[Merit] Legendary To Newbies Distribution Concern & Problem!

[Igebotz]

If there is actually a criteria for measuring quality of posts before posting them, I will like some of my senior colleagues on the platform to kindly assist me with even one of the criteria. I will really appreciate.

There are no criteria; merit is awarded based on one's judgment; aside from positively contributing, shitty posts may receive merit simply because they were extremely funny. Just choose the board with which you feel more at ease and have fun! Merit will follow.

Please how do I know that I am making a quality post because I need to start posting high quality posts, get merits and leave Newbie zone.

I find it fascinating that you have been a member of this forum for more than a year, but you claim that you dont understand how the rank system works? Do you find it hard to read or search the forum?
For God's sake, why don't you at least read the sticky threads at the top of this board?

Not everyone came to this forum to learn; some were introduced by a bounty hunter friend, so their knowledge of the forum is limited; and others only discovered the merit system a year or two.

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[philipma1957]

Please how do I know that I am making a quality post because I need to start posting high quality posts, get merits and leave Newbie zone.

The purpose of making high quality posts isn't solely to get merits, or for you to "leave newbie" like you said, Bitcointalk is a forum for Bitcoin discussion and other whatnots too, so we basically discuss the aforementioned here, so as you discuss with other users and contribute to discussions in places other than the bounty section, users will give you merits if or when they like your contribution. But your contribution shouldn't be because you want merits, it should be because you want to discuss about Bitcoin with others, thus you go in search for knowledge that is required and it becomes a win-win for you in learning, contributing to the forum, and receiving the appreciation for it in the form of merits.

I disagree somewhat. newbie status has many restrictions and if you actually are posting good stuff the restrictions are somewhat tiring to deal with.

Purchase a copper membership is not a solution for some third world people.

merits and leaving via good posts is the only way for some poor people.

[Coyster]

merits and leaving via good posts is the only way for some poor people.

I am not against this, and i do not think you understood my post. My idea is that the sole aim should not be about merits and signature campaign, at least at the beginning of a user's journey in Bitcointalk, the thing is this, if a user concentrates on merits, they might get too desperate/frustrated if it doesn't come as quickly as they have envisaged, and this could cause them to make some mistakes like plagiarism that might get them banned. But if a user genuinely enjoys posting in Bitcointalk and discussing Bitcoin and other whatnots/issues, they will easily garner knowledge, earn merits, eventually rank up and join a signature campaign in the end, and when on the signature campaign, they will not struggle to make as many constructive posts as the campaign (and its manager) requires.

[CryptoHeadlineNews]

High ranking members, like the legendary members make far more posts than newbies

Go to https://loyce.club/active/7d.html, and check the 10 most active Newbies. Then come back and explain how evil Legendary members are for not Meriting them.

I just check list and it still justify the statement Fivestar4everMVP said about high ranking members like legendary making more post than Newbie, because according to the 7days statistics given above, we are meant to understand the following...
Over 11,000 post was made by 2285 Newbie users in the past 7days
Whereas,
Over 7494 post was made by 375 Legendary users in the past 7days

Which if we are to calculate the number of post each users per rank made in 7days will be seen as given below

That is,
No of post each Newbie made in 7days = total No of post / Total No of users

No of post each Newbie made in 7days = 11000/2285= 4.8 post per user

While,

No of post each Legendary made in 7days = total No of post / Total No of users

No of post each Legendary made in 7days = 7494/375= 19.98 post per user


So with this little calculation from the data given above, it still shows that legendary users makes more post than Newbie, but moreover a merit was supposed to be given to any quality post irrespective of your rank on the forum

[n0nce]

Till now, I am a Newbie with 22 posts and just 1 merit.

Please how do I know that I am making a quality post because I need to start posting high quality posts, get merits and leave Newbie zone.

Why do you think you need to do that? You don't need to do anything; you can do that, if you wish.
You could also just read the forum without posting much; this is something that newcomers could and should do more, in my opinion. Sure, without posting, the rank won't budge, but who cares about a forum rank?

