", but today no its f*cking damn about Bounties and ANN that's all.
Let's accept this is also part of evolving, Bitcoin can live with it. Still BTC market Dominance is 38.9% not bad. So what did we do here? Nothing just sit and watch them spam bitcointalk.

There should be strict checks on Bounties and ANN threads, bitcointalk should help to minimize the scam and only legit announcement and Bounties should be allowed to stay. Let the bounties and ANN thread should be created by company's account only. As soon as someone realizes something fishy or scam going on it should be "nuked" immediately (I like this term "nuke" used by hilariousandco so often).

Yes it need time and investment but come on owners this is your baby. How can you allow someone to scam here? Yes we can't control but as soon it becomes clear why not nuke and stop it.

4. bitcointalk is money making platform
No it's not!!! It's platform to discussion your ideas of making money, to get honest opinions on your thoughts and ideas. PoS was coined here on bitcointalk, yes ethereum also started from here. So bitcointalk is not all about just ranking up and started earning free money by shitposting.

I usually don't quote such long contents but here I am quoting it for the first time. Don't know why but I liked it and I want the admin notice it. You said it mate! These are some solid dissections. Like the rest, I always thought, it's the spamming but this should be an eye opener for the admin.

Lack of innovation is the one I guess killing the forum. In addition with you example:
Consider Facebook in 2010/11 and now. Back in those days Facebook used to look like a simple php driven website and now it a massive application with enormous features.

Think of 2010 versions of windows, mac, apple, android. You don't want an iPhone 1 to have now, do you?

[vit05]

This was one of sole reason for old members leaving the forum.

Some reputed members who left the forum:

sirius
SmokeTooMuch
Gavin Andresen
Mike Hearn
gmaxwell
Vitalik Buterin

and a lot more....

None of them left because of spam or signature campaigns. They left for disagreeing with some questions related to the forum or the Bitcoin project and start to support other forks. Sirius got tired, SmokeTooMuch, Mike Hearn and Gavin Andresen began to support other projects. Vitalik seems to find a greater refuge using Twitter and Reddit.

gmaxwell still uses the forum.

I'm not disagreeing with the premise. I think a lot of others left because of spam. I just put that in these specific cases, they never said this was the biggest reason.

[siddartha1492]

So after reading all these comments, I think we can easily label spam and the resultant difficulty to do serious discussions as one of the major cause of old timers leaving. It can be compared to mining difficulty also. More miners or hashpower, greater difficulty in finding the block vs. more spam means greater difficulty in coming up with good ideas, serious discussions!!

@shahzadafzal comments are also worth noting. And they could also be some reasons why legends left. But it is indeed surprising that you came up with these points despite being new. Could it be that you are an alt of an oldie!

@Pharmacist point about Mt.Gox burn also sounds like a valid reason for them leaving. Afterall, how many people would want to get near fire after getting their hands burnt.

@audaciousbeing comment about oldies being involved in other crypto projects or other businesses and hence less time to be on forum sounds like a fair deal. After all, these oldies were the best candidates to start new crypto projects as they had detailed knowledge about this stuff. Not like many of us (including me), who don't even understand the technical terms associated, forget the tech behind a cryptocurrency.
Also the idea of seeing repeated discussions over and over might have led them to not participate is a good possibility.

@angel and @Tszunami98 comment about oldies leaving due to them becoming rich is a possibility but very minor. They didn't adopt Bitcoin for money but because of the idea, tech and power behind it. It is highly unlikely that they would abandon the idea part just because they made money with it.

I am also seeing comments about people leaving Bitcointalk because of lack of new features. Again, I feel this is a minor possibility. You can still discuss whatever you want, new features might complement it, but aren't really that necessary.

@vit05 I see you are quite an oldie. But your level is just Full Member. That means you didn't post much like many of the oldies, but you still say that the main reason of them leaving is not spam. That gives a whole new twist to this discussion. You say that they left because they started supporting other projects or because of some questions related to the forum or Bitcoin.

So all in all I see that the major reasons for them leaving is spam, involvement in other projects and maybe burns.

So with this a new question pops up. Why some oldies are still using the platform despite many issues. Theymos is probably the oldest active member here. If you are reading this, I want to know from you. Why do you still use Bitcointalk? Is it because you got the opportunity to become the admin here and the resultant status and weight in the Bitcoin community or because you really think that Bitcointalk is still the best place for Bitcoin discussions? Same questions for all other active oldies.

Please feel free to answer or ignore these questions. But I am indeed very curious. You might ask why. The reason is that for some unknown reason I am feeling a bit sad because of the fact that many (maybe most) oldies left the platform. So, I just want to dig deeper.

[LoyceV]

Lack of innovation is the one I guess killing the forum. In addition with you example:
Consider Facebook in 2010/11 and now. Back in those days Facebook used to look like a simple php driven website and now it a massive application with enormous features.

