Is the Default trust system still working/active?

[theymos]

I don't like how the current system is working at all. It was never intended to be a top-down "decision-making body". Everyone is supposed to set a custom list, and DefaultTrust is supposed to just be a stepping stone for newbies.

But what do you propose to fix it? Keep in mind that:
 - The #1 thing to be avoided is someone keeping illegitimate positive trust for long, since that facilitates scamming.
 - It's kind of OK for someone to get illegitimate negative trust, but if it's wrong then it should be removed eventually.
 - Other than that, it's best to have as many ratings trusted as possible.

Some possibilities which have come to my mind:

Force custom lists

Display an annoying message instead of a trust score next to every post until the person sets a custom list with the assistance of the set initial trust page.

Pros:
 - No remnant of top-down decision-making remains.
Cons:
 - Newbies will often choose poorly, especially since the suggested list is possibly manipulable.
 - I've been thinking that I might want to enable trust for non-users, and that'd be impossible with this.

Athenian democracy

Every month, pick ~30 random users from the set of users who meet certain fairly strict criteria. Those users are DT1 for the month. As a special exception to the normal trust network construction algorithm, distrusts in DT1 will also affect DT1; ie. if a user on DT1 has -1 or less net trusters on DT1, then they will not be considered to be on DT1 anymore.

Pros:
 - I think that it'd end up being fairly accurate on average.
 - It strongly encourages people to maintain good trust lists at all times.
 - Since it'd be erratic, it'd encourage people to not use DefaultTrust, which I don't want people to be doing.
 - It's not very top-down, though in some cases major failures might require manual adjustment.
 - It can be used by non-users.
Cons:
 - The stability everyone has gotten used to with DT will be gone.
 - Some degree of abuse is inevitable. There will be constant battles to get things working reasonably.

Voting

I'm not a fan of voting, especially in an environment like this where sockpuppets are impossible to prevent, but maybe it could be made to work with sufficient layers and oversight. For a while I was thinking about a complicated system in which users would self-assign themselves to "tribes", elect tribal leaders, and then the leaders would construct DT1 (plus some other stuff). I think I've decided that this particular method would be overly complicated and not sufficiently useful, though. Alternatives are possible.

Algorithmic

Maybe there's some algorithmic way of looking at the universal trust graph and pulling out a DT1 which would guarantee several important properties, even in the face of manipulation. I thought about it for a while, but I couldn't figure anything out.


If you have specific suggestions for alterations to the current DT1 list, then make a topic about it. I think that the system is structurally flawed as it is now, though.

[suchmoon]

I don't see anything particularly bad about forcing custom lists. Yes, some users will choose poorly but the other options are potentially as much or more dangerous - e.g. if there's a flaw or loophole in the algorithm it would impose wrong choices on users without their knowledge or input.

Other than that - some combination of "Athenian" + "Voting" perhaps, where a certain set of users can vote? Random sounds a bit scary.

[jackg]

Maybe start with the annoying message once people reach member status or even full member. With a hint that if they don’t know who to add, then dot add anyone.

DT seems to be overvalued and seems to be made a rank in itself for some reason...

[OgNasty]

I've always thought the trust system worked pretty well.  Even in cases where users have positive trust that I don't agree with, it seemed to take community opinion over a "top-down" approach.  However, I'm always open to seeing improvements.

Every month, pick ~30 random users from the set of users who meet certain fairly strict criteria.

It sounds like the benefit of this approach would be more DT1 users, but also a rotating approach that could help point out users with poor networks who could use adjusting.  Over time, I could see this being great, but would likely involve a more hands on approach from the users being selected and random is a bit scary.

Why not expand the current DT1 system?  It sounds like most of the complaints about it are that people aren't included.  Why not take a look at how expanding the current DT1 members to 30 would effect the system and perhaps moving to a random rotating approach if that goes well?

[Anduck]

I’m surprised Sirius isn’t dt1, afaik he’s still holding the domain for this site.

He's not holding the domain.

If a DT1 member trusts someone for whatever reason, I think the DT1 member is fully justified in adding the member to his trust list, thereby making that member a DT2 member.

