Trust System

[Waldaniam]

Hi there.
First of all I do not know is this subject belongs to reputation thread. Correct me if I'm wrong so I can move it to appropriate thread. I was reading about the trust system and as I understood you must be s potential or real scammer to be tagged. Administrator theymos said that DT members can't tag anyone for something stupid. https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5050263.msg47119519#msg47119519 Well he was talking about merits but as I understoot that refers not only to merits but to all stupid tags in gemeral.

I saw a lot of of tags from DT members with feedbacks like "Idiot" "Mentally sick" "Shitty person" "Meritted a scammer" e.t.c. I checked that profiles and found nothing that was related to any type of scam. So my question is if it is allowed to tag a person just because you don't like him? Is it allowed to tag someone because of your vendetta or something? Also I would like to to know why obvious scam threads were not closed before they scammed out millions of dollars out of the gullible people's pockets?    

Bitconnect - Biggest ponzi in crypto history. Slole around $ 1biilion - the thread was not closed despite many warnings. After it's collapse many people left homeless and some of them commited a suicide.

Ethconnect - Obvious scam that just stole around $ 4 million and vanished without giving out a single token - The thread was closed by topic starter to avoid uncomfortable questions.

Bankera - Collected 140 million dollars via ICO. - After the listing and now the token cost and trading volume are almost zero. The thread was closed by topic starter to avoid uncomfortable questions.

Bitcoin gold - hard fork with a hidden 200 000 premine which was sold on exchanges within first days of listing for $150-200 that equals $ 40 millions. - The thread is open and alive. (Well here they did not steel anything but the people who bought BTC gold on early stages lost 80% of their investments)

There are so many more. Sorry but it will take a long time to name all of them. Generally speaking 99% of all ICO's was nothing but a scam.

I read that scams are not moderate because it is not our business. That is the statement of bitcointalk.  But I am sorry... 99% of potential private investors (not institutional ones) are coming here on this forum to find some crypto investment opportunities. Many of them do not understand how it really works. So closing the scam threads on early stages or forcing suspicious projects to escrow investments can save a lot of people a lot of money and maybe someone's life as well. Please let me know what do you think about this and sorry for my bad english (I'm Russian)
Thank you in advance.

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[Charles-Tim]

I saw a lot of of tags from DT members with feedbacks like "Idiot" "Mentally sick" "Shitty person" "Meritted a scammer" e.t.c. I checked that profiles and found nothing that was related to any type of scam. So my question is if it is allowed to tag a person just because you don't like him?

It is wrong, and not advisable. Red tags are for people that are obviously scammers or encouraging scammers, or that did anything wrong to cheat on this forum.

Also I would like to to know why obvious scam threads were not closed before they scammed out millions of dollars out of the gullible people's pockets?

Check the quote below. But, the negative feedback is enough to avoid such users.

19. Possible (or real) scams and Trust ratings are not moderated (to prevent moderation abuse).

So closing the scam threads on early stages or forcing suspicious projects to escrow investments can save a lot of people a lot of money and maybe someone's life as well. Please let me know what do you think about this and sorry for my bad english (I'm Russian)

Your English is good. If an ICO is noticed to be scam, there are a lot of users that will red tag the company's user account on this forum and also the reason can be seen in the feedback which is enough for us to know to back off such projects. But, some might not be detected early.

[suchmoon]

I read that scams are not moderate because it is not our business. That is the statement of bitcointalk.  But I am sorry... 99% of potential private investors (not institutional ones) are coming here on this forum to find some crypto investment opportunities. Many of them do not understand how it really works. So closing the scam threads on early stages or forcing suspicious projects to escrow investments can save a lot of people a lot of money and maybe someone's life as well. Please let me know what do you think about this and sorry for my bad english (I'm Russian)
Thank you in advance.

This forum does not moderate scams (for a number of reasons, bias and false sense of security among them) and I don't think it ever will. But if it comes to that... since most scams tend to be shitcoin-related just getting rid of altcoin boards would probably reduce scams by 99%.

Consequently red (or any) trust ratings are not moderated either. And yes, some users will post red trust for stupid reasons. Technically they should not be included in trust lists of other users therefore rendering their sent ratings appear under "untrusted" feedback but the system is not perfect.

