The curious change of the Reputation board

[GazetaBitcoin]

Looking through the history of the Reputation board, I observed that during time, its use changed completely.

The board has 109 pages of topics. Between pages 77 and 109 (meaning the oldest topics), this part of the forum was used by members for writing topics about their own reputation, trying to show they are honorable persons or trustworthy traders. The methods were a bit different, but their aim was always the same.

For example, some used to ask feedback from the others:

Please post your feedback here. Thanks!

Hello,

This is a reputation thread for all the people who did or are thinking about doing any sort of trades with me.
----------------------------------------

My primary bitcoin related business is renting and hosting mining rigs.

And, in many cases, the replies to their topics were stating words which were building good reputation for OPs:

Thanks for the alts

Will trade again

Others though took a different approach and posted all the activities considered to bring them good reputation:

Hello,

This will be my reputation/trust thread.

19/03/2013 - Trusted with 6 LTC; https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=154730.0
22/03/2013 - Sent $76 PP to sublime5447; https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=147876.0
07/04/2013 - Trusted with 0.0175 btc; Sent $20 PP to gibbyd-btc; https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=169279.0
18/04/2013 - Trusted with 200 FC; https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=179191.msg1880184#msg1880184
18/04/2013 - Trusted with 300 FC; https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=170761.msg1881156#msg1881156
19/04/2013 - Trusted with 100 FC; https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=170761.msg1888062#msg1888062
19/04/2013 - Trusted with 900 FC; https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=170761.msg1888420#msg1888420

Posting this as many people have been asking.

I am posting trades I have completed both verifiable through threads and those in PM which MOD's could verify if needed.

Trades with links to thread
Trade with mill0601 https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=180151.msg1880043#msg1880043
Trade with Cyberdyne (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=182751.msg1908051#msg1908051
Trade with rafsoaken https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=187404.msg1941796#msg1941796
Trade with sublime5447 https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=189548.msg1964847#msg1964847
Trade with shibaji https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=189548.msg1964847#msg1964847
Trade with 1234r https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=193282.msg2004537#msg2004537
Trade with donjohnson https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=193936.msg2016995#msg2016995
Trade with WeTradeCoins https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=193936.msg2021539#msg2021539
Trade with xibeijan https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=199605.msg2080430#msg2080430
Trade with Blastbob https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=199074.msg2080735#msg2080735
Trade with yuzhe https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=199074.msg2095365#msg2095365
Trades through PM

But, no matter the topics content, the titles were always the same: "Profile name - Reputation thread".

Hundreds and hundreds of topics were created on this fashion:
- cryptocoinhunter reputation thread (not cryptohunter lol)
- sonihr Reputation thread
- sharkbyte093's Reputation Thread.


Somehow, everything changed since page 77 (meaning the newest 1-77 pages of the board). Excepting a buffer number of pages where the above kind of topics still appeared, in the end they disappeared completely. Their place was taken by thousands of topics where people seemed to not be interested at all in their own reputation, but in the reputation of the others. And not in a good way.

This board became a place where members expose the bad behavior of others, where they point to others activities or behavior, where they accuse others, where they express their grievance and where they explain why they believe X or Y is scam, why X or Y are not suited for their position inside the forum and so on. Of course, not all the accusations are true, as not all of them are false. But this is not the subject of this topic.

As I was writing above, the members are more focused on others reputation and not in a good way. I don't remember even a single topic regarding someone's good reputation. To see words such as "oh, man, this guy is a great trader!". Or "this DT member really deserves his place". Or "this member always used the trust (or merit) system as he should". These kind of topics don't exist, unfortunately.


Seeing all this interesting history and the abrupt change which took course on pages 1-77, I couldn't stop asking:
- why the members stopped building topics for consolidating their reputation? Reputation is essential on the free market and I knew that, as it can be seen from this link. Apparently, many others forum users knew that as well, since in the pages 77-109 the early forum users were trying to show their trustworthiness and the fact that others should make deals with them. So what happened? Suddenly nobody else is interested in showing he /she has a good reputation? Suddenly everybody forgot about the key importance of having a good reputation

- how is it possible that in 77 pages, each containing 40 topics, to not see a single topic related to self-built-reputation (maybe this is an exaggeration; most likely there are still a few such topics left)?

