History of bitcointalk.org's rank system

[tranthidung]

Today, @Welsh wrote this:

It's definitely harder to rank up these days, and certain posts are more likely to get merit. For example, the statistics users are chucking out via data scraping, and all that will be more likely to receive merit, because its both informative, and out of the capability of many of the users here. There's been 3 stages of ranking up if I remember correctly here on Bitcointalk. First of all, ranking up was tied to amount of posts you had (activity wasn't implemented at this time) then activity got introduced, and there were a few moans, and groans about it. Finally, the merit system was implemented, and has had the most criticism, and impact on the forum. I personally believe its had a positive impact on the forum, and is the better system of all three.  

I searched topic history of @satoshi, @theymos, @Cyrus, and @Sirius, but I have not found the first rank system of the forum. I do checked all @satoshi's posts, and did not find what I need. So, anyone knows it, please give me details.

I think this thread is helpful for forum users, old or new users, to have exact information on history of bitcointalk.org's rank system.
There are three periods, in which the forum has three different rank system and different criteria for it.

1. November 22, 2009 - June 17, 2013: Without activity requirements
Welcome to the new Bitcoin forum!
I need help with more details on rank system within this period. Please help if you know it!
However, that period existed, because I saw some complaints when the second rank system activated.

This is bullshit! I was less than 40 posts way from being a Hero, and now I'm not quite even Sr??!! That's it, I'm outta here.

Totally kidding. I much prefer this new system personally. People have always put way too much stake in the "Sr/Hero" titles... at least now only veterans will get them.

Thanks for your continued efforts upgrading the forum, theymos. Great stuff.

@Welsh gave me hands, but still need more details (official announcements from admins?)

Forum rankings, unless custom, are based on post-count alone.

Highest is Hero Member, followed by Sr. Member, followed by Full Member, followed by Jr. Member, followed by Newbie.

What are the numbers of posts for each ranking?

I believe it's something like:
Hero - 500
Sr Member - 250
Full Member - 100? (not sure on this one)

2. June 18, 2013 - January 23, 2018: Activity requirements
Activity & new membergroup limits

The activity number is determined in this way:
time = number of two-week periods in which you've posted since your registration
activity = min(time * 14, posts)

Rough summary of what this means: If you post once per day on average, then you will eventually get the maximum number of activity points that you can get. Posting more than once per day on average is useless for increasing activity. The maximum number of activity points you can get is 1 per day, but your activity score only updates every two weeks. Therefore, it will take about 100 days to get 100 activity if you post once per day on average.

Activity is updated every hour.

The new membergroup limits work like this: (Edit: Obsolete, do not use)

Group	Requirement
Brand New	0 posts
Newbie	(none)
Jr. Member	activity: 30
Member	activity: 60
Full Member	activity: 120
Sr. Member	activity: 240
Hero Member	activity: 480
Legendary	occurs randomly between 775 and 1030 activity

I'm not 100% sure that the membergroups work correctly. Tell me if you see any bugs.

Theymos wrote that announcement, but Cyrus wrote that one:

I added forum activity, changed the number of coins. Was kinda tired and that slipped away.

I still don't know who coded activity requirements / badges for ranks in this change.

3. January 24, 2018 - by now: Activity requirements + Merit requirements
Announcement for changes: Merit & new rank requirements

In addition to activity, everyone now has a merit score, and you need both a certain activity level and a certain merit score in order to reach higher member ranks. The required scores are:

Rank	Required activity	Required merit
Brand new	0	0
Newbie	1	0
Jr Member	30	1
Member	60	10
Full Member	120	100
Sr. Member	240	250
Hero Member	480	500
Legendary	Random in the range 775-1030	1000

Note that merit requirement on Junior member rank only implemented since September 17, 2018.
Enhanced newbie restrictions & requirements

Due to excessive garbage-posting, you now need 1 merit to be a Jr Member. All existing Jr Members who didn't meet the requirement were demoted. Also, newbies can no longer set any signature or personal text.

To sum up, from the history of forum rank system, it is clearly that we all do survive in the forum, whatever rank requirements used; and we (most of us) don't leave the forum due to new requirements on rank system.