This is how it should be, but in practice hasn't been like that for years.

It shouldn't matter in the least if the newly-anointed DT2 member is active or leaves a lot of feedback or anything else.  The point is that the DT2 member can be trusted.  He's not required to be a scam buster or to use his DT status for anything if he doesn't want to.  Hell, I don't recognize half the DT2 members on that list, but I wouldn't argue that they should be removed just because they're inactive.

I agree. Sadly, DT1 members do not agree with us. I've talked recently with few DT1 members (who I could contact, several of them are unresponsive or inactive) and how they describe DT is very far from your view.

not required to be a scam buster

I think DT is more for placing valid scammer tags and the only sure avenu to becoming DT is to become a scambuster and leave a lot of valid negative feedback.
DT positive is very conservative because you are basically staking your reputation to vouch for someone, or risking the reputation of your judgment for not much gain. Moreso adding someone to DT2 because then you are staking your judgment on them not only not to scam, but on their judgment of others not to scam. It's just much easier and safer not to, and their isn't much upside.

I disagree. DT should be a list of people who are unlikely to scam others. Nothing else. It should not be used as some "ultimately trusted people" -list, as that's as real as unicorns. There have been plenty of scammers in DT. And I can tell you that scammers know their way in to that list, no matter how curated or small you want to keep it. So DT, if it has to exist, should merely act as a list of people unlikely to scam others. People should in general form their own trust networks, so I find the whole DT list largely unneeded.

Negatives are 99.9% provable fact and positives are a judgement call, the way feedback is used.

Untrue. Negatives are largely based on pure opinions and incompetence. E.g. look at my trust rating received from SaltySpitoon (a DT1 member). He rated me red, because I did a vendor bid on my auction ~3 years ago. I had not stated that the auction was without reserve, as it was not without reserve. (E.g. the U.S. law states that auctions are by default with reserve and all no reserve is a special rule.) So I did this vendor bid, which is a sort of a concealed reserve price. SaltySpitoon is lying that I didn't honor the auction. I didn't back then know about the Bitcointalk auction standard, which is quite vague and not specified anywhere, but is something one just has to know. I didn't know back then that vendor bids are not cool in here. They're very commonly done in my country. In any case, vendor bids are not scamming, unethical or anything like that. So this rating by SaltySpitoon is wrecking my trust score and is listed in "trusted rating" page for all the people who trust DT, and it's based on SaltySpitoon's incompetent opinion. It's unfair, unjust and shows incredibly bad judgement, but there's nothing anyone can do about it except theymos. Nobody will go against a DT1 member publicly, Believe me, cliques and what not exist around DT.

Scambusters and negative tags are very beneficial to the community to warn others and stop bad actors while positives are only good for what?, saving some traders some escrow fees and slight complexity in trading?
Positives don't really help a person much while negatives have a massive impact.

Agree. And when negatives are used poorly, like they are... There have been various cases where DT members are misusing or abusing the system to boost their ego or whatever. In even more cases, the negative and positive ratings are given without proper basis. E.g. Vod rated me because I told him privately that I don't specifically trust him. Ego got hurt and shows.

@eddie, I don’t like that sort of system as we have now.

I don’t think scam busters should be on dt merely for being scam busters and it’s why quite a few have gone on to scam and also why mdayonliner got negative trust too.
A system in which verifiable trades get chives positive trust in return, is as I see it, a much better system. Call me old fashioned, I like people to only give trust when they’ve had something at stake and it’s paid off.

This also highlights one of the issues about DT: people have very different views about what it should be. And people in DT positions have different views too, and use them according to their own view. This makes it a bad thing.

DT list should be removed completely. Right now it's acting as a "elite", "trusted people" list while that's only the perception of it. Reality may be totally different. There have been very nasty scammers on the DT list, even on DT1. It took a long time until the worst ones got removed. There are still untrustworthy people who do their shit only occasionally, so they are not removed. My point is that it's not a list I would suggest trusting. It has objectively not worked very well at protecting big scams from happening. It has and is only working to protect newbies from getting scammed in some ridiculous way. So it should be used for that purpose only. Best would be to remove the DT completely -- it would encourage people to make their own lists just like trust networks are supposed to work. Of course there's some steep curve in the beginning, but isn't there always?

