Is the forum over regulated?

[minthit]

First of all, I'm not here for merit.(Even after telling in advance, I was insulted by some hypocrites. See below.) I'm not familiar with how people think about the forum. I'm just giving a thought here. Be patient with me, because I'm not used to posting in a logical order.
First, merits, activities, and ranks. Generally speaking the incentive is the higher rank you are, the more money you can earn with less effort. Yes, the forum is not intended that way. But, let's face it. That's what's happening.  People complaining and defending about merit. Those whiners complain about merit because of that incentive. Those defending merit don't want these shitposters to rank up and ruin the forum. Previously, ranks are determined by activities and then merit was introduced. What if we remove all these activities, merits and ranks? I'm sure there are people who can promote well in good ways without having rank. And, projects that are serious won't have problem with that. All they need is to reach potential users, not high rank hypocrites, except the unethical or scam projects, right? It will remove incentive for ranking up, merit abuse, account trades and best of all, there won't be desperate posters in meta section. (How's that? )
 Spam and bot problems in the announcement and altcoin sections. Why bother mods and members with that problem? Let the campaign managers handle it by self moderating their topic.(In fact, that's what campaign managers are already doing. They saw every post made on their thread. If they saw spam, report or ban that user from the thread.) Create a subsection, something like 'Spammy ICOs' (shady ICOs, whatever) and  If the campaign managers fail to moderate spam, report that thread to mods and mods will remove the topic to that subsection. In that way, if these ICOs are using bot, they have to compete with other bots. What can be the potential problems by doing so?

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[Vod]

In that way, if these ICOs are using bot, they have to compete with other bots. What can be the potential problems by doing so?

??  It drowns out legitimate conversation on the forum.

[minthit]

No, it probably won't with a responsible campaign manager IMO. Those projects which fall into that subsection because of negligence can come back with better thread. If the thread becomes old, it can even be deleted, right?

[Jet Cash]

I think your profile slogan says it all.

Shitposter but don't read shit

[minthit]

I think your profile slogan says it all.

Shitposter but don't read shit

Off-topic. Why you care when you have nothing to share??

[Don Pedro Dinero]

First of all, I'm not here for merit.

Excusatio non petita, accusatio manifesta.

Bye.

[minthit]

First of all, I'm not here for merit.

Excusatio non petita, accusatio manifesta.

Bye.

Bye. That's why I don't want to write down my thoughts. Some of you hypocrites think is all about merit.

[jonemil24]

Removing activity will be a big problem, especially to those who are active on this forum since 2009. If merit is removed, how will a quality poster know that his post is highly appreciated?

Let those quality posters and topic starters earn it, they deserve to rank up!

And for the altcoins section; the first time that I made a post there was on ethereum thread, the rest was question about their ICO, and posting my weekly report on bounty section.

Instead of complaining about ranking and merit, why not ask something that will add functions to merit?

[minthit]

Good for you that getting merit is associated with quality post. But, most of those talking about merit are for ranking up. Activity and merit on their own is not a problem. Associating them with rank is a problem. Associating higher rank with more capabilities like wearing signature and avatar probably is a problem. And most of all, associating those capabilities with higher earning is a problem.

Let those quality posters and topic starters earn it, they deserve to rank up!

Even you who care about quality post associate rank with earning, right?
If removing activity and merit can be a problem, how about removing rank or at least the limitation to wear signature or removing the ability to wear signature and avatar totally?  If so, it will become that even newbies can wear signature and can probably lead to more spam. But, campaign managers can play their role properly for spams.Just a thought.  That's the first part. How about the second part?

[mdayonliner]

Generally speaking the incentive is the higher rank you are, the more money you can earn with less effort. Yes, the forum is not intended that way. But, let's face it. That's what's happening.  People complaining and defending about merit. Those whiners complain about merit because of that incentive. Those defending merit don't want these shitposters to rank up and ruin the forum. Previously, ranks are determined by activities and then merit was introduced.

So you are saying merit has been introduced only to protect ALL higher rank members? Lower rank will not be able to get merits and they will not rank up? So, the higher ranks has less competition now?

Well - it sounds a plan, isn't it? Wrong!!!

You are talking about the higher rank members who did nothing for the forum but shit posted and raked up to earn money from the signatures. I feel shame for them, they just got the advantage.

