Gazeta's reputation thread: 5000 merits in four years

[GazetaBitcoin]

I created this account on November 6th, 2017. For those who don't know me, GazetaBitcoin is the account of one of the few Romanian crypto news websites. Unlike the spammers of the forum, I never used this account for shilling Gazeta's website nor I will. Actually, the account was almost never used until October 2019. And that was because I used to read the forum while being not logged in. Only since October 2019 I started to be active here.


At first I was interested in Bitmain coupons (I still am). Regarding the coupons I can say that I was able to make some successful transactions with some reputable members of the forum (including philipma1957), which were kind enough to leave me positive feedbacks after finishing the deals.


But I also started to enjoy the idea of sharing my knowledge here, of spreading here also Satoshi's word (I also did that on Gazeta's website) and, of course, to learn as much as I could from more experienced members. I was and still am very passionate about Bitcoin and crypto history starting from (even) pre-Cypherpunk's era and I tried to document several important moments from crypto history. I think the following ones are my best essays here:

            Historic threads

• Libertarians -- where are they now?
• A Declaration of the Independence of Cyberspace - We all should read it
• The dream of Cypherpunks, libertarians and crypto-anarchists - this is my 1000th post - also translated in Romanian
• The call for Julian Assange || The WikiLeaks Manifesto - We all should read it
• The Crypto Anarchist Manifesto - We all should read it
• Governs try to limit access of public to information and freedom since ages
• Phil Zimmermann's thoughts about PGP - We all should read them

            Educational threads

• Bitcoin - a bloodless revolution - also translated in Romanian
• 12 years later and people still don't know to use Bitcoin nor what it's good for - also translated in Romanian
• Governs are coming for the traders - also translated in Romanian
• Cryptocurrency vs digital money issued by the state
• Why reputation is essential on the free market

Merits-wise, on October 25th, 2019 I earned my first merit at 1 week after I became active, during the 10th Anniversary Art Contest. Mitchel was so kind to promote me to Jr. Member. Thank you Mitchell!

2 weeks later, on November 7th, I earned already the 10th merit necessary for becoming Member, thanks to Cyrus, which merited a post of mine from Romanian board. The post was linking to a translation I made, in Romanian language, for Wendy McElroy's book The Satoshi Revolution (obviously, with her approval). At the moment, Gazeta Bitcoin's translation is still the only Romanian translation of this book.

15 days later, on November 22nd, suchmoon gave me my 100th merit, necessary for ranking up to Full Member, also for a post from the art contest. Thank you suchmoon!

On February 11, 2020, philipma1957 was very kind and gave me my 250th merit, necessary for being Sr. Member, in a topic where I was suggesting some common sense rules for signature campaigns. Although my activity didn't allow me to rank up, I was happy to know that I reached the merits for being Sr. Member in only 109 days since I received my first merit.

While being still a Full Member, on April 5th, 2020, fillippone awarded me with my 500th merit! It was for a translation I made in Romanian for his topic Everything you wanted to know about BTC futures but were afraid to ask! Grazie fillippone! It happened at only 163 days since my first merit here.

Finally, on October 16, 2020, 357 days after receiving my first merit and while still being a Sr. Member, nullius made me a huge surprise, giving me my 1000th merit for my 1000th post! I think it's the nicest way I could ever think for earning this merit. Thank you nullius, for promoting me to Legendary member!

I'd like to state my deepest respect for:

1. those which ranked me up - Mitchel, Cyrus, suchmoon, philipma1957 and nullius

2. my merit fans

3. all the other forum user which merited me.

Thanks to you all, I am the 116th most merited member! At the moment I have a merit vs. activity ratio of 2.6 and a merit vs. posts ratio of 0.6. I am the second Romanian member which becomes Legendary after the merit system was implemented (after 20kevin20) and the only Romanian member which reaches 1000 merits starting from 0.


January 2023 update: it's been two years since I published this topic and I think I should update it with some more information.

I managed to obtain Legendary rank (almost at the upper limit of 1030 activity) and I am the only Romanian user which reached this rank starting from 0 merits. While having earned, in three years more than 3300 merits, according to bpip, I am the 59th most merited member and I am the 47th user with most earned merits! My current merit vs. activity ratio is of 2.78 and my merit vs. posts ratio is 1.17, being one of the few users which ever managed to achieve (and keep) a number of merits higher than the number of posts. I am also one of the very few users which ever sent and received (more than one) 50-merit bombs.

