Is Merit Requirement Per Rank Excessive?

[tranthidung]

I'm just a full member way back 2017 but look me now, reached the rank of Sr. Member because of hard work and dedication.

I understood you feelings, because I started from zero (all of my 272 merits are self-earned), not from Full Member like you, but finally I have become a Senior Member from all my hard works, and my dedication to contribute the forum in my limited ability. The new era of self made users started in January of 2018, and please look at the fact now. In highest paid campaign in the forum, except Chip Mixer, most of participants are self-made users. I think it is the big rewards of merit system and the current rank requirements, the gift is not only merits as well as promotion, but it also is the higher competitive indicator of your account when you rank up with merit system.

[erikalui]

When people have taken 2-3 years to get the Legendary rank, why should 1000 merit be too much to ask for? Not to forget, a person can get merited by many people for just 1 post as well. It's like a free bonus. However, I don't still agree with the merit system but people always have a problem.

[Jet Cash]

I'm fired up this month, so how about letting us have custom titles if we can get to 2,000 merits. It's always good to have new levels for our ambitions.

[finaleshot2016]

When people have taken 2-3 years to get the Legendary rank, why should 1000 merit be too much to ask for? Not to forget, a person can get merited by many people for just 1 post as well. It's like a free bonus. However, I don't still agree with the merit system but people always have a problem.

Merit system didn't affect you since you're a Legendary when it's release. Do you think it's good to have a lot of Legendaries that has no talent, skills, ideas, and knowledge about the blockchain especially in the bitcoin community? I'm not saying that all of the new generations will become like that if there's a chance, most of them will just focus on the bounty and earn a profit without any contribution to our community.

The merit system wasn't created to make people's life worst but to act as a barrier, the legitimate and strongest individuals can enter easily instead of those bounty hunters and shitposters. In your generation, I can say that some of the Legendaries are not quite good and just making money through this platform without any threads created for the development of the community and the blockchain. I'm expecting that if you're a legendary, I should learn something extraordinary from you because you have the experience and you already said that it takes 2-3 years to be a Legendary, that's quite long to have a high level of innovation. If I'm not seeing you as an information giver, do you think the title of being Legendary is worth it?

[Quickseller]

For me, it's like a badge of honor from the forum after spending much time learning bitcoin, learning good things. Or can be said Certificate

I would encourage anyone who questions the value of being a higher ranking account to review this thread.

Quickseller- I'm not saying sources per say. Just a feeling that people who have given out a large amount of merit may tend to merit posts that agree with them more than they would a post they disagree with. Nobodys perfect and I believe most try to merit objectively.

At the very least, this shows a hidden bias. I personally try to remove as much of that bias from the merit I send by soliciting people to make submissions to me of examples of high effort posts, made over a period of time, although I do make some exceptions to this, for example, if one person gives an accurate answer after many people have posted nonsense (so to highlight the accurate answer).

The above also gives the maximum benefit of the doubt to merit sources, that I don't think is necessarily appropriate to give all of them. For example, I have seen at least one merit source make subtle efforts to get rid of certain forum members they do not like, or get along with -- if you accept my conclusions of this at least one person's behavior to be "trying to get rid" of the person, then it would probably not be unreasonable to say they also make an effort to de-facto censor those who they do not agree with. 

[erikalui]

Merit system didn't affect you since you're a Legendary when it's release. Do you think it's good to have a lot of Legendaries that has no talent, skills, ideas, and knowledge about the blockchain especially in the bitcoin community?

Merit system did not affect me but there were many things that affected me on this forum from the time I joined till now and the forum was much worse and it's quite better now. 99% members out here have alt accounts to hide themselves. Legendary members according to you may not have any talent or skills but why do you feel they don't deserve being a Legendary? Why is it such a big thing being a Legendary? For me, Legendary is just a rank and I did not chase down the rank or be desperate to get it nor did I nor anyone else earns it. It's not a degree or a certificate to be proud of. This is just a normal forum for me so I don't really appreciate my rank as much as others do.

There are many Signature Campaigns that accept even such members if they have been reputed and quality posters and I have seen such members even becoming staff members so nothing is impossible here but still people keep complaining. Hence, according to me nobody actually gives so much importance to the rank except for Signature Campaigns.

I'm not saying that all of the new generations will become like that if there's a chance, most of them will just focus on the bounty and earn a profit without any contribution to our community.

Also, can you define what comes under contributing to your community mean? Sharing guides or something?

The merit system wasn't created to make people's life worst but to act as a barrier, the legitimate and strongest individuals can enter easily instead of those bounty hunters and shitposters.

Now this merit thing was introduced to increase quality posting but I have seen nonsensical posts getting merited as nobody has to justify it just like positive feedback which was and is a craze even today.

In your generation, I can say that some of the Legendaries are not quite good and just making money through this platform without any threads created for the development of the community and the blockchain.

What's my generation and your generation like lol

I have been using bitcoins since it was 5 years old and now it's 10, that's the main difference. I have helped many members who were clueless about trading and were trying to be trapped by scammers. And everyone in the world wants to make money which is not wrong and this forum gives you and many others to share information you get. It's not necessary that a Legendary has more information than you have and vice versa. Yes, there may be things you don't understand and know and I may be able to answer them which I do when anybody asks me.  

I'm expecting that if you're a legendary, I should learn something extraordinary from you because you have the experience and you already said that it takes 2-3 years to be a Legendary, that's quite long to have a high level of innovation. If I'm not seeing you as an information giver, do you think the title of being Legendary is worth it?