In the end it boils down to what your motivation is. In my above statement, I assumed a crypto newcomer that wants to educate themselves. This may be a totally wrong assumption.
But in general, I wouldn't say that anyone 'needs to [...] get merits and leave Newbie zone'.

Please how do I know that I am making a quality post because I need to start posting high quality posts, get merits and leave Newbie zone.

The purpose of making high quality posts isn't solely to get merits, or for you to "leave newbie" like you said, Bitcointalk is a forum for Bitcoin discussion and other whatnots too, so we basically discuss the aforementioned here, so as you discuss with other users and contribute to discussions in places other than the bounty section, users will give you merits if or when they like your contribution. But your contribution shouldn't be because you want merits, it should be because you want to discuss about Bitcoin with others, thus you go in search for knowledge that is required and it becomes a win-win for you in learning, contributing to the forum, and receiving the appreciation for it in the form of merits.

I disagree somewhat. newbie status has many restrictions and if you actually are posting good stuff the restrictions are somewhat tiring to deal with.

Actually, I remember not being able to post pictures was a bit of an annoyance indeed. But you need just a single merit and 30 activity points to become Jr Member and remove that limit, so I don't think it's really an issue.

[LoyceV]

Therefore, a technical Altcoin and Layer-2 board would be extremely helpful, where anything non-technical can just be reported and subsequently deleted or moved to the right board / subsection.

Maybe an Altcoin subboard where only users who earned 100+ Merit can post will work? That should stop the large majority of the spammers if airdropped Merit doesn't count.

[n0nce]

Therefore, a technical Altcoin and Layer-2 board would be extremely helpful, where anything non-technical can just be reported and subsequently deleted or moved to the right board / subsection.

Maybe an Altcoin subboard where only users who earned 100+ Merit can post will work? That should stop the large majority of the spammers if airdropped Merit doesn't count.

I guess that could work, yes. Such limitations are technically possible, such as in Ivory Tower (Full Members and above).

On the other hand, this thread is actually about newbies who are interested into Altcoins being unable to get merits..
Since I've got no idea about the Altcoin section, it would be interesting to know how hard it is to get 100 merit in there (from someone with actually good contributions of course - not a whining altcoin bounty spammer) to then 'unlock' the more serious / harder to get into Altcoin sub-board.

It could be argued that 100 merit can be achieved rather quickly in the Bitcoin section, and Bitcoin knowledge is kind of required for advanced concepts that go one or two steps further, anyway. So in practice, users would be required to meaningfully contribute to mostly Bitcoin discussion (I found well-formed questions to have almost as much potential for receiving merits as educational threads and replies, by the way) for a couple weeks first to get access to that board.

[UmerIdrees]

Therefore, a technical Altcoin and Layer-2 board would be extremely helpful, where anything non-technical can just be reported and subsequently deleted or moved to the right board / subsection.

Maybe an Altcoin subboard where only users who earned 100+ Merit can post will work? That should stop the large majority of the spammers if airdropped Merit doesn't count.

I guess that could work, yes. Such limitations are technically possible, such as in Ivory Tower (Full Members and above).

No, it will not work because it will not be implemented 

How many times have we had such discussion threads opened where members gives valuable feedbacks but these things remain virtual as the forum is not modified with these changes.

