MERITS: Will doing this be uncertain, or should I do this?

[Stedsm]

Guys, I've got something in my mind. Keeping merits in my account is useless for me as well as it always remind me of my responsibility that I am currently able to give them to someone who actually needs them.

What I wish to know: If I allocate some or all of my merits to a person I feel that they deserve it and that they should rank up, is it really fine if I do it like that way?

I was doing everything in favor of low rank members until I saw this:

I agree with this approach. I considered giving merit proportional to activity, but I decided not to because doing so would probably give far more undeserved merit than deserved merit in total. But undoubtedly some people got screwed by this, and if they have decent posts, by all means, give them the 250 or 500 merit that they need to rank-up.

I also agree with the idea of (free) "reviewer" topics in general, for finding high-quality posts that went unnoticed. Barcode_ created one in the Chinese section, as well.

It's a quote from a thread by QuestionAuthority, please visit it as it won my heart and changed the way I used to think. Please don't come up begging for them, and also, please don't post stupid comments like: "They are your merits, it's your wish, you can do whatever you wish to." As I'm looking for some factual comments here and suggestions as well, please be fair in your words and let me know whether it'll be fair enough if I do it like this way?

I'm also scared of one thing that when we give higher amount of merits to users, others start backbiting and say that this user is an alt of that and blah! blah!

Is it not unfair with people like us who are trying to help?

If merits are mine, can't I decide whom they should be allocated to?

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[UserU]

Personally you're free to give to whoever that deserves them.

Every opinion is subjective. Just because someone doesn't like how its posted, it doesn't mean its bad.

As long as you're not simply giving them to copy-pastas, personal attacks, short one-liners and spam, there's nothing wrong spending them your way.

[Obiwankenodium]

Basically you dont want to hear that its your merit and you can give them how you want. But in the end isnt that what it is? There is no right or wrong with giving out your own smerits and you seem to have thought about it how you would like to do it.

[elda34b]

What I wish to know: If I allocate some or all of my merits to a person I feel that they deserve it and that they should rank up, is it really fine if I do it like that way?

IMO If your judgment is based on their post quality, then you can do it. Like it or not, there will always be someone who questions your decisions, but as long as you give it to decent post (not one line garbage, hard to understand post, plagiarism, etc) then I'd say you're safe. Don't forget to see their post history before you decide to give them a huge amount of merits, because some spammer might change their posting style in order to get merits but after that they'll turn back and start spamming again.

I'd argue that most of the time, we can generally agree whether people are abusing merit or not. So you don't have to be afraid. Best of luck.

[r1s2g3]

If it is a good post then you will not be questioned. Since you talked about QA in your OP. I think this thread will be certainly of your interest.

[mk4]

Is it not unfair with people like us who are trying to help?

If merits are mine, can't I decide whom they should be allocated to?

It's pretty simple. Deciding on what a "good post" is, is hugely subjective; like some people in this thread already said. As long as you think the person deserves it, then go for it. I just don't think you should give them hundreds in one go. Probably only give them a decent number of merits, depending on how useful their posts are. If you think a certain person actually deserves the rank up, probably spread the merits out on the person's posts.

Yes, you are to decide to whom to give the merit to. But if you give merits to people who don't deserve it but you just wanted to help them, then that beats the purpose of why we have the merit system in the first place; to potentially prevent spammers for joining campaigns, and or to prevent spammers in general.

[Kopyleft]

I believe the new system only allows you to send 50 merits to a specific user within a month, so that's the highest you can award in a post.

As to whether it's right or wrong. That's not a debate, that can be conclusively defined. There's a reason members ration there merits; so they can have some more to give if they come across another deserving post, and except you are a source your sendable merits is limited to how much you can acquire. And there is the likelihood of you running out of smerits when handing them out in very generous amounts

I'm also scared of one thing that when we give higher amount of merits to users, others start backbiting and say that this user is an alt of that and blah! blah!

There already are members who do that (complain about members merit sending habit), but, if you are consistent in your distribution that would answer any query anyone might have.
But this is the Internet, there would always be trolls.