How about those early adopters who left the forum long ago and before they left they gave a lot to the forum? As a result you and me are seeing the demand of the forum and Bitcoin these days. How about those higher rank members who are still active on the forum and every single day they are working to improve the forum environment? They started this long ago and still they are continuing their journey to make it a better place for everyone and to help Bitcoin to evolve. They deserved it.  Without these people - Bitcoin would never spread, the forum would not be the one it is today, even - you would not come to the forum at the first place!

Look, every system/idea needs to start from some point. Idea like merit system was needed to improve the forum experience and we are seeing the positive results. People think at-least twice before making a post because they are now more focused on creating good contents rather than throwing out something which does not make sense (I am not saying people are not shitposting anymore, there are members who are/will and they will never rank up and TBH the forum is not for them).

What if we remove all these activities, merits and ranks?

Don't need to.
Those who deserves merit they are earning it. Have a look on this list: List of members achieved 0 to 100 and plus merits
These members had started from 0 merit, they did not even have 10 initial merits like you but they became full members. Not only them there are other lists as well which I am working on. DdmrDdmr has created an entire dashboard to analyse how merits are working. Members are becoming full member, full members are becoming Sr. Member, Sr. Members are becoming Hero and Legendary and it's from the stats not something made up like you are having in your imagination. So what's wrong? It's working perfectly.

I'm sure there are people who can promote well in good ways without having rank. And, projects that are serious won't have problem with that. All they need is to reach potential users, not high rank hypocrites, except the unethical or scam projects, right? It will remove incentive for ranking up, merit abuse, account trades and best of all, there won't be desperate posters in meta section. (How's that? Cheesy)
 Spam and bot problems in the announcement and altcoin sections. Why bother mods and members with that problem? Let the campaign managers handle it by self moderating their topic.(In fact, that's what campaign managers are already doing. They saw every post made on their thread. If they saw spam, report or ban that user from the thread.) Create a subsection, something like 'Spammy ICOs' (shady ICOs, whatever) and  If the campaign managers fail to moderate spam, report that thread to mods and mods will remove the topic to that subsection. In that way, if these ICOs are using bot, they have to compete with other bots. What can be the potential problems by doing so?

ALL junk so excuse me, I pass.

[jonemil24]

FYI, there are bounty managers who never cared about posters and multi accounts. It's been a problem by many, and some of these bounty managers are associated with scam. They only cared on how they will be paid.

If spam is the problem, anyone can report it to moderators. Been using it for a while, and it puts a smile on my face when the accuracy is high!

[minthit]

So you are saying merit has been introduced only to protect ALL higher rank members?

No, what I'm saying is simply people's impression with ranks. That's why I thought maybe removing it can bring about something. Of course, I do admire those people you said and what they have contributed. They don't even need such rank to be admired. It would even be a shame to mix them with ranks.. Anyway, it's just a thought and it's like 'what do you guys think'. That's all. Too bad that you think the rest are junk.

FYI, there are bounty managers who never cared about posters and multi accounts. It's been a problem by many, and some of these bounty managers are associated with scam. They only cared on how they will be paid.

That's also why I think they should be held accountable.

If spam is the problem, anyone can report it to moderators. Been using it for a while, and it puts a smile on my face when the accuracy is high

That's also what I'm enjoying now!

[celtic99]

It's regulated in some ways ( strict rules against spam and plagiarism).  However scams are not regulated and many ICOs on this forum are fraudulent.

[Jet Cash]

Bitcoin Talk is quite a complex enterprise. Ranks are important to encourage members to follow the rules, and to be active in the forum to improve their perceived status. Ranking can also help to retain members who have worked to improve their status. They also help new members to differentiate between opinions, although this is not infallible.

As a large enterprise, Bitcoin Talk has a number of members with assigned functions, and I suspect these are of more importance than ranking. These functions include moderator and global moderator, Staff, Merit source, DT1 and DT2 and several other functions. The obsession with ranking seems to stem from bounty activities, and the extra privileges associated with rank improvement. In many cases increased rank seems to lead to an increase in these abuses, and this seems to be contrary to the situation in other forums. Bounty hunters seem to assume that all members are bounty hunters, and are just here to milk the forum. I think it would be interesting to know how many active members are not part of any bounty programmes.