Stop complaining, adapt, and rank up!
If you want to find out more about bitcointalk's history or want to become a bitcointalk historian, I have a few documents for you:
Satoshi's lesson
Bitcointalk history of MtGox and how a Bitcointalk post caught the MtGox hacker.
Bitcointalk history of hacks and vandalism.
The most iconic bitcointalk threads. History on Bitcointalk.
History - signature campaigns and bounties on Bitcointalk

[Welsh]

If I'm remembering correctly, and I'm pretty sure I am the ranking system previously to this was merely just based on post count. I haven't hosted any Simple Machine Forums for quite some time, but it might well be the default ranking system used. I can't remember the exact ranking requirements, but just as an example; to become a hero member you needed 500 posts. I'm not sure if there's any "official" posts regarding this as like I said it might be the default SMF behavior.

Here's a thread discussing it back in 2011 which verifies that my memory is in fact correct: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=27917.0

Forum rankings, unless custom, are based on post-count alone.

Highest is Hero Member, followed by Sr. Member, followed by Full Member, followed by Jr. Member, followed by Newbie.

What are the numbers of posts for each ranking?

I believe it's something like:
Hero - 500
Sr Member - 250
Full Member - 100? (not sure on this one)

As we can see from the quoted discussion from that thread is that most of the post count values were similar to the required activity these days. However, Jr member was slightly changed.

[tranthidung]

Thank you, Welsh. I still search to find it, but it looks interesting, like what I saw with merit system and Junior demotion.  
You are one of the first users commented about the second rank system (with activity requirements).

Hmm, this system has it's pros and cons. But, we shall see how it works.

I'm a full member - newbie again! YES.

Thank you for giving me this one, but I do think that such things would be announced by admins, not in a normal thread like this.

Forum rankings, unless custom, are based on post-count alone.

Highest is Hero Member, followed by Sr. Member, followed by Full Member, followed by Jr. Member, followed by Newbie.

What are the numbers of posts for each ranking?

I believe it's something like:
Hero - 500
Sr Member - 250
Full Member - 100? (not sure on this one)

[Welsh]

Thank you, Welsh. I still search to find it.
You are one of the first users commented about the second rank system (with activity requirements).

Hmm, this system has it's pros and cons. But, we shall see how it works.

I'm unsure what my concerns were, but it was probably bias to the fact that I think I was a member or full member at that point, and got demoted with the activity implementation, and the fact by default I'm always cautious of limiting users, but I think I was proven wrong with my doubts, and the activity ranking system was an improvement over the old system. The merit system was definitely a large step up in increasing forum quality, and again not without its downfalls, but I think its been largely successful in what it was implemented for.

Thank you for giving me this one, but I do think that such things would be announced by admins, not in a normal thread like this.

Tysat would have been a moderator around that time if I remember correctly, however whether admins officially announced it I'm not sure. It was probably using the default SMF values, unless I'm mistaken. I definitely remember Hero Member being 500, but I'm not so sure about the others. Despite the lack of admin response on that thread, it seems everyone agreed those were the values though.

[AB de Royse777]

If I'm remembering correctly, and I'm pretty sure I am the ranking system previously to this was merely just based on post count. I haven't hosted any Simple Machine Forums for quite some time, but it might well be the default ranking system used.

I can confirm that the default SMF ranking based on post counts. I have tested SMF several times and found out it's too easy to rank up (if anyone wants). Introducing activity counts was a good move.

Two years ago, I was hanging up in another forum for few weeks and that was hosted using SMF and believe me or not, I have seen people to post crazy amount of posts. In a week some people made over 1k posts. So, according to our activity requirements they are Legendary in a week LOL

Anyway, the evaluation of our ranking system is better in my opinion. Especially the last edition of merit requirement. At the beginning some users were totally against it but now it seems, "The hell has frozen" :-P

[Welsh]

I can confirm that the default SMF ranking based on post counts. I have tested SMF several times and found out it's too easy to rank up (if anyone wants). Introducing activity counts was a good move.