[Ahli38]

Being a beginner is the most difficult thing because it has certain limitations. even for completely new beginners the distance between posts should not be less than 360 seconds. I still remember when I was about to reply to a discussion quickly but it turned out to have to wait 360 seconds. However, this limit decreases as activity and merit increases. or every rank up then some restrictions are removed.

so I understand how important merit is for beginners to rank up in order to remove the restrictions. like newbies who can't post pictures it will be very difficult when they newbies want to make posts accompanied by pictures.

when I was a newbie, I also had the same thought, namely why high rankers send more merit to high levels too. But after now I've gone up in rank. I'm starting to understand the reason why more and more merits are sent to the top ranks like legendary. The reason I found was that the writings of the legendarys were of higher quality and sometimes I couldn't stop myself from sending merits.
when sending merit to the top rank, it must be based on the quality of his writing which deserves to be given merit.

the reason would be different when giving merit to beginners. sometimes I give to beginners with the excuse of helping and appreciating their efforts just to be more motivated and motivated to make even better posts. because I also feel when someone sends me merit, it feels like there is an urge to be better and like I get new energy or a booster spirit.

[n0nce]

Being a beginner is the most difficult thing because it has certain limitations. even for completely new beginners the distance between posts should not be less than 360 seconds. I still remember when I was about to reply to a discussion quickly but it turned out to have to wait 360 seconds. However, this limit decreases as activity and merit increases. or every rank up then some restrictions are removed.

It's good that you brought that up - I've almost forgot about that.
Now that I remember it, I can say that while I've rarely encountered that, when it did, it helped / reminded me to really think and read what I'm posting before I post it. I feel that's a very important thing to keep in mind if your aim is writing meaningful posts.

Personally, if I just agree with something, I write nothing and maybe give a merit. If I have a little correction or such, but nothing that really matters or changes a statement, I don't bother replying in like a one-sentence post. If I agree / disagree with a post, but someone already wrote basically what I was about to say, I also write nothing and maybe merit the post.

In general, I believe this 360 second limit can help newbies avoid starting 'megathreads' from normal threads, repeat something that's already been said and write other mostly useless posts that just add clutter to a topic.

so I understand how important merit is for beginners to rank up in order to remove the restrictions. like newbies who can't post pictures it will be very difficult when they newbies want to make posts accompanied by pictures.

As I've said above, images was the restriction I 'felt' the most, but it was still not more than a minor annoyance. If it's really important, higher ranked members also sometimes simply quote the post.

[Igebotz]

Therefore, a technical Altcoin and Layer-2 board would be extremely helpful, where anything non-technical can just be reported and subsequently deleted or moved to the right board / subsection.

Maybe an Altcoin subboard where only users who earned 100+ Merit can post will work? That should stop the large majority of the spammers if airdropped Merit doesn't count.

That would be a nice initiative, not only on the altcoin board but also on the bitcoin discussion board. I've been trying to get the stats of the most active users on that board, I also have the impression that most of the active accounts there were airdrop merits and haven't earned one since. They use that board as a safety net to gain Activity

But what happens to the genuine newbies who sign up to share their ideas on that forum? Who doesn't care about the merit system

[Falconer]

But what happens to the genuine newbies who sign up to share their ideas on that forum? Who doesn't care about the merit system

True beginners will be recognized by the effort they put into sharing ideas and trying to gain knowledge. They will have no trouble getting merits or even rankings as I'm sure some of them currently have higher merit than activity.

Even though they didn't directly state that they cared about the merit system, in reality they were users who cared. I would say they don't care about the merit system if the newbie just join for the money and the activity is just for the bounty. We can get to know him more closely, so that in fact beginners who want to gain knowledge and contribute to the forum by sharing ideas are those who care about all systems in this forum, including the merit system.

[n0nce]

But what happens to the genuine newbies who sign up to share their ideas on that forum? Who doesn't care about the merit system

True beginners will be recognized by the effort they put into sharing ideas and trying to gain knowledge. They will have no trouble getting merits or even rankings as I'm sure some of them currently have higher merit than activity.

The question would be: what about newbies that do put in such effort, but are simply more interested in advanced cryptocurrency aspects, maybe especially in the realm of smart contracts and this sort of stuff. They might be easily overlooked since most long-time visitors of the forum just ignore the Altcoin section due to the sheer amount of spam to sift through.

