Suggestion: allow on-forum altcoin giveaways for established altcoins

[LoyceV]

Two days ago, I wrote this in response to theymos ending the 7-day ban on many users:

Slightly off-topic (but not worth a new thread): would you consider updating the altcoin giveaway rules? I imagine those rules were made when many worthless altcoins were spamming the forum (kinda like the current bounty threads), but if someone is giving away some real value of an established altcoin that can be exchanged for Bitcoin, shouldn't that be allowed?
It's going to be tough to set a minimum, and there's going to be border cases, but the minimum could be for instance worth $50 or 0.01 BTC. There are currently topics (such as this one) with thousands of posts for a $250 giveaway. It's in Bitcoin, so it's allowed, but it's clearly a thread nobody is going to read.
So: shouldn't for instance a 40,000 Dogecoin giveaway be allowed too?

I received a PM asking to create this thread anyway, and my post in the locked thread will soon be forgotten, so here it is

A better description may be to allow on-forum altcoin giveaways if the giveaway is not meant to promote the altcoin itself (which is probably what lead to spam in the past), but instead promotes for instance a website (this could be a casino, a mixer, or an exchange) that uses the altcoin . The coin itself shouldn't be the main reason for the giveaway, but it should be worth enough to have an actual cost for the company that runs the giveaway. So no tokens make up out of thin air (like the Bounty board).

Background of this request: this now deleted thread offered 8000 TRX as a prize, currently worth $92. I don't think a promotion like that hurts the forum, so I'd like those to be allowed.

[1714095805]

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[hacker1001101001]

Doesn't this include moderators making decisions about which altcoins are shitty and which are not ? It would make it more like altcoins are moderated which is avoided here from the start.

[LFC_Bitcoin]

Agree with you Loyce, we’ve all seen the mess that can happen when people advertise airdrops & true shitcoins in the Altcoin Sub but I don’t think posters or indeed the actual casino or sportsbook should be punished for posting in or creating an altcoin giveaway, especially when the casino or sportsbook accepts the altcoin.

I’m a bitcoin maximalist, I own a good stash of bitcoin & have very little interest in alts, however we have to allow alts room to grow. Hey, most alt profits end up being pumped back into bitcoin any way so I 100% agree with you, Loyce.

Certain giveaways should be allowed, it’s quite obvious which threads are designed to spam the hell out of this place & which threads are genuinely created with good intentions, the casinos or sports-books growth & their punters interests at heart.

The TRX giveaway saw Bitcasino.io Support (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=profile;u=2087138 ) banned for 30 days, I think their ban should also be lifted.

[LoyceV]

Doesn't this include moderators making decisions about which altcoins are shitty and which are not ?

A bit. But even the shitty ones can have value, so it will come down to whether or not they can be exchanged for Bitcoin. The next problem will be coins that are only traded on shitty exchanges. I'm glad I don't have to think of all the details, all I do is make a suggestion

[suchmoon]

Instead of complicating things with exchange rates, definition of what is considered established, etc, why couldn't the entity running the giveaway just convert it to Bitcoin? This is a Bitcoin forum.

Imagine the outcry and rivers of red trust if someone were to run e.g. a BSV giveaway. I mean it's established isn't it...

[mk4]

I'm for it, even though I'm really not interested in 99.9999% of existing alts right now. How do we decide which alts are considered "established" or not though? I assume probably alts that are in the top 20/50/100 on Coinmarketcap? If not, it's going to be hella difficult as certain alts being established/legitimate or not is quite subjective. Probably the last thing we like to see is mods and users battling it out arguing if x coin/token is considered a scam or not LOL.

[AB de Royse777]

A better description may be to allow on-forum altcoin giveaways if the giveaway is not meant to promote the altcoin itself (which is probably what lead to spam in the past), but instead promotes for instance a website (this could be a casino, a mixer, or an exchange) that uses the altcoin . The coin itself shouldn't be the main reason for the giveaway, but it should be worth enough to have an actual cost for the company that runs the giveaway. So no tokens make up out of thin air (like the Bounty board).

It's a common sense that the altcoin giveaway rule was meant to prevent all those shitloads of useless coins when forum was flooding by them but since the situations has changed I will agree here with some others that the rules needs a change if possible.

Besides, if this giveaway things were not confusing then we would not see much talk about it. I was one of the user who was banned recently too even after knowing the rule but really could not identify the nature in the topic.

Doesn't this include moderators making decisions about which altcoins are shitty and which are not ? It would make it more like altcoins are moderated which is avoided here from the start.

Technically it does but I think we want here a common ground where we will see it preserve the forum interest of not to get spammed and also legit promotions from established companies/projects.

Edit:

Imagine the outcry and rivers of red trust if someone were to run e.g. a BSV giveaway. I mean it's established isn't it...