Since I became part of DT I always tried to make my feedbacks realistic, coherent and following the existing rules.

After months of investigative work and after many unsuccessful attempts performed by many others, I managed to find the truth about paraipan, ex-forum treasurer which held 250 BTC. Investigation showed he did not steal the coins. (Due to Investigations board restrictions I will not hyperlink the topic here.)

Maybe one of my most important achievements, I managed to change the earlier translation of Bitcoin white paper from bitcoin.org, which was a poor translation made by some illiterate Romanians which were lucky enough to have their document uploaded on bitcoin.org. However, I managed to create a new translation from scratch and, with NeuroticFish's help, the new document is now available on bitcoin.org.

During all this time I also involved a lot in keeping forum clean. With more than 60.000 good reports I am one of forum's best reporters. In September 2021, according to an announcement made by theymos, I was the fourth most efficient reporter of year 2020.

Together with 1miau, I involved in a campaign for improving posting quality for local boards. While the results of the campaign can not be quantified with numbers, the outcomes, so far, are promising.

I felt delighted to be chosen by icopress for helping him with votes counting of Bitcointalk Community Awards 2021 edition and with some more organizing of the 2022 edition of this wonderful contest (votes counting, establishing rules, suggestions, maintaining the historic quiz topic etc.).

I also became one of forum's known translators, collaborating, so far, with users like fillippone, 1miau, LoyceV, Little Mouse and others. My full portfolio can be found here.

And last, but not least, I recently launched my escrow service thread. Currently I'm running it for free.

Needless to say, I am one of the very few users wearing Foxpup's avatar and I thank her once more time for this opportunity! I feel very proud for being a part of Merit Cycling Club, where I was accepted in January 2021!

Note: all of the above were realized in under 100 days on the forum. My current logged in time is 105 day, but all of the above were done before I reached 100 days of online time.

Issues of note:
- I know there was (and still is) a trend of users to make topics like "My road to Member / Full Member" / "From zero to Hero" etc. Most of them (not all , though) are looking for merits when creating such topics. I'm not. Reaching the merits for Jr. Member, Member, Full Member, Sr. Member and even Hero is not such a big deal. On another side, reaching the merits threshold for becoming Legendary is something notable, as this is the ultimate rank of the forum. That's why I never created such a topic until now. I'd like to encourage all the low rank users to keep contributing to the forum and to never lose their hope: obtaining 1000 merits is possible, and even more -- it is possible in less than a year!
- topic is self moderated for avoiding spam. I wish I won't have to delete any post made here, but I will, if I have to.

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[eddie13]

Congrats..

[Blackpussy]

Merits-wise, on October 25th, 2019 I earned my first merit at 1 week after I became active, during the 10th Anniversary Art Contest. Mitchel was so kind to promote me to Jr. Member. Thank you Mitchell!

This is the motivation i've been searching for all this while being a jr member oct 2019 and today you are 1000 merit up,
this is a class act and a good example to follow i'm really hungry to do more after reading this reputation thread. thank you
and more success on the forum

[1miau]

Congratulations and well deserved!
I really like the effort you put into writing unique articles and as well as translations to your local board (Romanian).
I don't know about your total time logged in but it must be far more than my few 60 days / 5 hours. 

And I've still to respond to your PMs about your recent translations to Romanian. I can assure you, that I'll respond soon ^TM (this term is well known in shitcoin industry  )

[GazetaBitcoin]

Congrats..

Thank you eddie13!

This is the motivation i've been searching for [...]
this is a class act and a good example to follow i'm really hungry to do more after reading this reputation thread. thank you
and more success on the forum

I thank you! And I'm glad if this story of mine motivated you. I'm encouraging you to keep contributing to the forum and the results will appear

Congratulations and well deserved!
I really like the effort you put into writing unique articles and as well as translations to your local board (Romanian).

Thank you 1miau! I really appreciate your kind words! And I also have to thank you for the help you offered me in this journey. With the merits you just gave me for this topic you became officially my best merit fan with 102 merits! Which means you gave me 9.7% of all the merits I earned. That's huge

I don't know about your total time logged in but it must be far more than my few 60 days / 5 hours. 

Actually it's not I have 46 days, 2 hours and 24 minutes. Man, this logged in time raises very hard!