Two years ago, I was hanging up in another forum for few weeks and that was hosted using SMF and believe me or not, I have seen people to post crazy amount of posts. In a week some people made over 1k posts. So, according to our activity requirements they are Legendary in a week LOL

Anyway, the evaluation of our ranking system is better in my opinion. Especially the last edition of merit requirement. At the beginning some users were totally against it but now it seems, "The hell has frozen" :-P

Do you know if the default values of ranking up were 500, 250 etc? I've hosted SMF forums before, but nothing compared to this forum, obviously. I've only ever done it for testing purposes, and setting them up for others. I can't remember the default values as it was a number of years ago now.

Yeah, I think that was the concern at the time many users were spamming their post counts up, getting to a "respectable" rank, and then attempting to scam, and I believe a few new users to the forum were falling for it. I'm sure there was a number of reasons for it to be implemented, and the discussion that the OP linked shows users discussing that.

[AB de Royse777]

~snip~
Do you know if the default values of ranking up were 500, 250 etc? I've hosted SMF forums before, but nothing compared to this forum, obviously. I've only ever done it for testing purposes, and setting them up for others. I can't remember the default values as it was a number of years ago now.

Same here, I have nothing stored in the memory.

[hugeblack]

I searched topic history of @satoshi, @theymos, @Cyrus, and @Sirius, but I have not found the first rank system of the forum. I do checked all @satoshi's posts, and did not find what I need. So, anyone knows it, please give me details.

You will find more information if you search manually using the first topics created in this section.
GO TO  >> Meta >>  Pages:  >>  401.
There seems to be a similar system of merit system that exists where users can give a positive or negative evaluation "karma system!" but does not affect the rank. For more Read -----> [applaud]/[smite] system?

Is it Sirius who makes these forum decisions? Sirius alone or an ad-hoc committee?

Mods and admins act mostly independently. I'm not going to change the limit, since I want the reputation system to be completely removed.

It's pretty simple:


Only admins can see the ratings in-depth, and only by downloading the database. There's no web interface that I can see.

So Yes. I think the first system is a reputation system

Again, I request that there be an official archive of the forum.

[dkbit98]

Interesting history, and I wish I joined in that early days myself

It is very good that we have this merit system,
but I also do think that we may need to upgrade it
so that genuine activity plays a bigger role in ranking up.
We should focus more on rewarding users, rather then banning them,
and make unban procedure a bit better.
Maybe even adding a small knowledge test/quiz for passing to new rank.

I would limit forum access for newbies to only certain parts of forum,
and give them some limited freedom there.

[tranthidung]

Interesting history, and I wish I joined in that early days myself

It is very good that we have this merit system,
but I also do think that we may need to upgrade it
so that genuine activity plays a bigger role in ranking up.
We should focus more on rewarding users, rather then banning them,
and make unban procedure a bit better.
Maybe even adding a small knowledge test/quiz for passing to new rank.

I would limit forum access for newbies to only certain parts of forum,
and give them some limited freedom there.

There is no Newbie Jails for a long period of time, and admin repeatedly wrote that he does not have plans to bring Newbie Jails back.
However, there are suggestions from community, including staffs and global moderators that Whitelist procedure should be considered. Whitelist might create new kinds of work burden on forum staffs, that they might not expect. I still think that if there are some kind of community-led clean-up process like more effective reports, Whitelist is not essential thing to implement. Recent waves of spam bots with Yobit-worded posts eliminated very. I do agree that such things make the forum like a land-fill area of spammers, but it does not last for too long, as I saw.

[dkbit98]

Interesting history, and I wish I joined in that early days myself

It is very good that we have this merit system,
but I also do think that we may need to upgrade it
so that genuine activity plays a bigger role in ranking up.
We should focus more on rewarding users, rather then banning them,
and make unban procedure a bit better.
Maybe even adding a small knowledge test/quiz for passing to new rank.

I would limit forum access for newbies to only certain parts of forum,
and give them some limited freedom there.

There is no Newbie Jails for a long period of time, and admin repeatedly wrote that he does not have plans to bring Newbie Jails back.
However, there are suggestions from community, including staffs and global moderators that Whitelist procedure should be considered. Whitelist might create new kinds of work burden on forum staffs, that they might not expect. I still think that if there are some kind of community-led clean-up process like more effective reports, Whitelist is not essential thing to implement. Recent waves of spam bots with Yobit-worded posts eliminated very. I do agree that such things make the forum like a land-fill area of spammers, but it does not last for too long, as I saw.

