thenextking - Merit Sharing With Alt Accounts / Possible Negative Trust Evading

[RivAngE]

I just noticed a person with 62 merits and Jr. Member rank and I instantly noticed something is wrong!

Taking a deeper look it's obvious that this account (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=profile;u=176810) created this account (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=profile;u=1208438) because the 1st one got a lot of negative trust. He/she then spent all the free sMerit to the new account.

As far as I was able to research, there isn't an official rule they're breaking, they're not ban-evading but instead negative-trust-evading. Also having multiple accounts and sharing the merit among yourself... that doesn't seem right but again I didn't find any rule in the merit announcement.

In any case, the purpose of this topic is to bring the matter in the attention of people with more knowledge than me regarding what is accepted and what is not and also with more power than me (aka DT users) to judge the person in question.

I'd also be glad to know if there is an official rule on the matter and I missed it.

[Piggy]

Merits are generally community moderated, but sometime for cases where the abuse is obvious, people do get red trusted.

[MagicSmoker]

Good catch, OP, but this belongs in reputation.

[RivAngE]

Good catch, OP, but this belongs in reputation.

Thanks for pointing out! Believe me, I searched for the right forum to post this but I never thought that under the "Economy>Trading" section there would be a reputation one!
Hopefully a kind moderator would move it there then!

[MagicSmoker]

Scroll down to the bottom of your page and you should see a "move topic" link on the left. And yeah, reputation is in a weird section.

[SFR10]

I'd also be glad to know if there is an official rule on the matter and I missed it.

Only for "merit sources (unfortunately)" but that doesn't mean it's fine for other users to sell/trade/share their merits:

"You are a merit source. The next XXX merit you spend will come from your source rather than your sMerit balance. Merit spent from your source will come back in 30 days. Unused source merit is wasted. It is not allowed for merit sources to sell their merit."

I found this quote slightly disturbing - it would tend to imply that others who are not merit sources are allowed to sell their merits. That rather kills the whole concept.

Good catch, OP, but this belongs in reputation.

Or here: Suspected users that are abusing merit 3.0

[RivAngE]

Thanks SFR10, I posted it there too.
I've learnt a lot from that thread I posted!

[nostrings]

I wish merit abusers would get red trusted more often, they really undermine the system.  They seem to be getting away with it for the time being.

[RivAngE]

I though it'd be better to update the subject and add "Possible Negative Trust Evading".
If I was an untrustworthy person in this account, making a new one wouldn't make me more trustworthy, right?