And I've still to respond to your PMs about your recent translations to Romanian. I can assure you, that I'll respond soon ^TM (this term is well known in shitcoin industry  )

Hehe, no worries, whenever you have time. If weeks will pass though I may poke you from time to time to not forget, if you don't mind

[NeuroticFish]

Congrats man, although sometimes your posts tend to get long, they are very informative.
Also hats off for the work done on translating the important threads.
All in all, it's well deserved.

[The Cryptovator]

Congrats mate, you got what you deserved. If some contribute to the forum then the forum can give back something like merits. It's not an easy task to earn merit nowadays and seems your merit ratio is quite a good comparative with your activities. I can't recall how much merit I had earned in a year, but all of my merits by earn. You proved once again earning merits and rank up is possible for good contributors although it's hard.

By the way, the reputation thread shouldn't self-moderate and merit doesn't relate with reputation.

[GazetaBitcoin]

Thank you NeuroticFish and Coolcryptovator!

By the way, the reputation thread shouldn't self-moderate and merit doesn't relate with reputation.

Yes, I know, but I did it only for limiting signature spams and trolls (if any). It's a habit I learned from LoyceV and nullius However, I hope it won't be the case. And in a self moderated thread anyone can see if a post was deleted... I didn't delete any nor I intend to, unless some notorious trolls end up here (I won't name them but everybody knows them).

[skarais]

Honestly, I am very jealous of your achievement on this one. You got it really fast and have beaten me at this. The last time I saw you was when you were a full member. But after all this time, today I have seen that you have reached the threshold to become a Legendary member with a collection of 1000+ merit. Just one word for you and it's "Amazing". It was like a racehorse galloping with joki. Congratulation buddy.

[LoyceV]

By the way, the reputation thread shouldn't self-moderate and merit doesn't relate with reputation.

Yes, I know, but I did it only for limiting signature spams and trolls (if any). It's a habit I learned from LoyceV and nullius

That can't be, my reputation thread isn't self-moderated:

No spam
Contrary to most of my threads, this one won't be self-moderated. I don't want to be able to censor this thread.
Local rules
I don't want any (signature) spam in here.
Insubstantial posts will be reported.
Do not quote the entire OP.

If you want to remove the self-moderation: just move (bottom-left) the topic to a board that doesn't allow self-moderation (for instance Archival), then move it back here.

GazetaBitcoin is the account of one of the few Romanian crypto news websites. Unlike the spammers of the forum, I never used this account for shilling Gazeta's website

You did a good job hiding it: I never knew!

[GazetaBitcoin]

That can't be, my reputation thread isn't self-moderated:

No spam
Contrary to most of my threads, this one won't be self-moderated. I don't want to be able to censor this thread.
Local rules
I don't want any (signature) spam in here.
Insubstantial posts will be reported.
Do not quote the entire OP.

Yep, I know. I just read recently (just prior writing this topic) your reputation thread and I saw it is one of the few not self moderated topics of yours. I meant that generally speaking, I learned from you and nullius to make self-moderated threads

If you want to remove the self-moderation: just move (bottom-left) the topic to a board that doesn't allow self-moderation (for instance Archival), then move it back here.

You and Coolcryptovator were right with this suggestion. Such threads shouldn't be self-moderated. I just removed the self moderation. Thx!

Honestly, I am very jealous of your achievement on this one. You got it really fast and have beaten me at this. The last time I saw you was when you were a full member. [...] Just one word for you and it's "Amazing".

Thank you! Yes, this is how it feels... amazing. But don't be jealous... Just act normally, as you did until now, and I'm sure you'll also reach this milestone! Be patient, be a good contributor and you'll get there! You won't even realize when you'll earn the remaining 372 merits that you need To be honest, during this journey I had only 2 periods when I felt "stuck". The merits from 600 to 700 and those from 900 to 1000. Last week I wasn't thinking anymore that I could breach this barrier in less than 1 year. I had 971 merits back then. But nullius made me a very nice surprise, offering me my 1000th merit for my 1000th post What I'm trying to say is that if you keep being a good forum member you'll certainly get there!

[Lordhermes]

I have just observed you for sometimes now, its pretty cool with your interactive behavior.

Its rare to see merit earners with quite little ratio with activities, these are crazy of you guys like Ratimov too, doing the same thing, I just wondered how you guys do this, but by the way, I'm in the game already so I have to do my best.