[The Cryptovator]

All of the points you mentioned here were already discussed multiple times. If you spend more few times and read related topics then you should get all of your desired answers. It's easy to ask why the forum doesn't moderate an obvious scam or a potential scam. The question is who will determine the scam and what is the perfect way? If the forum takes the responsibility to prevent scams and if after happening any scam in the case then users will blindly blam to the forum administration. On the other hand who will prevent potential abuse scam moderation. That's the reason why the trust system has been implemented. Listen, any system in the world isn't perfect, but you have to compare if the system is useful or not. Perhaps there is a few stupid feedback, but it doesn't mean the whole trust system is broken. But often I have seen other DT members exclude if discover such as DT members. So, also you may help the trust system by detecting such stupid feedback. You may realize the case, so other DT members would take action if they think it's reasonable.

[nutildah]

But I am sorry... 99% of potential private investors (not institutional ones) are coming here on this forum to find some crypto investment opportunities.

Well, I don't know about that. Several big, big projects have no presence here at all; nor do countless little ones. Sometimes Bitcointalk comes up in search results and that's how ANN threads drive clicks, and I don't think people would keep paying bounties / advertising signatures if there was no profit in it (but who knows really... its a mystery).

I believe theymos would intervene if a project and/or account owner had clearly broken laws and been convicted of it. Up to that point, well, there's a few other ways in which threads can be locked or nuked (spamming, linking to malware)... probably more if you asked around.

Don't hold your breath waiting for scam threads to be locked in the meanwhile.

[andulolika]

Half the forum is probably well organized.

[Maus0728]

Here's my insights

I saw a lot of of tags from DT members with feedbacks like "Idiot" "Mentally sick" "Shitty person" "Meritted a scammer" e.t.c. I checked that profiles and found nothing that was related to any type of scam. So my question is if it is allowed to tag a person just because you don't like him? Is it allowed to tag someone because of your vendetta or something? Also I would like to to know why obvious scam threads were not closed before they scammed out millions of dollars out of the gullible people's pockets?    

We do not encourage tagging users with such reasons. As much as possible, people must only tag others with legitimate claim and supporting evidence that must be referenced on the flag. Also, once a user tag others unreasonably, it would also be shown on that user's sent feedback -- in which if was pure non-sense feedback, would then just soon backfire onto that user. And on a stronger point, tags with those unnecessary reasons often tend to not be taken into consideration for campaign restrictions and/or by campaign managers. Lastly, some people never tend to investigate nor do their own research first before investing on projects. Instead, they read whitepaper, see if it has potential just by their own reasoning, then invest right after.

I read that scams are not moderate because it is not our business. That is the statement of bitcointalk.  But I am sorry... 99% of potential private investors (not institutional ones) are coming here on this forum to find some crypto investment opportunities. Many of them do not understand how it really works. So closing the scam threads on early stages or forcing suspicious projects to escrow investments can save a lot of people a lot of money and maybe someone's life as well.

Highlighted the text that they don't understand how it works. And yes, it is not really the fault nor the shortcomings of the community once a user had been scammed in his investments. You already mentioned it, they don't understand. Hence, some users tend to be attracted with a good project idea and sees it as an opportunity for an easy money, plus the fake reviews that adds to his hopes up and FOMOing the user. Right now, all the users that were active in scam busting is passionate in taking down scam projects ASAP, and it would be the investor's initiative if he will investigate and research first or not.

Hope this clears out your questions. 

[DaveF]

I have posted about it a few times, but I'll keep this somewhat short.
The trust system is trying to do a few things and there are groups that feel it should be done differently.

But, in my view, the trust system should be used for trading / dealing with people and letting people know if you can TRUST them to DO WHAT THEY SAY.
Did you send them BTC and they shipped the miner / collectable token / whatever. Then positive trust.
Did you send them BTC and they sent you the 100% worthless shit coin / eth token / whatever then you know what. They did what they said. Either no trust / neutral trust or positive trust.
If you walk into a car dealer and say "Sell me that rusted out crap box in the corner that does not run for $230,0000 then you know what. That is on you.

Scams are not moderated here, and people tend to take that personally. Sorry, we as a forum are not you mom, do your own research. If you send out money to some unknown place on the internet and get ripped off, that's on you. Not the trust system.

Now people here have been using the trust system to peruse their own views of justice or what is right or wrong.
It's not going to be stopped. So you really have to look at what is posted.

Links to deals not complete, links showing that someone said "A" and then did "B". Are all good.
If I tell you that if you buy this token for $.001 and it's going be $20.00 tomorrow and you believe me. That's yet again on you.

