Reduced forum activity

[Findingnemo]

Even since the introduction of merit system we could see drastic change in the activity on bitcointalk which is probably due to account farms stopped their working.

And since the lockdown people got kore lazy including me so spending time on starring the videos over doing something productive or learning something.

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[CryptopreneurBrainboss]

It quite obvious and the merit system has alot of contribution to the decrease in activity on the forum. Before now an account farmer could easily spam his or her way to higher ranks using multiple accounts posting randomly on the forum and it'll appear like the forum is been engaged by different users not knowing it's just a cycle of account farmers. But with the introduction of the merit system the activity becomes useless if you don't have the required merit needed for each rank.

Assuming we didn't have this system put in place before the lockdown probably the forum would had turned into something else and become inhabitable as there won't have been any quality discuss left as a result, driving away quality contributors.

Slowly the activities will come back up, lets just give it time, just have to support @Findingnemo thought too because personally I notice some reduction in my productivity. The lockdown did make us more lazy than productive and it'll require some time to return to normal.

[dkbit98]

If we look at our local Croatian section we are doing just fine and we are active and making more or less good posts, and have normal discussion.
As for rest of the forum it is true that quality and quantity of posts has gone down, and I don't see many new genuine people joining the forum.
Young people who are into crypto never even heard about Bitcointalk, and I am directing them  to join here, but often times they can't register in forum (evil fee or try later).
We are near 2021 and we do need changes to keep up with progress.

[DaveF]

tvplus006 has a thread with monthly stats, although it was not updated for August:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5206041.0

Without any hard numbers all I can give are seat of the pants feelings.
I left some comments in the other thread about why I feel some people might have left here.

With what other people have said about the Covid / work from home thing I can also add that people working from home might be doing more "wandering" around the net.
I know I was about to post a reply to something here the other day but wound up looking for dinner recipes and never came back to post.

So more time on line, and possibly more time on forums but just more / different ones.

-Dave
 

[CarnagexD]

Even since the introduction of merit system we could see drastic change in the activity on bitcointalk which is probably due to account farms stopped their working.

Account farming has been reduced lol didn't we have that user who got almost 100 accounts connected? the are crushing the bounty campaigns back then earning thousands of stacks when the project succeeded, it seems quiet now huh.

And since the lockdown people got kore lazy including me so spending time on starring the videos over doing something productive or learning something.

I feel it too, it feels like I woke up everyday just to waste another time of my life. I quite lose interest in gaming these days, which I thought would save me from being bored, then it gets boring every time I play I'm not used to this

[andulolika]

Been years people quitting this forum for obvious reasons, it is a shame from a perspective but thank satoshi bitcoin is decentralized.

[FIFA worldcup]

I'm starting to notice that several forums, including Bitcoin Talk, are not as active as they were a while ago. Also many of the threads and posts seem to be of lower quality. I would have thought that the lock downs would have increased activity, but maybe people are playing games and watching Netflix instead. I'm increasing my domain development, so maybe it is just that I'm spending more time on the net, and getting impatient. Has anyone else noticed a slowdown?

You may see an overall decrease in the forum posts and activity because of the new system in place. Now you cannot rank up with only activity and many account farmers have left the forum.
I think the current activity of the forum is more likely a genuine one and consists of users who are actually interested in the forum. Although there may be some account farmers still exists but those numbers are decreasing.

[virasog]

If we look at our local Croatian section we are doing just fine and we are active and making more or less good posts, and have normal discussion.
As for rest of the forum it is true that quality and quantity of posts has gone down, and I don't see many new genuine people joining the forum.
Young people who are into crypto never even heard about Bitcointalk, and I am directing them  to join here, but often times they can't register in forum (evil fee or try later).
We are near 2021 and we do need changes to keep up with progress.

Does this chart shows that the most active users on this forum are from Russia ? They have made more than 10,000 posts in a month of August.
Can I have the full data of all the countries and how accurate is this data ?

[dkbit98]

No.
It only shows local sections, and russian have most posts, and that is normal if we know size of Russia and it's population.
Most posts are in english language.

[erikoy]

we are still here actively participating in the forum discussions. May others had been inactive for the moment because of their reason but it will just be for the moment and everything will be back to normal again.

Frankly speaking, participation in bounty campaigns was not limited to one account in the past. Each bounty hunter had several alternatives. Today, bounty requirements have become tough, and a lot of people on the forum are tracking cheating. From here, you can calculate the real number of people that could have been on the forum in the past, if by that time you apply today's conditions.

Definitely right, It seems that most active here are the bounty hunters. Bounty hunters are spreading awareness to the internet. It became rampant actually before the implementation of rank and merit system. I was a jr. member that time and one of the users that gets demoted to newbie from not earning a single merit. It was tough time because the implementation did not reach me and I was not expecting for it to happen. Still I find way to reach at my current status.

I really hope that some worthy bounty to come up and atleast give those bounty hunters what they deserved.

I have wrote something about the bounty hunters all blame to bounty hunters I am also after the welfare of those who are promoting bounty projects following the rules and regulations of the forum. I just wish that bounty hunters and all users wearing signature will get financial rewards they deserve as well.

[The Sceptical Chymist]

Since I put Polo7 and Bitcoin SV on ignore, this part of page one of what my "unread posts" looks like:



I have a lot of sections on ignore, mind you.  Gambling, Bitcoin Discussion, and the entire altcoin section--but man, it really seems like there haven't been a lot of really interesting threads as of late.  And as I said before, I thought it was me losing interest in the forum.  It's not, though.  There used to be tons of threads that I could voice an opinion in (and that was with all those sections on ignore anyway), but now it's like a desert.