Also, DT1's who have added people to DT2 may have been completely inactive for years, so who will remove them? Curating is not working properly and it's in the hands of a couple people. Not good.

I would guess many of the current DT-members were much less than 4 years old when they were added, which would mean getting on DT is harder now than it was 4 years ago. Of course it doesn't help that so many new users are spammers, but the number of decent posters went up too when Bitcoin gained popularity.

I asked to be included in the DT list. I've been here for years, and around the scene for years. I've also traded a lot, and so on. I've also acted as "a judge" on various cases as I've moderated e.g. Bitcoin IRC channels for years.

I received mainly three kinds of responses from DT members:
1) Adding anyone who has a negative from some other DT is not possible without insane drama. This is where DT has evolved. There are tons of drama always around and obviously some people (DT1) get the heat.
2) I don't post enough positive or negative feedbacks. (one of this came from someone who is a lot less active regarding feedbacks than me, so I wonder this a little...)
3) I've rated positively someone they don't like. (and the person I have rated positively has dozens of positive ratings from various other people too, also from people on DT)

Some possibilities which have come to my mind:

Force custom lists

Display an annoying message instead of a trust score next to every post until the person sets a custom list with the assistance of the set initial trust page.

Pros:
 - No remnant of top-down decision-making remains.
Cons:
 - Newbies will often choose poorly, especially since the suggested list is possibly manipulable.
 - I've been thinking that I might want to enable trust for non-users, and that'd be impossible with this.

I think this is the best option. They will anyway rely on using DT (with the current system) and this is a step forward where there's no real DT, but still something (individual) that acts as such. Also new users would need to pick the users themselves, so they'd acknowledge it at that very point that they have chosen those "trusted" users themselves, and nobody did it for them.

If you have specific suggestions for alterations to the current DT1 list, then make a topic about it. I think that the system is structurally flawed as it is now, though.

Here's mine: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5081293.new#new

[Cashi]

Improving the DT system is a good idea, but we should consider the consequences if we remove someone from DT or make a weak system changing every month. Don't forget about the bounty cheaters which will see a chance of getting their account rid of a red tag. When Lauda was removed from DT2 many tagged accounts were untagged. Imagine if some more DT2 are removed, the spam would go to moon  
Adding more members to DT1 or DT2 is inevitable in my opinion. There are so many accounts not tagged yet for bounty abuse although the proof is obvious. The few DT members tagging them are too busy and it's just unfair if most of the recently reported cheaters can still escape. I provided a proof of hacked or sold accounts abusing bounties and they are still not tagged.
There are so many reports not reviewed. If all the cheaters will be tagged the spam would be reduced a lot.

Therefore I would increase the DT1 members up to 30 by adding trustworthy DT2 members. This will keep the existing ratings intact and fix some issues we have right now (not enough DT to tag already reported cheaters).

Edit:
@OP, the link to dserrano5 is wrong, correct version is here: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=profile;u=17768

[r1s2g3]

Best way is to use your own brain and judgement while dealing with others and you do not need any custom list/forum supplied list/ or more people in DT.

[Findingnemo]

Lot of cheaters aren't getting tagged due to unavailability of DT members on this forum and only few members were constantly finding cheaters and negging them so we need to add more DT members for the system to work with full potential I believe.

[coinlocket$]

I think the idea of the current DT system is working in a good way the only problem is that is the that the list of Dt1 is stopped at 5 years ago and the list dt2 is stopped a couple of years ago.
Maybe you just have to expand this list and add a couple of trusted people to the list dt1 (without shady past) and a dozen active people to the list dt2.
Also, you could add to the list dt2 some people who "are taking care of the forum" and who punish the people who are abusing the forum and not only people who managing the marketplace.
Or creating a new DT2 rank with any name and doing this kind of work, it's unpleasant to see that a large part of people here https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=2544574.new#new and here https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=4695194.msg42378900#msg42378900 are not tagged for abusing since a year, since almost nobody of DT cares about them.
Finally, I do not believe that a dynamic dt1 is a great idea, in the end it could be a goot trust network, but for the first months we would have trustworth people with negative rep for revenge and vice versa scammers with positive rep.