With the "Shitty person" "Meritted a scammer" comments, if you post them and I see it, I tend to ignore you from that point on. I may give you a ~ in my trust list. I should probably do that more, but that's on me being lazy.

-Dave

[Laudanum]

Let me make this simple.

The trust system is a protection racket.
They will red tag you for presenting independently verifiable evidence of DT members scamming.
They will block legitmate warnings of scamming.

If you want evidence ask me. Suchmoon is one such DT member.
All of DT1 are either deliberate scammer protectors or worse

There are a few okay ones but they are too scared of having their sigs pulled and being red tagged themselves.

I mean if you can debunk anything I say that would be great.
Dont get me wrong. I actually want to be wrong.

The majority of DT1 now are noob trash no coiners that will seek to retain their grasp on the highest paying sigs and other rev streams at all costs. Or elder members that are complete losers that are still not wealthy.

[Halab]

So my question is if it is allowed to tag a person just because you don't like him? Is it allowed to tag someone because of your vendetta or something?

It's not forbidden, but it's not really the best thing to do (unless you like dramas).
The best answer is given here in the LoyceV guide :

Be the bigger man!
With great power comes great responsibility (source unknown). Especially when you're on DefaultTrust (or if you want to be on DefaultTrust in the future), you shouldn't (ab)use that power by leaving (negative) feedback when someone does something you don't like. Your Sent feedback is what others use to judge your judgement.
If someone on the internet is mean to you: boo fucking hoo! Use the Ignore button, and forget about them.

So closing the scam threads on early stages or forcing suspicious projects to escrow investments can save a lot of people a lot of money and maybe someone's life as well.

Mods are not perfect judges (no one is perfect). If you meet a stranger on the street and he asks you for 100$ and tells you he will give you 200$ back tomorrow, will you blindly give him the 100$ ? It's the same thing here, and just because it's a crypto-thing doesn't mean you have to give your money away without doing a few basic verifications.

[DireWolfM14]

This forum does not moderate scams (for a number of reasons, bias and false sense of security among them) and I don't think it ever will.

False sense of security is a big one.  There are so many scams around, the mods would be busy just trying to keep up.  There's no way the small team of forum mods could effectively mitigate the hundreds (maybe thousands) of scams that pop up.  Any attempt to do so, would lead many to fall for the ones that haven't been addressed.

Then we would have to rely on, or trust that moderators have our best interest in mind.  Bias is real, we're all human and vulnerable to it.  If a mod was employed by one project or another the community might see that as a blemish on the system.  Even if a mod was a employed by a legitimate project, any attempt to expose a competing project as a scam might come across as a conflict of interest.  That happens already, and theymos is smart to remain unaffiliated.  

It's really best for the forum to remain neutral in these situations.

since most scams tend to be shitcoin-related just getting rid of altcoin boards would probably reduce scams by 99%.

This was one of the reasons I joined the forum back in 2018; to research the shitcoin claims.  I believe ICOs were in full bloom at that time, right after the 2017 ATH.  I know I've learned a lot since then, that most (if not all) alt coins are worthless.

If history is any indicator, we're just a few months away from another ICO boom.  Some of my coworkers have asked me about one shitcoin or another in recent weeks, always with the same premise: "Have you heard about xyz coin?  It's supposed to be the next bitcoin..."  Of course I cringe and have to reign in their enthusiasm, telling that every shitcoin in existence has promised to upend bitcoin, yet none have.

I wouldn't mind if the forum did away with the Altcoin boards, I haven't visited them in a while.  I don't see that happening, though.  There's a significant economy in those boards, and I can only imagine that a portion of the forums income comes from those sections.

But even if that mitigates the issue, it wouldn't solve it.  There are plenty of scam exchanges, scam mixers, bitcoin doublers, and it's only a matter of time before scammers start emulating the RobinHood model of crypto futures, which I believe is a new form of scam on it's own accord.

[Laudanum]

So my question is if it is allowed to tag a person just because you don't like him? Is it allowed to tag someone because of your vendetta or something?

It's not forbidden, but it's not really the best thing to do (unless you like dramas).
The best answer is given here in the LoyceV guide :

Be the bigger man!
With great power comes great responsibility (source unknown). Especially when you're on DefaultTrust (or if you want to be on DefaultTrust in the future), you shouldn't (ab)use that power by leaving (negative) feedback when someone does something you don't like. Your Sent feedback is what others use to judge your judgement.
If someone on the internet is mean to you: boo fucking hoo! Use the Ignore button, and forget about them.