Congratulations,

[Upgrade00]

What I'm trying to say is that if you keep being a good forum member you'll certainly get there!

Congratulations on your merit achievement especially considering the time period (using activity score) it took you to get there. And you're right, any member who puts in effort to help other users through posting quality content or catching scammers would stand out from the pile eventually.

New members would naturally find it more difficult to use the forum, and I usually advice they take your approach of lurking in the forum for as long as it takes to get a hang of things before they create an account or become active.

[notblox1]

Congratulations GazetaBitcoin!
Now let's make a big merit party celebration 

[GazetaBitcoin]

Its rare to see merit earners with quite little ratio with activities, these are crazy of you guys like Ratimov too, doing the same thing, I just wondered how you guys do this

Thank you for the kind words, Lordhermes! Indeed, last winter some newbies with potential appeared on the forum, including, but not limited to Ratimov, Rikafip, bullrun2020bro, myself and others as well... And yes, some performed incredibly. About how we are doing this what can I say... I guess each one tried to contribute to the forum in niches where they do their best, either if that means writing tutorials, translating quality and precious essays of other members, reporting spam, revealing scams, making proposals for the overall benefit of the forum and so on... And, in the meanwhile, learn as much on the areas where each one had limited knowledge. thus improving himself. Learn also from older forum members, with more experience. And act with decency, respect towards other members of the forum.

Congratulations on your merit achievement especially considering the time period (using activity score)

Thanks, Upgrade00! I'm trying my best and I had a lot to learn from other users which have enormous greater merit vs activity ratios (take fillippone for example, which has 5.05 merit vs activity ratio; and not just him, of course) or merit vs activity ratio (such as nullius, which is one of the very, very few members here which has more merits than the number of posts). When I see such members I understand they bring quality to the forum and I'm trying to learn as much as possible from them.

Congratulations GazetaBitcoin!
Now let's make a big merit party celebration 

Hooraaay!

Congratulations, GazetaBitcoin.

You are doing great posts, first noticed on the theme The dream of Cypherpunks, libertarians and crypto-anarchists.
I really liked this article and I even translated it into Russian for our locale. Well, what can I say, don't stop there, now it's time to storm the mark of 2000 merits.

Hey Ratimov! Thanks for the kind words! Wow, I didn't know you translated my essay... it's a great honor for me to find that. If you don't mind, can you PM me the link, please? I'll add the translation at the bottom of the original essay. Never thought it would raise such a big interest, but I have to say that the respective topic is my best writing here and I worked a lot for realizing it. And yes, I'm on my way to 2000 merits now hehe

[fillippone]

Well done Gazeta!
Over the last months I had the opportunity to appreciate your dedication to the forum, and above all on the meticulosity of your work translating my thread on your local board.
Keep up with the good work and you’ll find yourself doing more post like this one!

[ScamViruS]

Congratulations, GazetaBitcoin, for achieving this milestone. You get what you deserve, because you did a lot of good work which was informative and important post. As a result of your good work, community members have helped you reach this milestone.

New members can take inspiration from your thread, that they too can take themselves to new heights if they work well and work hard.

[$crypto$]

Because there have been many who have appreciated you with the achievement of 1000merits, of course this is very extraordinary.

I am also here to congratulate you on achieving a good goal in doing work on this forum and for your contribution to earn the 1000merits you deserve.

Of course this will be a lot of motivation for people who want to level up in a perfect way.

Good work.

[GazetaBitcoin]

Well done Gazeta!
Over the last months I had the opportunity to appreciate your dedication to the forum, and above all on the meticulosity of your work translating my thread on your local board.

Grazie fillippone! It's been a pleasure for me to translate your very informative topics. I learned a lot while translating them!

Congratulations, GazetaBitcoin [...] New members can take inspiration from your thread, that they too can take themselves to new heights if they work well and work hard.

I am also here to congratulate you [...] Of course this will be a lot of motivation for people who want to level up in a perfect way.

Thank you ScamViruS and $crypto$! I'd be happy to know that I motivated others in their rank up journey and in doing their best for contributing as much as possible to the forum. I was also inspired by others which were ahead of me and it would be nice to be myself also an inspiration for others

[lovesmayfamilis]

I have long been going to congratulate you on your achievements, but I don’t like to come to the holidays empty-handed . I see your activity on the forum, and I want to express my respect to you. You motivate newbies, and I also see that you are a good translator. Keep moving.