[Jet Cash]

Well lets see if we can get things moving again. We need to stop obsessing with the stats, and start to develop interest in crypto, the economies, changes to fiat currencies, and various other currencies. I had a go with my threads on selling domain names for Bitcoin, both assets are increasing in value, and I'm surprised that there isn't any interest.

We have it in our power to improve things, so lets start making some interesting posts. I'll start with a stimulus thread, I'll offer 25 merits each to the 4 posters who are voted to have made the best contributions over the next week.Do you think 25 is enough, or should I make it 50.

[Rikafip]

Does this chart shows that the most active users on this forum are from Russia ? They have made more than 10,000 posts in a month of August.

That chart just shows that by far most active local board is Russian, and it's like that pretty much every month.

Can I have the full data of all the countries and how accurate is this data ?

Data I am using for these charts comes from @DdmrDdmr Merit Dashboard, an excellent tool where you can find various info for each local board, things like most merited posts, most merited topics, users etc.

Since March 2020 I am making Brief monthly overview of the local boards activity where you can see local boards compared.

I'm starting to notice that several forums, including Bitcoin Talk, are not as active as they were a while ago. Also many of the threads and posts seem to be of lower quality. I would have thought that the lock downs would have increased activity, but maybe people are playing games and watching Netflix instead. I'm increasing my domain development, so maybe it is just that I'm spending more time on the net, and getting impatient. Has anyone else noticed a slowdown?

Part of the problem might be that younger generations are less likely to join forum, they prefer Discord/Telegram. Another factor might be that forum software is outdated (even though I personally like it as it looks like others forums I am using for many years), there is no things like mobile phone support etc and that also can affect amount of new people that are joining, while older ones are getting bored/tired.  I am very active on 2 other forums (not crypto related), and situation is pretty similar in that regard.

[LoyceV]

I'll offer 25 merits each to the 4 posters who are voted to have made the best contributions over the next week.

Who gets to vote? Everyone?

[Jet Cash]

Voting means that someone has to preselect the candidates.
I thought it might be best just to run a thread where people could suggest suitable members for a reward ( not themselves ). Then I would reward the most popular, provided they are in my ignore list , and there were no obvious objections. Other members could use the list to give rewards as well of course.

[Findingnemo]

Voting means that someone has to preselect the candidates.
I thought it might be best just to run a thread where people could suggest suitable members for a reward ( not themselves ). Then I would reward the most popular, provided they are in my ignore list , and there were no obvious objections. Other members could use the list to give rewards as well of course.

Good idea though but when people hear merit as rewards then they will come up with useless topics with a highly constructive first post along with a source at the end that is what I don't really like.

[Jet Cash]

As an English eccentric with fairly positive and extreme views ( in some cases ), I don't think I should be the person to short list those to receive awards, but I reserve the tight to overlook some.

I think I will be selfish here, and restrict it to technical discussions and help about hardware, software, Bitcoin, alts, defi and internet connectivity. Also included will be macro-economic reports and discussions related to banking and asset preservation, together with on-line income creation using Bitcoin.

Excluded will be health topics, especially those about viruses and vaccines. American and EU politics and governments actions - they all seem to be trivial and predictable. Forum statistics and other forum related topics seem to get enough merits, so we had better leave them out.

It is my belief that the inclusion of meaningless or trivial images degrades a thread, and discourages more serious readers, especially when they are included in quotes, so such posts may not be read by me. The same goes for unnecessary quotes, especially nested ones.All members from brand new to legendary are eligible.

Does anyone want to expand or comment on my initial thoughts?

[dkbit98]

Since I put Polo7 and Bitcoin SV on ignore, this part of page one of what my "unread posts" looks like:

My recent visits to reputation section look similar like yours, and top half of the screen and ignored topics from members like stupidcontract100 and others.
This should be considered as trolling and some moderator actions is needed, maybe cleaning and deleting topics and giving temp bans.

[ryap12]

I have noticed a drop in activity over the past months, although I think it could be a case of me finding fewer threads that interest me in the boards I frequently visit.
I looked at https://sitechecker.pro/traffic-checker/ to monitor the traffic on the forum over the last 6 months; can't confirm how accurate the chart is, but it shows an increase in traffic from last month after a drop between May and June;

If the chart is accurate, I would assume there was a spike in activity before May in anticipation for the halving and most people lost interest after that, as there was minimal change in price, leading to the drop in activity (this also coincides with the onset of lockdown in many countries as suggested by @mk4 above).
The current spike in traffic (last updated in August) could be a result of increased interest from institutional investors, such as the microstrategy purchase. The public may be getting bullish again about Bitcoin and renewing interest in it.

So I was thinking where you guys get the statistics and finally found the answer. Gotta add the website to my favorites.

And here are my thoughts for the decrease of activities;
1. Pandemic. Making everyone to work at home making them busy all day. Instead working in the office where you can just slack-off and post on Bitcointalk's forum.
2. Most people may have experienced scams in crypto and making them realize that they just wasted time here for earning not enough.
3. Lost of internet connection due to lockdowns and quarantines making most get unpaid. No salary, no bill, no internet.
4. And lastly, some did not survive for many reasons.

[friends1980]

(...)

Does anyone want to expand or comment on my initial thoughts?

Spam activity might have been reduced (which is, I think, what we were actually all hoping for), but I do not have the feeling quality has gone lower.

On the contrary, this week I've found 2 new books to read (in the WO thread, of all places). I started working on "Learn to Program from scratch" which was recommended in one of the threads (can't find back the thread). And I've been reading up further about crypto in judicial systems all over the world (which as you might know, is kind of my cup of tea), after having been tickled by LastofV8s a week or two ago.

In terms of intellectual stimulation, you could say this week has been a treat to me...

I feel like a lot of these interesting posts usually disappeared in heaps of spam.