So closing the scam threads on early stages or forcing suspicious projects to escrow investments can save a lot of people a lot of money and maybe someone's life as well.

Mods are not perfect judges (no one is perfect). If you meet a stranger on the street and he asks you for 100$ and tells you he will give you 200$ back tomorrow, will you blindly give him the 100$ ? It's the same thing here, and just because it's a crypto-thing doesn't mean you have to give your money away without doing a few basic verifications.

See the dirty turds thread in meta although there are many updates that should be added to keep it current.

loyceV is a scammer protector. He deliberately deleted a post requesting flag support even when the flag was based on independently verifiable evidence of scamming that is undeniable.
Besides that he is a moron. I would take any guide that snake makes and examine it very closely before following it.

Dont be fooled by high cycled merit scores and DT1 membership.
Well these are usually signs of corrupt self serving weasels and they'll be wearing chipmixer or other highly paid sigs.

There is no rules for red tags now since the flag system.
But even those trust abused under the old system get to have their abuse magnified and grandfathered into the dumb design..
If you need clarity or evidence just ask.
It's a shit show and highly dangerous.

The latest one is.... you can be given a tag for publically responding to a tagged person.
Even if you were stating the verifiable truth.

Some of the mods are as bad as DT and on the same sigs payrolls.

Theymos himself? Who knows. I think he just doesnt care honestly.
Maybe he thinks I've tried to design a trust system I'm not messing around with it anymore let the kids fight it out.
Problem is merit and trust killed the forum.
Many elder members are not happy with the trust or merit system  but are rich so cant be bothered to help fix the forum that made them wealthy. They are also to blame. Theymos good or bad? Who knows. He seems weird to me  I actually believe he knows very little about the forum or its members. He sticks to his meta circle of sycophants who dont care about bct only milking it but he thinks they are his pals so let's them run riot over other less greedy real enthusiasts for the movement.
I mean he designed this mess but just washes his hands of it.

I mean sure he could be a lot worse. But could be a lot better too.
I like cobra more mostly because he recognized real bad guys when he saw them.
Theymos just thinks everyone is good deep down but then hates any criticism of his designs.
He is used to everyone kissing his ass and lost the ability to discern sneaky greedy scum from noisy but decent people who want to see satoshis principles followed thoroughly.
Gmax can be a bit rude but he is straight and simply follows logic and reason.
A bit machine like but consistent and will give transparent open explanation to his opinions.
He should have helped theymos design something more sensible for bct control systems.

Red tags = scammer, setting up a scam, attempting to scam or posing a direct financial danger to members.

Anything else is trust abuse.

I would also red tag people for promulgating as true conclusively debunked information repeatedly after being warned.
That is trolling at the highest level.

I mean there are no other people aside from DT mods admin and special characters that can get things changed for the better.
Discussing what is permitted and not generally is a waste of time but is good for historical purposes and a cathartic release
The greedy and driven generally are not easy to defeat entirely but it's fun to bitch slap them around in public so they can run and hide or be picked apart for the objective witness to observe. Slimy weasels.

So yes in theory it is okay because other DT will not do anything for red tags for any reason.
Even under the old system a.mod of 6yrs said to a real legend here that it was okay for them to be tagged if they said they liked lemons.
What did theymos say? Nothing ... but told the abused real legend to shut up moaning the boring long winded bastard.
That legend made us all super wealthy and smashed the biggest scams here.

Lol.

[The Sceptical Chymist]

I saw a lot of of tags from DT members with feedbacks like "Idiot" "Mentally sick" "Shitty person" "Meritted a scammer" e.t.c.

Yep, I don't doubt that for one second--but Theymos generally keeps his hands off of the DT membership and their behavior.  If a DT member is leaving feedbacks like those, it's kind of up to other DTs to exclude the person who's leaving wrong negatives like those. 

And yes, it is a very imperfect system and there has been a lot of misuse of it and that probably won't stop completely, since anyone can leave feedback for anyone else and trust isn't moderated.  Hopefully DT members are doing the best they can to clean their own house, so to speak.  That's how it's always worked (and sometimes it doesn't work very well).