[minthit]

As a large enterprise, Bitcoin Talk has a number of members with assigned functions, and I suspect these are of more importance than ranking.

That's what I was talking about when I say I am not quite familiar with how people think about the forum. Just a thought experiment and want to know whether it is a viable option.

[PsylockReborn]

First of all, I'm not here for merit.(Even after telling in advance, I was insulted by some hypocrites. See below.)

I feel you bro. I guess you're a hypocrite yourself. Your not here for merit but your whining about it even proposing to remove ranks which is way beyond your imagination.

I'm not familiar with how people think about the forum. I'm just giving a thought here. Be patient with me, because I'm not used to posting in a logical order.

Don't worry everyone's opinion is being respected and accepted in a debatable manner.

First, merits, activities, and ranks. Generally speaking the incentive is the higher rank you are, the more money you can earn with less effort.

I agree with you on the incentive part but in the "less effort" that's a little bit shady. Even if your a high rank but with a shitty post, you can never participate in signature campaign run by legitimate managers. Some of those high rank accounts are already tagged worst banned.

Yes, the forum is not intended that way. But, let's face it. That's what's happening.  People complaining and defending about merit. Those whiners complain about merit because of that incentive. Those defending merit don't want these shitposters to rank up and ruin the forum.

People complaining about merits are those people who want to rank their way up instantly without any efforts. If those whiners will just find a decent paying job in real life then they won't complain in here for not getting their desired amount for a certain task. There's no shortcuts in everything bud.

Previously, ranks are determined by activities and then merit was introduced.

That was a thing in the past move on. It was the privilege of those people who knew first about the forum. Please don't take that away from them. They did their part as well by being active everyday in here.

What if we remove all these activities, merits and ranks? I'm sure there are people who can promote well in good ways without having rank. And, projects that are serious won't have problem with that.

You made me laugh at this part. Where's your respect to the oldies in here? Are you just gonna remove them from their respective posts because you want equality in all members. I think that's a communist way of thinking.

All they need is to reach potential users, not high rank hypocrites, except the unethical or scam projects, right? It will remove incentive for ranking up, merit abuse, account trades and best of all, there won't be desperate posters in meta section. (How's that? )

I'm one of those hypocrites bud and just wanted you to know that you are a hypocrite as well. No harm intended but that's my opinion about you because of your post.

Why bother mods and members with that problem? Let the campaign managers handle it by self moderating their topic.(In fact, that's what campaign managers are already doing. They saw every post made on their thread. If they saw spam, report or ban that user from the thread.)

Atleast you have a point in here. I totally agree with you on this part of your post.

I'm not trying to provoke or create flame with you OP, but merit system is made to prevent lazy people farming in this forum. I'm a hypocrite as well, since I'm here to earn but I do respect the system as well as the high rank members in here. I highly suggest that you just live and let live.

[The Sceptical Chymist]

Yes, the forum is not intended that way. But, let's face it. That's what's happening.

And a lot of the higher-ranking members, who've been here for a long time and place a value on intelligent discussion, don't want to see it get any worse.  I'm not even talking about myself being high-ranked, because I've only been here 3 years. 

If you look at how people posted in 2011 vs. today, you'll see an incredible difference in the quality of posts.  All that basically got ruined once signature campaigns came along.  So the merit system was a response on Theymos's part to how bad the problem has gotten.  That's a huge barrier for a lot of people who expected to come here, post garbage, and earn money. 

Yep, that's what bitcointalk has become and it's not cool.  I'm not a bitcoin expert like a lot of folks here, but I do enjoy reading a lot of stuff here.  I also don't think people should be coming here and ruining a perfectly good discussion forum for money--or anything else.  It's not something that people have to roll over and accept, and not even Theymos was willing to do that.  He just didn't want DT members tagging shitposters.

I don't particularly care about bots or spammers when that's isolated to sections where it almost makes sense--EXCEPT people are doing it to bump their ANN threads, and those posts like "great project" are just empty spam and are against the rules here.  Nobody goes to the bounty or token section to have a real discussion, however I'm not advocating spam or bots even there.  I just happen to have certain spammy sections on ignore and it doesn't bother me personally. 