[Jet Cash]

We need to get away from the idea that if a person only has one leg and a pregnant sister, then we need to award merits. You are only doing it so that they can spam the forum, and earn a bit of extra cash. Merits are for people who support the forum, and provide helpful and informative posts.  This doesn't mean that you only give merits to posts that would win a Pulitzer prize, but they should certainly be above average, and of benefit to the forum. For some time now, I've been looking at the post histories of some members, and where they make consistent posts that encourage further discussion, I've been awarding merit for posting behaviour, rather than just for individual posts.

[khaled0111]

Giving a huge number of merits to one post may have side effects.
Your intentions may be good and you want to help him to rank up,
but, as you said, 90% of users will think it is your alt and such they will avoid dealing with him.

If he was able to create such valuable post, he probably has many of them, you can give few merits to each one.

If I may ask: why do you want to get rid of your sMerits?
just keep them and whenever you find a good post, give it the amount it deserves.

Sending merits can't be reverted, what if you give all your sMerits to one user than discover that his post was copy pasted from someone else!!

[CryptopreneurBrainboss]

I've been awarding merit for posting behaviour, rather than just for individual posts.

I second you on this. I also put that into consideration when it's someone I haven't merited before also I have merited users for following post rules when quality was average for keeping the forum healthy.

@Stedsm, you can try increasing the amount of smerit to the quality posts you merit maybe that'll solve your having much smerit issue. Notice you didn't merit any user  between November -December last year and your first merited user in 2019 got 15merits (and receiver is using it for a good course)  so you're good.

[Stedsm]

We need to get away from the idea that if a person only has one leg and a pregnant sister, then we need to award merits. You are only doing it so that they can spam the forum, and earn a bit of extra cash. Merits are for people who support the forum, and provide helpful and informative posts.  This doesn't mean that you only give merits to posts that would win a Pulitzer prize, but they should certainly be above average, and of benefit to the forum. For some time now, I've been looking at the post histories of some members, and where they make consistent posts that encourage further discussion, I've been awarding merit for posting behaviour, rather than just for individual posts.

Based on your theory, should only members with higher ranks or at least Full members with high activity be looked in, to see if they've got something informative and helpful to the forum? As almost 99% newbies are completely new to this concept and many of them don't even know the basics of Bitcoin, how can we expect such above-average posts from them? They can learn and say something in their words but most of them fail to make it look a well-said post.

Giving a huge number of merits to one post may have side effects. Your intentions may be good and you want to help him to rank up, but, as you said, 90% of users will think it is your alt and such they will avoid dealing with him.

Noted. That's the reason why I created this thread, to know whether the community will support this or not.

If he was able to create such valuable post, he probably has many of them, you can give few merits to each one.

One more good point noted.

If I may ask: why do you want to get rid of your sMerits? just keep them and whenever you find a good post, give it the amount it deserves.

Sending merits can't be reverted, what if you give all your sMerits to one user than discover that his post was copy pasted from someone else!!

I've never said that I'm in any kind of a hurry to give out my sMerits to anyone at a stretch or in a single shot, but rather look for better people who deserved good amount of merits on their posts but didn't receive. This plagiarism is one such issue I'm scared of, and if I accidentally (not intentionally) give out merits to such user who copy-pasted content from someone else's, will I also be blameworthy with that user?

[Alone055]

If I allocate some or all of my merits to a person I feel that they deserve it and that they should rank up, is it really fine if I do it like that way?

About all of your sMerits in one go (assuming they are between 20-40), I would say no.

About some of them, yes, if:

1. The user is in a rank where he requires a few more Merits to rank up, and the post in question deserves to get that many Merits.

2. You are not showering him with Merits for only that particular post and passing him to the next tier, but you are sure of his post history being constantly constructive.

[AdolfinWolf]

Based on your theory, should only members with higher ranks or at least Full members with high activity be looked in, to see if they've got something informative and helpful to the forum? As almost 99% newbies are completely new to this concept and many of them don't even know the basics of Bitcoin, how can we expect such above-average posts from them? They can learn and say something in their words but most of them fail to make it look a well-said post.