[Vod]

Default Trust has done a pretty good job of holding scammers at bay.

I believe without the system, the amount of scams would be several times higher.

I'm OK with pushing custom lists (I don't use them) but removing the trust system completely would be a mistake of epic proportions.  People would run ponzis, promote paypal, bid on their own auctions,  post fake facts, etc. etc. 

Personally I have tagged over 1,300! untrustworthy people.  My actions have led to the majority of scammers thinking twice about pulling a common scam.

[yahoo62278]

I think the idea of the current DT system is working in a good way the only problem is that is the that the list of Dt1 is stopped at 5 years ago and the list dt2 is stopped a couple of years ago.
Maybe you just have to expand this list and add a couple of trusted people to the list dt1 (without shady past) and a dozen active people to the list dt2.
Also, you could add to the list dt2 some people who "are taking care of the forum" and who punish the people who are abusing the forum and not only people who managing the marketplace.
Or creating a new DT2 rank with any name and doing this kind of work, it's unpleasant to see that a large part of people here https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=2544574.new#new and here https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=4695194.msg42378900#msg42378900 are not tagged for abusing since a year, since almost nobody of DT cares about them.
Finally, I do not believe that a dynamic dt1 is a great idea, in the end it could be a goot trust network, but for the first months we would have trustworth people with negative rep for revenge and vice versa scammers with positive rep.

The current dt2 list did not stop 2 years ago. Marlboroza and the pharmacist were recently added within the last 6 months.

Regardless, it does feel like a good ol boys club at times and more people need to be added to dt1 so the current lists can increase and more users have a valuable opinion as far as who is or who isnt a scammer.

Right now with all the scam icos going around, you can never have enough eyes protecting the community.

Doesnt matter what is done, some people will be pissed off while some will obviously be pleased.

There will always be users who just do not get along. Only thing I would like to see is people consider the drama train that will arise when deciding on whom to add to either list. Choose users who can have an unbiased opinion and help the forum vs assholes who will go on a power trip.

There really is no reason to create a new list every month or whatnot. The users that made dt1 have earned that prestige. They have proven they belong on the list.

I do agree however that inactives or scammers should be immediately removed.

[Quickseller]

I tried using my own custom trust list, but was fairly quick to find problems with trust ratings within my trust network, and frequently had to research why  certain people whose ratings I didn't agree with was in my trust network, and excluding many who either gave many ratings I disagreed with, or who included many people who I didn't want in my trust network.

I suspect the root cause reason why so many do not use custom trust lists is because so many people are bad at creating maintaining a custom list, and cannot be bothered to keep it updated. It only takes a small number of people whose ratings/list is 'trusted' that maintains a bad trust list to cause problems in the entire trust network.

I want to think about this topic some more....more to come on this subject

[The Cryptovator]

I don't like how the current system is working at all.

Trust system is working fine, but DT list should refresh. I have made a thread about inactive DT member list, https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5025480.msg45474059#msg45474059 . There are lots if DT inactive. Especially on DT1. So if DT1 is inactive who will add new DT2? And I think there is more people's who deserve DT member's. I think list has not updated from long time. I believe list need to refresh. More DT could be add due many are inactive.

I'm not a fan of voting,

You can get suggestion from existing DT member's if you don't trust on voting. However current trust system should be continue due to prevent scam from forum. Just need improve with time. I think it's possible upgrade few members from DT2 to DT1 so DT1 could expand thier trust network.

[jackg]

I sense cryptocvators idea is essentially what theymos has already  shunned (making dt3 viewable like 1 and 2 are).

If it goes ahead, a lot of moderation of inaccurate forefinger ,Igbo be required as dt3 members might have given some negs where a dt2 would have given a neutral for example.

[eddie13]

I don't like how the current system is working at all.

I don't mind the current DT system however centralized it may be because I trust and have great respect for the vast majority of those currently enlisted.
I think they check eachother pretty well also when their are disagreements everyone comes together to make sense of the situation, even non-DT have a voice, and usually everyone steps away with continuing mutual respect. Everyone misunderstands or is wrong sometimes.