[xtraelv]

There are sections of this forum I don't even bother to go to. unless it is to report shitposters to do my bit in helping clean up the forum.

I don't have a problem with people having low quality conversation but when bots and shills add to that with complete and utter nonsense (spam) then conversation has been broken down altogether and the real purpose of human interaction has been lost.

If bots and shills had no incentive to "bump their thread" and post nonsense to spread their blatant advertising then intelligent conversation can surface again.

It would also mean that some more genuine projects that give bitcointalk a miss would be on here - or be more on here.

After all the forum is called "bitcoin forum" and not "altcoin advertising" or "altcoin bots talk to themselves".

There are high ranking accounts that have low quality posts. They either just make the standard, improve their standard or eventually get banned.

[Quickseller]

Let the campaign managers handle it by self moderating their topic.

The problem with this is that campaign managers are ultimately paid by and are accountable to the companies behind the ICOs, or the bitcoin related business that are advertising.

In the past, when a bitcoin related company was advertising their services, they would have an incentive to only accept those with a decent reputation, and/or to not accept those with a negative reputation, and to take other measures to prevent those advertising on their behalf from making garbage posts. The incentive was that if many users over time made garbage posts while advertising for the company, then the company's reputation would suffer and the advertising would do more harm than good.

The problem with ICOs is that their goal is to reach as many people as possible very quickly, so there is an incentive to allow for people posting garbage. Also, an ICO will only last a month or two, which is generally not enough time to weed out spammers from an advertising campaign, so they can claim that any spam problem is being worked on. Most importantly, once they raise money from their ICO, they generally do not need to worry about their reputation anymore, so any negative reputation "earned" from the spammy advertising will not affect them.

[Welsh]

In the past, when a bitcoin related company was advertising their services, they would have an incentive to only accept those with a decent reputation, and/or to not accept those with a negative reputation, and to take other measures to prevent those advertising on their behalf from making garbage posts. The incentive was that if many users over time made garbage posts while advertising for the company, then the company's reputation would suffer and the advertising would do more harm than good.

I'm not sure this has ever been the case. There's a few campaign mangers that enforce their own rules, but I doubt the people behind hiring them actually care, and it's the campaign managers that are insisting on specific rules. It definitely didn't do more harm than good. It would be nice if that was the case, but that's not really how advertising works. 

[Quickseller]

In the past, when a bitcoin related company was advertising their services, they would have an incentive to only accept those with a decent reputation, and/or to not accept those with a negative reputation, and to take other measures to prevent those advertising on their behalf from making garbage posts. The incentive was that if many users over time made garbage posts while advertising for the company, then the company's reputation would suffer and the advertising would do more harm than good.

I'm not sure this has ever been the case. There's a few campaign mangers that enforce their own rules, but I doubt the people behind hiring them actually care, and it's the campaign managers that are insisting on specific rules. It definitely didn't do more harm than good. It would be nice if that was the case, but that's not really how advertising works. 

PrimeDice came to mind when I was writing that. Their advertising campaign was very big, and full of spammers, and over time many people started publicly complaining about their advertising, and they eventually reduced their campaign to only posters with good posts, and subsequently only allowed staff to advertise for them.


Another example was, IIRC, the "777" campaign as they paid very little but accepted everyone(?), and attracted many spammers. The owner of that casino eventually earned negative trust.

Some campaign managers will say they will only manage campaigns with certain rules, however it is ultimately the company's money, and someone who doesn't agree with the rules, or is being denied payment what they perceive to be unfairly, can appeal to the company directly for an exception to the rule.

[suchmoon]

Why bother mods and members with that problem? [...] report that thread to mods

So which is it then, do we need mods or not? ANN thread OPs already have the self-moderated option and could use it except most of them LOVE shitposters bumping their threads and won't do anything to clean it up.

Instead of this useless thread you should have spent some time reporting shitposts to moderators.

[pugman]

Spam and bot problems in the announcement and altcoin sections. Why bother mods and members with that problem? Let the campaign managers handle it by self moderating their topic.(In fact, that's what campaign managers are already doing. They saw every post made on their thread. If they saw spam, report or ban that user from the thread.) Create a subsection, something like 'Spammy ICOs' (shady ICOs, whatever) and  If the campaign managers fail to moderate spam, report that thread to mods and mods will remove the topic to that subsection. In that way, if these ICOs are using bot, they have to compete with other bots. What can be the potential problems by doing so?