..Then they don't "deserve" merit? I'm pretty sure the system was/is intended to work this way.

I agree though, for the average newbie, it's not going to be easy to rank up.
When placing myself in their shoes, i'm pretty sure i would've not received any/a lot of merits either for my first half year of posting here.

What I wish to know: If I allocate some or all of my merits to a person I feel that they deserve it and that they should rank up, is it really fine if I do it like that way?

If you're willing to shake off probably a dozen allegations of the account in question being your alt (As i'm pretty sure no user has ever received more than 250 merit in 1 go..?)  sure.

[o_e_l_e_o]

I think this other post by theymos answers most of your questions:

If they complain about amounts, tell them to complain to me. It's best if sources try to exhaust their source allocations, even if it means giving posts higher amounts than is typical. If you have 150 source merit and you only see 3 merit-worthy posts in a month, then I'd rather you over-give each of them 50 merit than let the merit expire. That way there are more people capable of sending merit, and the "merit economy" is less top-down.

If a DT member tags you for something stupid involving merit (ie. probably anything less than selling merit), then they're not going to be a DT member for much longer.

Aside from that, if people complain about whether things deserve merit at all, then that's something to perhaps think about, but if you conclude that they're wrong, then that's that. You don't need to stress about it or defend yourself constantly. It's conceivable that someday you and I will end up disagreeing too much about this stuff and I'll remove your source status, but it's really not a big deal.

It's fine to merit any post you like, and it's fine to give as many merit as you want to a post (even 50).

I have much different criteria for meriting newbies compared to senior members. Yes, the vast majority of newbies aren't contributing anything particularly new or groundbreaking, but if they are making an effort to contribute something, learn, ask, discuss, etc, and not just spam, then I'll considering throwing a merit their way. But no, most newbies won't rank up because most newbies are only here to try join bounty campaigns.

This plagiarism is one such issue I'm scared of, and if I accidentally (not intentionally) give out merits to such user who copy-pasted content from someone else's, will I also be blameworthy with that user?

No, you will not be held responsible. Probably every merit source has merited users that have since been banned for plagiarism. It happened to me just a few days ago: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5093301.msg49088232#msg49088232. You can also see a list of "Top merit senders to permabanned users" here: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=merit;stats=topsendban. There are some very senior members on that list, including several staff members. They are not held responsible. If users were held responsible, the entire merit system would grind to a halt as everyone would be too scared to merit anything.

[crairezx20]

I don't think it is good to give a large amount of merit to a post except if the post is really high quality but if you give a large amount of merit to low-quality post they will think that you are alts of the account.

Some trusted and well known high-rank members here in the forum are giving merit randomly even the post is not helpful or high quality.

So it depends on you if you can give them merit or not but don't give a high amount of merit to low-quality post. For safety purposes.

[Ispep]

I don't think it is good to give a large amount of merit to a post except if the post is really high quality but if you give a large amount of merit to low-quality post they will think that you are alts of the account.

Merits have been given in large amounts on the forum,both deservedly and other wise,and most times thats for the merit awarded to decide,i have seen a one line post,with ten merits or so,go unquestioned,so why not 20,30 or even 40 for those in which a little effort is put into it
Definitely you wouldn't be giving out merits in that much large amount,except you're a merit source as you'll run out of them sooner or later,which could come back to bite if you come across another worthy one
Thus it's best to keep it simple and give a high amount to high quality and a fair amount to averagely quality posts

[Pmalek]

1. The user is in a rank where he requires a few more Merits to rank up, and the post in question deserves to get that many Merits.

I agree with this and would like to add the following. Since theymos mentioned that some users got "screweed over" with the invention of the merit system, maybe it wouldn't be a bad idea to give those users a certain advantage when you are handing out merits, since they were close to gaining a higher rank and missed it by an inch. I think I saw a table about unlucky users who got affected by the merit system or sth like that but I cant find it now. I am sure there could be a way to check that though.

@o_e_l_e_o
Thanks for sharing that quote by theymos, it is encouraging that he would support such a decision if the merits are given to quality posts.