- I had in mind to ask why is this board now full of topics where some members accuse others for various facts, but I just realized this happens as there is no such other suitable place on the entire forum. However, another question just popped: how is it possible to not have such accusations in the oldest pages of the Reputation board (pages 77-109)? Could it be that during those ancient times, no user had any beef with any other user? I assume not. Conflicts exist for thousands of years. Then how did the members manage to deal with their grievance in the beginning? Were they writing accusation topics on other boards?

I'm curious what others think about these questions and also about the abrupt change of the Reputation board. Is it a good change?

[rhomelmabini]

- how is it possible that in 77 pages, each containing 40 topics, to not see a single topic related to self-built-reputation (maybe this is an exaggeration; most likely there are still a few such topics left)?

I dig if I could find one at least that can save Sodom and I think this Hhampuz Reputation Thread was one for entry, to say the least, just my two cents I guess this is a self-built reputation thread. Surprisingly I found it on the 7th page of the Reputation board.

As I was writing above, the members are more focused on others reputation and not in a good way. I don't remember even a single topic regarding someone's good reputation. To see words such as "oh, man, this guy is a great trader!". Or "this DT member really deserves his place". Or "this member always used the trust (or merit) system as he should". These kind of topics don't exist, unfortunately.

This quoted messages below are few messages from Hhampuz reputation thread:

One thing I like about you, that is you discussion with community regarding your confusion and mistakes. Once when I know you and working with seems you are transparent enough with your profession/work. However, I have not seen you yet with any corruption and obviously I will notice you if I found in future. Best of luck.

Having been a constant participants of your campaigns and having qualified for anyone i apply to join and looking at other users been accepted too I can say you're doing well when it comes to accepting quality non shitposters in all your campaigns. As a result I notice your campaigns don't always have open slots that's great news as it says a lot about the campaign manager accepting only quality rule abiding users.

Your payment are always on time in all your managed campaigns (haven't seen any complains of deserving members not receiving their earned payouts) and from my timezone that's the first thing I see every morning on payments days and having recieved the following benefits from joining your campaigns and I haven't seen any accusations of you abusing your power as a CM nor abusing your DT privileges, I can boldly say you're doing a great job Hhampuz. +1

Hhampuz, my thoughts on you as a poster are that I regard you very highly on the forum. I don’t know you off it but I consider yourself as very trustworthy. You always seem positive & you seem a nice guy. You obviously manage campaigns well which in itself comes with a level of trust. You look after escrowed money & pay your campaign participants on time. You’re DT1 & are active red tagging scammers etc.

The forum would be a worse place without you.

how is it possible to not have such accusations in the oldest pages of the Reputation board (pages 77-109)? Could it be that during those ancient times, no user had any beef with any other user? I assume not. Conflicts exist for thousands of years. Then how did the members manage to deal with their grievance in the beginning? Were they writing accusation topics on other boards?

Not that I know of it since I've just been here 2 years+. Dig more you'll surely find what you're looking for, I'm sure there's something that's been beefed way back regarding someone else's reputation.

[hacker1001101001]

how is it possible that in 77 pages, each containing 40 topics, to not see a single topic related to self-built-reputation (maybe this is an exaggeration; most likely there are still a few such topics left)?

May be some of the manipulated freeks in DT have made it a fun game to damage others reputation, others than spreading positivity. .

Yet, I think a reputation thread would not always end as expected as everyone is trying to damage reputations of others with a slit sparks. Guess, more people got it after sometime.

[DooMAD]

I'm not sure if topics that are effectively begging for positive feedback like the examples of old are something we should be encouraging.  Maybe it's not particularly friendly or nice to question the reputation of others, but it's generally better to confront a potential problem and try to find a resolution, rather than to simply look the other way and ignore something that could cause issues for less experienced users.