Yes, some of these guys get the tickets but this is not solving the issue we have here. If we consider the recent ban issue applied to some of us and still there are some who are under the same rules and possibly still in ban status means one thing which is the rule is not very clear. There are still some campaigns (not complaining against them coz I do not see any problem there) which has hundreds of users responded but from their OP it looks like they did not clearly mentioned if the giveaway will be in BTC or any other altcoin. If the rules need to be applied to them then we will see a mess ban where more than few hundreds of users will be banned and I do not think this will look good for all of us.

Instead of complicating things with exchange rates, definition of what is considered established, etc, why couldn't the entity running the giveaway just convert it to Bitcoin? This is a Bitcoin forum.

Not sure but may be it's not possible all the times? Who knows.

I think hilariousandco said somewhere that in this kind of situation trashing the thread will be a good thing instead of banning everyone who joined and to make it more flexible in my opinion whoever will be the topic creator will get a PM from the mod about the post that this kind of giveaway is not allowed so their post got trashed and if they post the same topic again only then they (the topic creator) will get x days ban. This my personal opinion by the way.

[OgNasty]

Allowing one altcoin giveaway to be discussed here and denying another doesn’t seem to fit with free speech.

[suchmoon]

Instead of complicating things with exchange rates, definition of what is considered established, etc, why couldn't the entity running the giveaway just convert it to Bitcoin? This is a Bitcoin forum.

Not sure but may be it's not possible all the times? Who knows.

If it's not possible to convert to Bitcoin then such a horrible shitcoin wouldn't fit the OP's criteria either.

And - correct me if I'm wrong - it's not the actual giveaways that are forbidden, it's the "I want to join this giveaway, here's my address" type of posts. In other words, if someone wants to run an altcoin giveaway outside of the forum and even link it here - that should be fine. As long as they don't incentivize low-effort posting/bumping.

[AB de Royse777]

If it's not possible to convert to Bitcoin then such a horrible shitcoin wouldn't fit the OP's criteria either.

Yes you have a point but we can not expect all the users will have greater handling power than the mods. What I mean by that is: not everyone will know that we will have to convert the coins to bitcoin and promote. So, still we will see topics where we will find it ultimately falls in the criteria of altcoin giveaway.

And - correct me if I'm wrong - it's not the actual giveaways that are forbidden, it's the "I want to join this giveaway, here's my address" type of posts. In other words, if someone wants to run an altcoin giveaway outside of the forum and even link it here - that should be fine. As long as they don't incentivize low-effort posting/bumping.

Here we are talking about spamming issue which still we can see if the payment method is bitcoin. Example: games and rounds and other prediction type threads like what will be the bitcoin price in x time etc. Most of them are very low effort posts, aren't they?

And - correct me if I'm wrong

No, you are not wrong in the context.

[suchmoon]

Here we are talking about spamming issue which still we can see if the payment method is bitcoin. Example: games and rounds and other prediction type threads like what will be the bitcoin price in x time etc. Most of them are very low afford posts, aren't they?

Yes, but it's a special board for that kind of thing and this being a Bitcoin forum (and lacking a better way of doing it) I can understand why such exceptions exist.

I don't really see why allow it for altcoins unless Bitcointalk actually needs to promote certain altcoins for whatever reason. What would that reason be?

[AB de Royse777]

Yes, but it's a special board for that kind of thing and this being a Bitcoin forum (and lacking a better way of doing it) I can understand why such exceptions exist.

I did not mean any problem there so period here of course, means we are on the same page.

I don't really see why allow it for altcoins unless Bitcointalk actually needs to promote certain altcoins for whatever reason. What would that reason be?

What bothers me is the rule of banning and if you got me earlier then it's not very friendly rule which is obviously confusing or we would not see so many users got trapped in it including a lot of us who are well aware of the rules and respect it by heart. Do you think some of the users really care much about those altcoin if they had this in mind in the next morning they will see they are banned? The answer is of course NO.

I will repeat what I said below regarding the concern here:

I think hilariousandco said somewhere that in this kind of situation trashing the thread will be a good thing instead of banning everyone who joined and to make it more flexible in my opinion whoever will be the topic creator will get a PM from the mod about the post that this kind of giveaway is not allowed so their post got trashed and if they post the same topic again only then they (the topic creator) will get x days ban. This my personal opinion by the way.

[DireWolfM14]

Doesn't this include moderators making decisions about which altcoins are shitty and which are not ?

A bit. But even the shitty ones can have value, so it will come down to whether or not they can be exchanged for Bitcoin. The next problem will be coins that are only traded on shitty exchanges. I'm glad I don't have to think of all the details, all I do is make a suggestion

The devil is in the details.  So now we're going to ask mods to decide which altcoins are shit, based on which exchanges they trade on, and whether those exchanges are shit.  I'm not saying the mods don't have the capacity to determine these things, but they're determinations might differ from mine, and vice versa.  Leaving so much up to the determination of the moderators is very likely to cause problems.