[kingpin4321]

Merit it's self should be seen as a big deal a holy grail something that is of good value.
We have great post and posters in this forum and in my own opinion a user getting as above 20merit from a particular meriter would be definitely undermining the value of merit
"well only if the post is a successful suggestions of how to get bitcoin to reach $50k" lol

But on a serious note once there is a very good post it catches the eyes of various possible meritters.

Merit should not be given because of ranking up, name, clicks, countryman, friends e.t c merit should be giving according to that particular post that was made turning blind eyes to what the merit can do for the user  

[LoyceV]

I'm also scared of one thing that when we give higher amount of merits to users, others start backbiting and say that this user is an alt of that and blah! blah!

Merit isn't only meant to limit ranking up, it's also meant to highlight good posts. I wouldn't send all merit to just one post, make the amount appropriate to the quality of the posts. I first did that here:

If I interpret this post from theymos slightly out of context:

~ if they have decent posts, by all means, give them the 250 or 500 merit that they need to rank-up.

You're not a spammer, you engage in decent conversation, and you use the forum as a forum instead of an ATM. I think you deserve the Merit needed to rank up.

I'm posting this here as a reference in case someone wonders/questions why I went on a meriting spree
Note: sending Merit doesn't necessarily mean I agree with a post.

This was my Merit spree:

Code:

December 24, 2018, 05:19:32 PM: 1 from LoyceV for Re: [ANN]XDNA-Revolution in mining|GPU ONLY HEX algo|Charity Support|NoICO|Cryptopia
December 24, 2018, 05:19:32 PM: 1 from LoyceV for Re: [XRP] Ripple Speculation
December 24, 2018, 05:19:32 PM: 1 from LoyceV for Re: Wall Observer BTC/USD - Bitcoin price movement tracking & discussion
December 24, 2018, 05:19:31 PM: 1 from LoyceV for Re: ARK - Blockchains Interoperability with SmartBridge 🔹 ARK Core v2 Live 🔹
December 24, 2018, 05:19:31 PM: 1 from LoyceV for Re: 1080Ti Specific - Best mining option
December 24, 2018, 05:19:31 PM: 1 from LoyceV for Re: Merit & new rank requirements
December 24, 2018, 05:19:30 PM: 1 from LoyceV for Re: NEW BAKKT game
December 24, 2018, 05:19:30 PM: 2 from LoyceV for Re: A simple bitcoin Q/A. Learn new and interesting stuff about bitcoin.
December 24, 2018, 05:19:29 PM: 1 from LoyceV for Re: NEW BAKKT game
December 24, 2018, 05:19:29 PM: 1 from LoyceV for Re: Community generated suggestions to improve the forum (+ eventual voting on them)
December 24, 2018, 05:19:29 PM: 1 from LoyceV for Re: [ANN] Ethereum: Welcome to the Beginning
December 24, 2018, 05:19:28 PM: 1 from LoyceV for Re: Anyone here that experience a long bear market besides this one?

By spreading the Merit over many posts, you also get to read them and make sure the user deserves it.
A week after I did this, theymos doubled my source sMerit, so I assume it's approved

I made another "targeted Rank up" here and unloaded some more here.

However, I wouldn't have done this if I wouldn't be a Merit source. Do with my opinion what you want

(As i'm pretty sure no user has ever received more than 250 merit in 1 go..?)

The maximum is 50 per post, and 50 per user per month.

You can also see a list of "Top merit senders to permabanned users" here: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=merit;stats=topsendban. There are some very senior members on that list, including several staff members. They are not held responsible. If users were held responsible

That list doesn't say anyting about the posts, a banned user can still have good posts (let's ignore plagiarism for this statement ).

[o_e_l_e_o]

That list doesn't say anyting about the posts, a banned user can still have good posts (let's ignore plagiarism for this statement ).

Oh, for sure. And the actual content of some plagiarized posts can be really rather good. I was just using the list to highlight the fact that many users, including senior users and staff members, send merits to members who are then banned for a variety of reasons, and no one ever tries to seek retribution on the merit-sender.