My point was to introduce some educative system and not jail like restrictive.
It would be automatic, and if user passes simple knowledge tests he unlocks his account, or grow his rank.
Just an idea... for merit system update.

[CryptopreneurBrainboss]

It is very good that we have this merit system,
but I also do think that we may need to upgrade it

Quite true, the system is doing just fine and it has reduced the level at which spammers can easily rank up, the next step should involving the forum tackling the spam directly by introducing something just like the merit system to discourage spamming and motive spam hunters to continue working tirelessly. We have successfully tackled the ranking up system, now let the forum tackle spam directly and a good way to achieve that would be implementing the report badges avatars for motivation and recognition.

We should focus more on rewarding users, rather then banning them, and make unban procedure a bit better.

Here's the catch buddy, most users getting banned aren't worth giving a listening ear when it come to appeal of ban. There post history aren't impressive, just full of crab and plagiarized posts so it make it even harder for the administration of the forum to forgive them to give a second chance.

Maybe even adding a small knowledge test/quiz for passing to new rank.

Don't forget we have Google at the fingertip, that someone is answering questions here and there doesn't technically means they're knowledgeable. Since we can't authenticate the source of their knowledge there isn't any need for these. Every member should be given and equal chance to rank-up which is why we have the merit system. Quality post = merit reward.

I would limit forum access for newbies to only certain parts of forum, and give them some limited freedom there.

We (forum) have already tried this solution (newbie jail) and it didn't work out, so lets move on. Copper membership is doing great.

[tranthidung]

A few threads on history found:
Bitcointalk history of MtGox and how a Bitcointalk post caught the MtGox hacker.
Bitcointalk history of hacks and vandalism.
The most iconic bitcointalk threads. History on Bitcointalk.
History - signature campaigns and bounties on Bitcointalk

[RivAngE]

My opinion is that those system have to be enforeced from early days and equally for everyone.

I suppose the forums didn't expect this kind of a popularity in the early days, so a simple "postcount" metric seemed to be enough back then.
But when they realised the need to filter out the weed from the legendary members, they should have made the changes in a more smooth way.
The only problem with how things have been developed is that people unworthy to be at the same rank as helpful and truly legendary members have been gifted the same rank as them when all they did and they keep doing is spamming with a signature gampaigns!

When the same performance would have them stuck to Jr.Members, it simply annoys me to see them at high ranks.
This just shows that something hasn't been done that well with this system.

[tranthidung]

My opinion is that those system have to be enforeced from early days and equally for everyone.

There is no perfect thing at born-day, and this is true for bitcoin, altcoins, and all of other things in our lives.

I suppose the forums didn't expect this kind of a popularity in the early days, so a simple "postcount" metric seemed to be enough back then.
But when they realised the need to filter out the weed from the legendary members, they should have made the changes in a more smooth way.
The only problem with how things have been developed is that people unworthy to be at the same rank as helpful and truly legendary members have been gifted the same rank as them when all they did and they keep doing is spamming with a signature gampaigns!

The forum initially created for bitcoin, and both the forum and bitcoin were not too famous years ago. As you can see in OP and related links, the forum did not have any troubles with spam before the appearance of signature and growth of signature industry. It is very simple to end spam by disable all signature in the forum, but due to some reasons this is not what theymos want to do. Admin try to avoid this, but he might do it if merit system does not solve spam issues.

Fortunately, as we all witnessed so far, merit system works, and spam reduced dramatically. In addition, spammers now can not rank up to Full Members and above from their shitshows. At least, they can not dump their shitposts here, destroy the forum reputation and abuse it, then get huge money out, and use the forum as their freely ATMs.

Furthermore, since 2018, especially since April of 2019, the forum has wiped out thousands of higher ranked accounts permanently, and users have more actively reported bad posts, bad users than ever.

When the same performance would have them stuck to Jr.Members, it simply annoys me to see them at high ranks.
This just shows that something hasn't been done that well with this system.

No one gets stucked if they made enough decent efforts into their posts, and from their time to read, search, read, and learn before making posts.