Why bother mods? Because they are hired for moderating. That's why.

Not all campaign managers create a self-mod topic. The ANN thread starters do,in most cases, by using the sentence: "To avoid spam". But they do it to hide the truth.

And you can't ban members from posting in a topic, or a board, had that been the case, digaran would have been banned from reputation.

There is no-need for a Spammy ICO subsection, people will think that it is a subsection to say shit like : "Marinecoin is better than btc", "shitcoin to the moon", etc.

There are 2-3 boards depending upon the case to report these ICOs. If they break the rules, meta section is for that. If its related to members who are not breaking the rules but still are doing shady stuff, Reputation section is for that. If an ICO is a scam or shows its scammy behavior, then there's Scam Accusations board. What else do you actually need?

Do you actually think ICOs have to compete each other in terms of bots,out of everything else? Well, the problems of bots right now are:

- They are bypassing cloudfare, which even some mods are unable to(the scrapping bot is no longer working(?) and the Autoban bot as well).
 
- They are making every board their victim, by spamming, making things worse for those who report the bots and for the mods.
And why was the first paragraph even required? You're talking about rank/merit/activity and all of a sudden you're talking about bots? And their potential problems? Bots are not posting here because they are hurt by the ranking system, they are posting here to earn money. That is why.

[The Sceptical Chymist]

Another example was, IIRC, the "777" campaign as they paid very little but accepted everyone(?), and attracted many spammers.

I don't think it was 777, unless there's something I don't know or unless Lutpin wasn't managing it at some point.  My sense of history is not good on campaigns.  Yobit and Secondstrade fit that description, though.  They took anyone, and Secondstrade kept decreasing the payments until everyone quit and their original account got hacked, IIRC. 

[Quickseller]

Another example was, IIRC, the "777" campaign as they paid very little but accepted everyone(?), and attracted many spammers.

I don't think it was 777, unless there's something I don't know or unless Lutpin wasn't managing it at some point.  My sense of history is not good on campaigns.  Yobit and Secondstrade fit that description, though.  They took anyone, and Secondstrade kept decreasing the payments until everyone quit and their original account got hacked, IIRC. 

I may have been thinking about secondstrade. It looks like lutpin was in fact managing the 777 campaign starting in July 2016, however before lutpin took over (a new thread was created by lightlord), the pay was very low, but it looks like the amount of spam generated by that campaign was mitigated because of the limited number of spots.

[minthit]

I feel you bro. I guess you're a hypocrite yourself.

@PsylockReborn Have no problem with that. I'm not even whining though.

If you look at how people posted in 2011 vs. today, you'll see an incredible difference in the quality of posts.

@The Pharmacist I do enjoy reading those posts and feeling the goosebumps.

I just happen to have certain spammy sections on ignore and it doesn't bother me personally.

So, it's that the ICO section is already spammy and no need for a subsection? Now, I see.

The incentive was that if many users over time made garbage posts while advertising for the company, then the company's reputation would suffer and the advertising would do more harm than good.

@Quickseller That's something I assume creating a subsection could bring about.

So which is it then, do we need mods or not?

@suchmoon It's not about removing mod. (I don' think there's anything I said so. Maybe my english.)  It's about reducing the workload of mods by delegating some of the responsibility to campaign managers rather than letting the mods handle each and every individual shitposts.

And you can't ban members from posting in a topic, or a board

- They are bypassing cloudfare, which even some mods are unable to(the scrapping bot is no longer working(?) and the Autoban bot as well).
 - They are making every board their victim, by spamming, making things worse for those who report the bots and for the mods.

@pugman New for me and I won't be able to know these on my own.
Well, thanks guys. Pls let me know if I have to lock this thread.

P.S. It would be better if every post is not directed towards merit. I'm sure there are people who don't care much or being neutral about merit. Peace!:)

[Welsh]

I thought I remember Primedice being alright, and ran well. That was a bloody long time ago though, and can't really recall who was hired. I don't think I remember Secondstrade at all. I guess recently we've had better run campaigns, because of the issues that are now widespread. At least a few years ago the spam problem wasn't as apparent.