Bad example: I liked Facebook more back then, before they forced a timeline and started deciding for me what I want to see (because they earn from it).
I've seen several forums "innovate", and in all cases I liked the old version better. For me, a forum doesn't have to change it's looks and behaviour once it works well and I know where to find stuff. A forum upgrade would also mean existing scrapers won't work anymore.
I do like the added Merit though, and I'd love to see more upgrades like it.

[jackg]

sirius
SmokeTooMuch
Gavin Andresen
Mike Hearn
gmaxwell
Vitalik Buterin

and a lot more....

Has Gmaxwell actually left, he was logged on fairly recently?

We still have users from quite a long time ago still however, like ThomasV.
And Theymos is obviously still here.

Lack of innovation is the one I guess killing the forum. In addition with you example:
Consider Facebook in 2010/11 and now. Back in those days Facebook used to look like a simple php driven website and now it a massive application with enormous features.

Bad example: I liked Facebook more back then, before they forced a timeline and started deciding for me what I want to see (because they earn from it).
I've seen several forums "innovate", and in all cases I liked the old version better. For me, a forum doesn't have to change it's looks and behaviour once it works well and I know where to find stuff. A forum upgrade would also mean existing scrapers won't work anymore.
I do like the added Merit though, and I'd love to see more upgrades like it.

That's true, with every facebook and messenger update I always sit wondering what they could possible have done to make it any different from how it was that would benefit the user (I think a lot of stuff they do now is for maximising profit). I don't think your data had as much value in 2010 (there's also the google incident and how they've changed what was a perfectly good logo). ?

He waited four days for a pizza, maybe that's why he left!
$43 back then was enough for at least 2 pizzas and no one took him up on it for four days (that being said, I hadn't even heard of bitcoin back then but I was very young so that's my excuse)...

[mdayonliner]

Lack of innovation is the one I guess killing the forum. In addition with you example:
Consider Facebook in 2010/11 and now. Back in those days Facebook used to look like a simple php driven website and now it a massive application with enormous features.

Bad example: I liked Facebook more back then, before they forced a timeline and started deciding for me what I want to see (because they earn from it).
I've seen several forums "innovate", and in all cases I liked the old version better. For me, a forum doesn't have to change it's looks and behaviour once it works well and I know where to find stuff. A forum upgrade would also mean existing scrapers won't work anymore.
I do like the added Merit though, and I'd love to see more upgrades like it.

That's true, with every facebook and messenger update I always sit wondering what they could possible have done to make it any different from how it was that would benefit the user (I think a lot of stuff they do now is for maximising profit). I don't think your data had as much value in 2010 (there's also the google incident and how they've changed what was a perfectly good logo). ?

Facebook is now too much with monetizing data that's where it is going wrong IMO.
I am not sure if everyone is facing this problem or not... it takes longer time to load the contents on FB now a days especially when I use it from my computer.

Anyway my point was adding some features like: receive notification when someone mentioning your username, a follow button or something that will enable your to receive notifications when your favorite user create a topic or post a comment etc. Some new features for better user experience.

Yes, I do like the merit feature and I am sure there are a lot of people like me who finds extra energy to do more because their work gets recognized.

[Slavyanskiy]

Who has a lot of money, why should he sit on this forum? Who has the high-level knowledge, is engaged in business, and not posting unnecessary messages.

[mdayonliner]

Who has a lot of money, why should he sit on this forum? Who has the high-level knowledge, is engaged in business, and not posting unnecessary messages.

Why do you think like that? I bet there are people who love spending time in the forum, they do not count the money.

[jackg]

Facebook is now too much with monetizing data that's where it is going
wrong IMO.

I get that, it's even more annoying with GDPR now that means all the terms and conditions have been rewritten and you have to read through them all (OK, I love a good contract so that wasn't actually so bad, but it just makes stuff you previously agreed to more obvious).

I am not sure if everyone is facing this problem or not... it takes longer time to load the contents on FB now a days especially when I use it from my computer.

Yes.
Sometimes my laptop crashes when trying to load faceook also (or it doesn't load the list on the right - or sync it often).

Anyway my point was adding some features like: receive notification when someone mentioning your username, a follow button or something that will enable your to receive notifications when your favorite user create a topic or post a comment etc. Some new features for better user experience.

Yes, I do like the merit feature and I am sure there are a lot of people like me who finds extra energy to do more because their work gets recognized.

Yes this would be good but you'd also have to be able to include a way to tag someone and people might spam it also and one might get a lot of notifications when they are unnecessary.

Who has a lot of money, why should he sit on this forum? Who has the high-level knowledge, is engaged in business, and not posting unnecessary messages.

I'm here mostly to learn. Sure, I get paid by my signature and I might not be here as often (might only come here a few times a week instead) if I didn't but the main reason you should be here is knowledge. Everyone who has Bitcoin should want it to be adopted more because then the value of their Bitcoin increases if there is a greater demand for its purchase.

[mdayonliner]

...you have to read through them all...