Being a Legendary member, I have information that I share at times with the community but doesn't mean that I have hardware knowledge etc. as I haven't been into mining or using hardware wallets or created my own coin. When I was a newbie, I was scammed of $200 and that happened on this very forum where I couldn't find the one who scammed me. I just learnt to be more alert and find scammers. There was a time illegal goods and accounts used to be sold openly and that's been stopped to an extent now. Most trustworthy members have gone to jail and turned out to be the biggest scammers. So what kind of extraordinary information are you searching for from Legendaries here that you can't find in so many bitcoin-related guides available online? This is a forum used to share information and everyone can share whatever information they have and no qualification is required.

[tranthidung]

I'm fired up this month, so how about letting us have custom titles if we can get to 2,000 merits. It's always good to have new levels for our ambitions.

I don't think theymos will add new custom title for users who earn above 2000 merits in the near future. There are some potential reasons for this hesitation:
(1) Currently, there are very limited users who actually received more than 2000 merits, only three for now, including theymos.
Theymos might consider to add new title if there are around 100 or 200 or more than 200 users reach that club of above 2000 merits-earned, in my opinion.

Update:

CLUB OF ABOVE 2000 MERITS-EARNED

Rank	User name	BPIP profile	Total Earned-Merits	Trust
Administrator	theymos	theymos	4213	196: 0 / +21
Legendary	LoyceV	LoyceV	2463	105: 0 / +16
Sr. Member	DdmrDdmr	DdmrDdmr	2037	3: 0 / +1

Source:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5115154.msg50583660#msg50583660

(2) There will be potential conflicts between Hero, Legendary and above Ledgendary ranks. It's just a potential conflicts, who knows when the new rank has not yet added?

[manfredmann]

I am currently the 95th most merited person on the forum and in the just under 16 months since the merit system was introduced, I have not yet received sufficient merit required to become a hero member. I was around when a lot of sMerit was airdropped to everyone and a lot of merit was being given out by a lot of people. There are more merit sources now, but much fewer people are now giving out merit.

The above means less than 95 people have become hero members, I know only a small handful of people have become legendary. I don’t know off hand how many have become senior members but I am pretty sure it isn’t many.

Based on the above, I think the merit system needs to be tinkered with a little bit.

I always look upon your ideas especially in the some serious discussions like this. I agree with you and not only for higher members but also to low rank users. Not, all can  create a good or constructive post that can be merited.

And I am one of the proof to it. LOL

[Jet Cash]

(1) Currently, there are very limited users who actually received more than 2000 merits, only three for now, including theymos.
Theymos might consider to add new title if there are around 100 or 200 or more than 200 users reach that club of above 2000 merits-earned, in my opinion.

I think it is good to give people incentives. At the moment many members think that giving Legendary members merits is a waste. This implies that the only use for merits is as a ranking tool. I believe that this is of less importance than their use as a guide for active posters, and a way for them to modulate their behaviour to comply with community standards.

Custom titles is just one possibility. A non-intrusive image in  signatures is another possible incentive. I don't like animated avatars, so those could lead to the blocking of avatars, and would be counter productive. Changing the colour of profile names would be very easy to implement, and it probably wouldn't even require much of a change to the software.

[tranthidung]

Wrong, the kind of approach seriously destroys the main purpose of merit system. Merits are rewards for good, high quality, helpful, constructive things; and constructive posts are always constructive ones because it is the fact, no one can deny constructive posts are not constructive ones, no matter what those posts composed and published by whichever ranked users in the forum.

At the moment many members think that giving Legendary members merits is a waste.

I'm hoping that this system will increase post quality by:
 - Forcing people to post high-quality stuff in order to rank up. If you just post garbage, you will never get even 1 merit point, and you will therefore never be able to put links in your signature, etc.
 - Highlighting good posts with the "Merited by" line.

While we will not be directly moderating this, I encourage people to give merit to posts that are objectively high-quality, not just posts that you agree with.

Merits, in reality, is not a ranking tool. In my opinion, merits and merit system play important role to prevent shitposters move up, but the merit system should be called as high-quality-motivative tool.

This implies that the only use for merits is as a ranking tool.

I agreed with your suggestion, and the key point here is whichever titles or priviledges for potential new rank, it should not give them any financial benefits, that might cause another kind of abusements.

Custom titles is just one possibility. A non-intrusive image in  signatures is another possible incentive. I don't like animated avatars, so those could lead to the blocking of avatars, and would be counter productive. Changing the colour of profile names would be very easy to implement, and it probably wouldn't even require much of a change to the software.

[Jet Cash]

it should not give them any financial benefits, that might cause another kind of abusements.

So that leaves colour changes for profile names. How about purple or gold?

[CryptopreneurBrainboss]

At the moment many members think that giving Legendary members merits is a waste.

It's never a waste as it highlighted the quality of the post and make it stand out among other posts on the board or replies in that particular thread although in the spirit of helping low rank users (trying their best in contributing positively to the forum through quality posts), if I was to be given the opportunity of having more smerits at my disposal, more allocation will go towards lower rank users but until then, most quality posts from members irrespective of their rank gets +1 from me.

[tranthidung]

So that leaves colour changes for profile names. How about purple or gold?

I would like to choose Gold color. Bitcoin is a gold, so users who are real asset of the forum should be highlighted with Gold color.