But, if you really don't like it for being a "top down" structure I think you could scrap the appointed positions of power part and rather use an algorithm to calculate the weight of everyones sent feedback to be summed to each accounts final trust score.

Something like..
[(Activity/1000)Rank](Trust/20) = Weight of left feedback

Variables for "Rank" could be something like Legendary=1 Hero=0.75 Sr.=0.5 Full=0.25 with all lower ranks zero and "Trust" would be the feedback leavers current trust score. If the solution is negative (negative summed trust) weight=0
(Abuse resistance)

For a 900 activity hero with a trust score of 50 leaving a positive trust [(900/1000)0.75](50/20)=1.6875 round to 2 decimals would give the feedback receiver +1.69 to their trust score.

For a (very trusted old member) legendary with 2000 activity and 200 trust score giving a positive [(2000/1000)1](200/20)= 20 would leave +20

So the more established and trusted a member is, the harder their trust hits (more weight), and you would have to be atleast a full member, with net positive trust, for your feedback to carry any weight at all.  

A persons Trust score would be the sum of all received feedback. Negative left feedback would just be negative in the sum and subtract from the final score with equal weight.

In the risked BTC column you could give the option to enter a modifier from 0 to 1 so a person could reduce the weight of their feedback if they want.
He could type in "1.25 #0.5" so the legendary example above could leave only +10, or type "1.25 #0.1" to leave only +2. (for 1.25 risked BTC example)
[(Activity/1000)Rank](Trust/20)(user modifier)

So a person could tone down the weight of the feedback they leave if they feel it is appropriate so they wouldn't have to be so conservative with every feedback they leave which is the case now. Maybe leave it continually editable for later changes.

If you wanted to keep the Time part you could add [(Activity/1000)Rank](Trust/20)(Time)(user modifier) where each month equals 0.1 maxing out in 10 months as 1 so it would grow throughout 10 months to its full strength.

I'm no mathematician and I just chose my numbers to try to get a reasonably ranged result.

I don't much like to make suggestions because I am just a nobody and not a genius but I think a system like this would be cool to see.
I don't think this should be done but rather should be considered and brainstormed upon unless their are serious flaws in my logic I am not seeing.

I would probably just leave it alone because it is a lot better than nothing. Maybe an algorithmic system like this could be implemented in parallel with the current system at first so the old system doesn't have to get completely scrapped while working out the bugs and adjusting to the new system.

I don't consider this "a suggestion for alteration to the current DT1 list" so won't make an OP about it.

[Vod]

Variables for "Rank" could be something like Legendary=1 Hero=0.75 Sr.=0.5 Full=0.25 with all lower ranks zero and "Trust" would be the feedback leavers current trust score. If the solution is negative (negative summed trust) weight=0
(Abuse resistance)

This forum stands out by not tying a person's trustworthiness to how often they post.

[coinlocket$]

~
I do agree however that inactives or scammers should be immediately removed.

In the end, I agree with what you say and I don't think we need to change the DT system (but they can do, is not a big deal to me if it will be a better version of this one), we just need to add few DT1 and some DT2 with them.
I think that with only adding very active people it can change the forum in a better place.

[Anduck]

Any updates regarding this?

[LoyceV]

Any updates regarding this?

There's this suggestion:

With the introduction of reporting badges on the horizon we should consider introducing badges for other things. Most importantly I think looking at the possibly of rewarding a badge for setting a custom trust list. The trust system is wholeheartedly broken and theymos has even said himself its not working as intended.  We are not sure of the positive effects that badges bring at the moment. But this is why reporting statistics should be released before the implementation of the badges and then after an initial period (3 months) we should look to see if this has increased the number of reports being made.

I think it's a very good idea! A shiny badge under a name will be something others notice, and if clicking it brings you to your trust settings, more users can be encouraged to make their own list.
(I haven't made my own list yet, because I want to be able to see trust the way most users see it)

[suchmoon]

Or we could airdrop worthless tokens Howeycoins for creating custom lists. 90% of the forum would do it overnight.