I never cared reading them seriously ever LOL

Yes this would be good but you'd also have to be able to include a way to tag someone and people might spam it also and one might get a lot of notifications when they are unnecessary.

A coin will always have its head and tail. Similar way, there will be always good and bad way of applying a feature. Just take merit system as example. Abusers are abusing publicly or non-publicly but there are good people as well who are using it as a tool to improve the forum experience. IMO, the number of these good people are larger than the abusers which makes the system even more beautiful. We just need to live with the good side of a system/module.

[evlogii]

Here are some reasons I can think of:

1) They found better alternatives or earning  opportunities. I am not saying that this forum is not useful but it is natural. I started with a local forum, they also used to reward users for contributing posts in different ways. But with time, I found better opportunities and I rarely visit that forum.

2) Spam can also be the reason. It is hard to find out genuine replies for a thread even after this merit system.

3) They might not be happy with the forum staff or how they mangae things here.

Exact reason only someone friend with that specific user can tell.

[onaiwusun]

The cryptoworld is growing very fast and a lot of projects are coming up on daily basis,I guess they are tied up in some projects.It is hard to keep up with pace on all fronts

[QuestionAuthority]

It’s not just one thing that caused the old timers to leave.

I would like to see a percentage study of why people left here. That would tell us the main reason and perhaps that one thing could be changed. Unfortunately, there is no one left around that does that sort of study anymore.

People that left the forum because of:

Spammers like sig campaign members posting one liners (discussion quality) =?%
Disagreements over forum operations like Goat =?%
Banned over disagreements with forum staff like MnW or MPOE-PR =?%
Respected members turned scammers like DnT or TradeFortress =?%
Respected members that lost credibly like Andresen or Zhou Tong =?%
The Silk Road scandal because of fear over their outspoken drug connection like MysteryMiner =?%
Were arrested and discredited like Shrem, Magical Tux and most of the early mining equipment manufacturers =?%
People who closed up businesses that ran their course like slush, Tycho or Jered Kenna =?%
Believe it’s more respectable to distance themselves from this forum like Tony Gallippi =?%
People that lost faith in bitcoin because their coins were scammed away from them = ?%
People that sold all for a massive profit and left =?%
Intellectuals that are beyond being stimulated by this forum like organofcorti or Meni Rosenfeld =?%
People with personal lives that take them away for years but end up returning like that johnthedong guy =?%

[mdayonliner]

People that left the forum because of:

Spammers like sig campaign members posting one liners (discussion quality) =?%
Disagreements over forum operations like Goat =?%
Banned over disagreements with forum staff like MnW or MPOE-PR =?%
Respected members turned scammers like DnT or TradeFortress =?%
Respected members that lost credibly like Andresen or Zhou Tong =?%
The Silk Road scandal because of fear over their outspoken drug connection like MysteryMiner =?%
Were arrested and discredited like Shrem, Magical Tux and most of the early mining equipment manufacturers =?%
People who closed up businesses that ran their course like slush, Tycho or Jered Kenna =?%
Believe it’s more respectable to distance themselves from this forum like Tony Gallippi =?%
People that lost faith in bitcoin because their coins were scammed away from them = ?%
People that sold all for a massive profit and left =?%
Intellectuals that are beyond being stimulated by this forum like organofcorti or Meni Rosenfeld =?%
People with personal lives that take them away for years but end up returning like that johnthedong guy =?%

I wonder how did you came up with all these perimeters for a report? How long did it take to construct this post if you don't mind to ask?  

Simply awesome to read. Wish there were these values for the % too.

[QuestionAuthority]

People that left the forum because of:

Spammers like sig campaign members posting one liners (discussion quality) =?%
Disagreements over forum operations like Goat =?%
Banned over disagreements with forum staff like MnW or MPOE-PR =?%
Respected members turned scammers like DnT or TradeFortress =?%
Respected members that lost credibly like Andresen or Zhou Tong =?%
The Silk Road scandal because of fear over their outspoken drug connection like MysteryMiner =?%
Were arrested and discredited like Shrem, Magical Tux and most of the early mining equipment manufacturers =?%
People who closed up businesses that ran their course like slush, Tycho or Jered Kenna =?%
Believe it’s more respectable to distance themselves from this forum like Tony Gallippi =?%
People that lost faith in bitcoin because their coins were scammed away from them = ?%
People that sold all for a massive profit and left =?%
Intellectuals that are beyond being stimulated by this forum like organofcorti or Meni Rosenfeld =?%
People with personal lives that take them away for years but end up returning like that johnthedong guy =?%

I wonder how did you came up with all these perimeters for a report? How long did it take to construct this post if you don't mind to ask?  

Simply awesome to read. Wish there were these values for the % too.

It only takes a minute or two to make that kind of post because I watched all that stuff happening. Old time members have been bailing out here for 5 or more years because of all sorts of reasons. Glad you enjoyed it. LOL