Currently there's very little stopping a casino or an exchange from creating a thread with a promotion saying "Go to our website, enter "bitcointalk.org" as a promo code, and receive 1 billion shitcoins that we now accept."  As far as I know that would not be against the rules, and no spam will result from it.

[PrimeNumber7]

No, thank you.

My reading of the explanation as to why participants were unbanned early are as follows:
*On forum games are allowed in the Games & Rounds sub, but on forum games involving altcoins would be wrongly posted, and would be disallowed forum wide.
*The thread was incorrectly posted in games and rounds
*It is an understandable that some participants made a mistake in thinking participating in the giveaway was allowed
*A lot of long-standing, active forum members were caught up in the mess, which is a negative consequence under normal circumstances, but this negative consequence is made worse by the fact that most of the world will be spending an increased amount of time on the internet in the coming weeks. 

This is a bitcoin-related forum, and its primary focus should remain to be bitcoin. I am okay with an altcoin sub where the development of altcoins can be discussed, and with an altcoin marketplace. The reason being that it is always good to have multiple perspectives, and things can be learned from the development of altcoins, and from altcoin economies.

[suchmoon]

What bothers me is the rule of banning and if you got me earlier then it's not very friendly rule which is obviously confusing or we would not see so many users got trapped in it including a lot of us who are well aware of the rules and respect it by heart.

Well, that's a different story. I think this forum is horribly unfriendly to its users. Even rules that will get you banned on the spot (permanently or temporarily) are not easy to find or understand. IMO that's what needs to be fixed instead of wasting energy on creating standards for allowing altcoin giveaways. I'd pin the rules next to the Bitcoin Core download but officially theymos doesn't believe in written rules but he writes strict anti-altcoin rules and violators get banned... go figure.

[AB de Royse777]

Well, that's a different story. I think this forum is horribly unfriendly to its users. Even rules that will get you banned on the spot (permanently or temporarily) are not easy to find or understand. IMO that's what needs to be fixed instead of wasting energy on creating standards for allowing altcoin giveaways. I'd pin the rules next to the Bitcoin Core download but officially theymos doesn't believe in written rules but he writes strict anti-altcoin rules and violators get banned... go figure.

I think theymos is handling this forum better than anyone could in the space. I have seen him to make some decisions in unbanning some users by not going very strict. There are exceptions and he always allowed room in it. My effort here is to see the next guy not to get banned because he was not very much aware about the rule or thought that it's not against the rule to make a post in thread X.

*It is an understandable that some participants made a mistake in thinking participating in the giveaway was allowed
*A lot of long-standing, active forum members were caught up in the mess, which is a negative consequence under normal circumstances

Isn't this mean that the rule was not very clear in their mind? It's not that they always do not understand the rules.

[PrimeNumber7]

*It is an understandable that some participants made a mistake in thinking participating in the giveaway was allowed
*A lot of long-standing, active forum members were caught up in the mess, which is a negative consequence under normal circumstances

Isn't this mean that the rule was not very clear in their mind? It's not that they always do not understand the rules.

I think there was some confusion.

I believe a simple solution would be for a mod to create a sticky in the games and rounds sub that says threads about altcoins do not belong in games and rounds, and that altcoin giveaways are not allowed.

[AB de Royse777]

I believe a simple solution would be for a mod to create a sticky in the games and rounds sub that says threads about altcoins do not belong in games and rounds, and that altcoin giveaways are not allowed.

This does not harm (sticky in the board) but how about the companies who have altcoin besides bitcoin in their platform. We do not suggest them to go to an altcoin forum or we ask them to go to altcoin marketplace? We need to embrace crypto projects, don't we?

[PrimeNumber7]

I believe a simple solution would be for a mod to create a sticky in the games and rounds sub that says threads about altcoins do not belong in games and rounds, and that altcoin giveaways are not allowed.

This does not harm (sticky in the board) but how about the companies who have altcoin besides bitcoin in their platform. We do not suggest them to go to an altcoin forum or we ask them to go to altcoin marketplace? We need to embrace crypto projects, don't we?

The games and rounds sub is for on forum games, spreadsheet-based and giveaways (and the discussion thereof). Examples would include giving a prize for correctly guessing a number, being the nth person to post (with n being unknown), playing tic-tack-toe, and similar.

The game or giveaway should be bitcoin-related, and if it is not giving away a bitcoin-related prize, it should not be in games in rounds. If a platform accepts some altcoins on its platform, that is okay, but I don't think the thread should be promoting this fact.

[Lauda]

This is a bad idea. There is no empirical guideline on established altcoins. What you likely consider established are very likely technological scams, e.g. EOS, IOTA.

So: shouldn't for instance a 40,000 Dogecoin giveaway be allowed too?

Speaking from a market cap - security perspective, it is as much of a scam like anything else. I like Dogecoin, but this is a fact. The answer is no.

Imagine the outcry and rivers of red trust if someone were to run e.g. a BSV giveaway. I mean it's established isn't it...

Correct, a established scam just like the previous 3 mentioned.