[Mpamaegbu]

It's really good to have this revisited. History is good and archives should always be safeguarded.  At least, newbies (if at all they can find their way to this thread as presumably they rarely visit Meta) will know how it all started and went down. Even for me, this thread is enlightening as I never knew there was a time users ranked up without "activities". Just post and rank up 🤔

Thanks tranthidung. You seem to be the statistician and record keeper for the forum. Thumbs up.

[The Sceptical Chymist]

Fortunately, as we all witnessed so far, merit system works, and spam reduced dramatically. In addition, spammers now can not rank up to Full Members and above from their shitshows. At least, they can not dump their shitposts here, destroy the forum reputation and abuse it, then get huge money out, and use the forum as their freely ATMs.

It's nice to be able to quote the above post in 2020 and realize that the shitposting situation that was so rampant up until only recently (I don't know exactly when the shitposting dropped off a cliff, but it was at some point in 2019) has dissipated such that I'm no longer writing long rants about spam and garbage posts being a persistent problem.

Seriously, I used to write a lot of posts in Meta raging about how useless certain sections were.  There are still shitposters, of course, but nowhere near as many as before the merit system was put into place.  It took time, but members began to realize how hard it became to rank up an account past Jr. Member, and I suspect many of them either gave up trying or purchased a high-ranked account.

It's really good to have this revisited.

I agree.  There's a lot of important (to the forum at least) history that's happened just in the last year or so and it's neat to look back at threads like this one.

[gentlemand]

I thought the shitposting would switch from shitting to make piddly amounts to shitting to rank up to make piddly amounts. It feels a little like that's the case but perhaps more people have given up. There'll always be enough who plug mindlessly along forever at it not understanding why they're not progressing.

[Lordhermes]

I have just became active in the forum 5 months ago, I really noticed how hard it is to rank up to this low point I am but I'm proud of it, creating topics took me some weeks to post because I'm trying hard to avoid shitty posts rather quality, I just imagine the bulky bounty hunters before November 22, 2009 - January 22, 2018 without activity requirements turning to legendary so easily without struggling.

This merit and activity system helped users a lot by letting them creating something tangible, ignites the talents in a user, I have seen series of good posters available in the forum and I'm pretty sure they really the ones having funs here because merit finds them through their good communication and conversation skills. Thanks for the merit and activity implementation system.

[tranthidung]

It's nice to be able to quote the above post in 2020 and realize that the shitposting situation that was so rampant up until only recently (I don't know exactly when the shitposting dropped off a cliff, but it was at some point in 2019) has dissipated such that I'm no longer writing long rants about spam and garbage posts being a persistent problem.

After 16 June 2019 on which the merit system was enhanced with demotion on old-era Junior members. You can see how demoted old-era Junior members abused the merit system from the main accounts with the merit time-series plot. Most of merits in the spike came from abuse and farms.

The monthly registered accounts fell since June 2019.

It took time, but members began to realize how hard it became to rank up an account past Jr. Member, and I suspect many of them either gave up trying or purchased a high-ranked account.

Recent months, it seems the ranking up progress has become easier -- what is the problem More power on merit sources after the reallocation of monthly sMerits and reduction on total merit sources. Now, the forum has only (or most) active merit sources but they are human and they won't be able to work 24/7. Consequently, they dump sMerits in patch sendouts. It is a problem, as always. When you have limited resources (anything) you feel it is scarce (Merit is not scarce) and be more careful when doing sendouts.

I feel like people began to forget how bad the shitpost and spam endemic the forum had few years ago and they want to help to create a new generation of spammers.

I thought the shitposting would switch from shitting to make piddly amounts to shitting to rank up to make piddly amounts. It feels a little like that's the case but perhaps more people have given up. There'll always be enough who plug mindlessly along forever at it not understanding why they're not progressing.

Some put efforts to rank up but after get what they aim at, they become spammers again.

I have seen series of good posters available in the forum and I'm pretty sure they really the ones having funs here

Sure, merit system has its power to change spammer to good member and some of them will do feel fun when they make high quality posts. Gradually, over months or years it will naturally become a habit -- habit of high quality poster.