[OgNasty]

The creation of the feedback system made it so self reputation topics are no longer necessary the way they once were. I used to have to collect quotes from trading partners and assemble them in a thread so users would know I was trustworthy. Thankfully that hasn’t been necessary for many years.

[The Sceptical Chymist]

Nice analysis of the history of the Reputation board.  I think it was originally intended for members to create their own threads in which other members would weigh in on their trustworthiness, but that all went by the wayside with the trust system (and the Scam Accusation section). 

That's not to say that it's not a useful section, because there are issues with individual members that crop up from time to time which are best suited for Reputation.

The creation of the feedback system made it so self reputation topics are no longer necessary the way they once were. I used to have to collect quotes from trading partners and assemble them in a thread so users would know I was trustworthy. Thankfully that hasn’t been necessary for many years.

Yeah, I wasn't around in the early days from 2009-2014, but it must have been a huge pain in the ass to do that.  If I'm not mistaken, the forum was using the "scammer tag" at that point--and my knowledge of forum history fails me, because I can't remember when Theymos did away with that.  Must have been around 2014 or so when I was still a lurker.

[GazetaBitcoin]

Thank you all for sharing you opinions!

Indeed, as OgNasty said, self reputation topics were no longer necessary after the introduction of the Trust system. I thought about that too, but wasn't sure though. Most likely, this is the reason for the disappearence of those topics. However, I think they could still exist... Many members do many good deals here without receiving a (positive) feedback from the other side, as the oposite is also true: many scammers are left without negative feedback...

What's certain is this: that board changed a lot during time and it is a great experience reading its first and last posts!

But I still believe it misses now something important: topics of people talking nice about others. It is full of accusations lately, facts which can be depicted in negative feedback. Again, the oposite is true: if good facts / deals can appear in positive feedbacks, why not also in topics? Just an example: why there is no topic expressing how much LoyceV or DdmrDdmr's statistics helped the forum? Expressing anger or bad facts is so easy... Why is it hard to express also the good facts in topics?

Regarding The Pharmacist's statement, I think this is the topic you mentioned:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=603586.0.

Indeed, there was a "scammer" tag, which was removed in 2014.

Surprisingly, some wanted to keep their tag

I'm assuming there is no way for users to retain their scammer tag if they want to keep it?

No.

A part of me feels like a piece of Bitcoin history has just been lost. I'm going to miss my tag

[LoyceV]

Just an example: why there is no topic expressing how much LoyceV or DdmrDdmr's statistics helped the forum?

There's LoyceV's reputation thread

[GazetaBitcoin]

Oh, I didn't know about it. Thanks for correcting me!

[Quickseller]

Part of this is because trust disputes involving default trust used to be located in Meta, and some number of years ago these threads were redirected to reputation. When DT disputes were posted in meta, the reputation board had nearly zero activity.

[OgNasty]

The creation of the feedback system made it so self reputation topics are no longer necessary the way they once were. I used to have to collect quotes from trading partners and assemble them in a thread so users would know I was trustworthy. Thankfully that hasn’t been necessary for many years.

Yeah, I wasn't around in the early days from 2009-2014, but it must have been a huge pain in the ass to do that.  If I'm not mistaken, the forum was using the "scammer tag" at that point--and my knowledge of forum history fails me, because I can't remember when Theymos did away with that.  Must have been around 2014 or so when I was still a lurker.

It wasn’t a pain really. Back then it was great to have any sort of Bitcoin activity to report. I just wish I hadn’t deleted so many of my great old posts and threads to retain my “LEET” post count back before activity was a thing. I underestimated their potential future impact at the time.

[gentlemand]

I'm happy there's a dumping ground for the endless DT wars. Better for one section to be sacrificed to it than several others.

I always found the idea of starting and running a thread about your own reputation a bit weird.

It would be useful if it found a middle ground somewhere between the two.