[suchmoon]

If history is any indicator, we're just a few months away from another ICO boom.  Some of my coworkers have asked me about one shitcoin or another in recent weeks, always with the same premise: "Have you heard about xyz coin?  It's supposed to be the next bitcoin..."  Of course I cringe and have to reign in their enthusiasm, telling that every shitcoin in existence has promised to upend bitcoin, yet none have.

I think we're already in a new bubble and it's partly responsible for the Bitcoin rise too:



I mean who in their right mind would be paying 30%+ APR for fake dollars if not to gamble on the various shit-defi tokens and perhaps on BTC and ETH. The new twist about this bubble is that the defi nonsense allows dumb greedy kids to overleverage themselves so when it all comes crashing down they will be more broke than in 2018.

The size of this defi thing is $70 billion. Makes the Robinhood redditors look like fucking amateurs.

[Vod]

I believe theymos would intervene if a project and/or account owner had clearly broken laws and been convicted of it.

A few years ago Theymos asked me to present any proof that OG was doing something dishonest.  I spent a couple years collecting the evidence while it was being deleted, then I find out Theymos knew about the ponzi the entire time. 

So don't believe that.  Talk to the growing number of people trying to recover stolen coins and ask them about Theymos' "non-legal, non-violent" way of hodling their coins.

[Waldaniam]

If you meet a stranger on the street and he asks you for 100$ and tells you he will give you 200$ back tomorrow, will you blindly give him the 100$ ? It's the same thing here, and just because it's a crypto-thing doesn't mean you have to give your money away without doing a few basic verifications.

If you send out money to some unknown place on the internet and get ripped off, that's on you. Not the trust system.

Some projects were looking very much legit and could easily mislead even some educated crypto investors. Fo example monetha.

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1978067.0 - Thread is closed to avoid uncomfortable questions.

Lithuanian scam organized by a stripper Justas Pikelis who was posing as a crypto ertenpenior but later was exposed by forum members. That guy was a night bar stripper. He and his partners found a former paypal executive manager Eric Duprat via linkedin and offered him to participate in a new crypto project. At that time Duprat was unemployed and struggling financially. So he said yes. After he appeared in the team in 2017 during  ICO boom that project received 38 million dollars in the first opening day of ICO. Tokens were sold for 0.4 USD but after the listing the price decreased only and now the price is $0.02079 and 24h volume is $900. And a few basic verifications like you said did not help at all. There was no white paper and nothing was delivered at the end of the project. (Just some shitty app made by a student for $500) It was all Eric Duprat who had no idea what was going on and who was just posing as a team member. He received his $1.5 million and was very happy. Was that a giveaway to some unknown place on the internet as another of our colleagues mentioned. I do not think so. Some scams are well organized and even a veteran forum member can fall for it. Read about BTC gold that I mentioned above.

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=2253633.0

[JustinBounty]

I don't want to spread hate but even I have a useless feedback on my profile.

Betking was returning funds to users and I wasn't aware of their history and I by mistake appreciated that move by betking.

I was tagged and still am tagged dspite apologizing but honestly I don't understand if I actually made that big a mistake.

The trust system on the forum is not working as it was meant to be, I never scammed anyone nor I even supported any scammer but just because I appreciated someone returning other's money, I was tagged.

[Vod]

I don't want to spread hate but even I have a useless feedback on my profile.
The trust system on the forum is not working as it was meant to be, I never scammed anyone nor I even supported any scammer but just because I appreciated someone returning other's money, I was tagged.

If JG tagged you because you thanked someone for returning money, that's wrong and he should be hung above an anthill with honey on his genitals for a few hours.

If JG tagged you because you made up unproven stories, then he is not calling you a scammer and the trust system is working.    Anyone who believes what you write will ignore that trust anyway, as JG did not come to your conclusion that you scammed. 

tldr; If the feedback is useless, don't worry about it.

[~DefaultTrust]

Are you really naive or are you pretending?
The forum have near 600 active members at all. Almost 3/4 - is the signature spammers. They only write here as long as they are paid for posts.
Nobody really cares about any reputation. Lies and hypocrisy in almost every post of "legends" and "heroes" here.

[villain_Mr.Burns]

Are you really naive or are you pretending?
The forum have near 600 active members at all. Almost 3/4 - is the signature spammers. They only write here as long as they are paid for posts.
Nobody really cares about any reputation. Lies and hypocrisy in almost every post of "legends" and "heroes" here.

Perhaps you`re right. Otherwise, i then dont understand the disgrace going on in the trust system. Obviously,system doesnt work the way it was intended.