Even if they don't care about merits at all, they will have a hard time finding people to talk to when it comes to these technical subjects, because Altcoin spammers have no clue (nor interest) about those topics and technical Bitcoin people stay in the much better moderated Bitcoin sections.

[Igebotz]

But what happens to the genuine newbies who sign up to share their ideas on that forum? Who doesn't care about the merit system

True beginners will be recognized by the effort they put into sharing ideas and trying to gain knowledge. They will have no trouble getting merits or even rankings as I'm sure some of them currently have higher merit than activity.

The question would be: what about newbies that do put in such effort, but are simply more interested in advanced cryptocurrency aspects, maybe especially in the realm of smart contracts and this sort of stuff. They might be easily overlooked since most long-time visitors of the forum just ignore the Altcoin section due to the sheer amount of spam to sift through.

Even if they don't care about merits at all, they will have a hard time finding people to talk to when it comes to these technical subjects, because Altcoin spammers have no clue (nor interest) about those topics and technical Bitcoin people stay in the much better moderated Bitcoin sections.

Both of you cut out the point of my comments, My response was directed to LoyceV, who suggested what sounded like post jail for newbies on the altcoin discussion board, in which I provided some challenges such development would cost honest newbies.

[Falconer]

The question would be: what about newbies that do put in such effort, but are simply more interested in advanced cryptocurrency aspects, maybe especially in the realm of smart contracts and this sort of stuff. They might be easily overlooked since most long-time visitors of the forum just ignore the Altcoin section due to the sheer amount of spam to sift through.

Your concerns may be true about the situation on the Alternate cryptocurrencies board regarding the merit system, but actually I don't think the board is completely ignored by merit sources or other merit users. At least 101,174 merit have been distributed on the Alternate cryptocurrencies board since the merit system was introduced, and average 521 merit were distributed during January - June 2022 (not including July). The average sender was 122 users from January to June, and the average recipient was 167 users. The total of merit distributed on the Alternate cryptocurrency board from January to date is 3372 merit (including this month). Check here: https://public.tableau.com/shared/K38WY9Z2Y?:display_count=n&:origin=viz_share_link

Even if they don't care about merits at all, they will have a hard time finding people to talk to when it comes to these technical subjects, because Altcoin spammers have no clue (nor interest) about those topics and technical Bitcoin people stay in the much better moderated Bitcoin sections.

About this I agree.

Both of you cut out the point of my comments, My response was directed to LoyceV, who suggested what sounded like post jail for newbies on the altcoin discussion board, in which I provided some challenges such development would cost honest newbies.

Sorry about that, mate. While LoyceV has not responded to you.

[Pmalek]

OP might want to check out this thread I made last year. It fits this discussion nicely. Here Is One Reason Why Legendary Members Get So Many Merits. 

As a merit source, I distribute my source merits as I read the threads that interest me. I would love if there were more users from lower ranks that participate in the discussions, but it's not my fault they aren't. If there are no newbies to merit, I am not going to merit newbies. Open any serious thread and it's not uncommon to see 10 posts and 7/8 are from legendary members, 1 is a hero, etc. Join the discussions to reap the benefits and create something of value. Then you will get merited. I even ran a merit giveaway thread for a long time and got very few responses there. Eventually, it died. Quality newbies will reach higher ranks easily, those who stay newbies do so for a reason.     

What’s happening now was, You can’t get a enough merit if your field of expertise is not about Bitcoin technicalities or in Meta which most of the merits distributes.

To be fair, this is a Bitcoin forum as the name suggests. And on a Bitcoin forum, you discuss Bitcoin. Everything else is of less importance and that includes the altcoin section. That doesn't mean that there are no quality posts there as well, but the majority don't care much about them. I am not going to merit you for your ability to fix cars because that's off topic to me. The topic of discussion is in the name of the forum.

[LoyceV]

a technical Altcoin and Layer-2 board would be extremely helpful

Maybe an Altcoin subboard where only users who earned 100+ Merit can post will work?

But what happens to the genuine newbies who sign up to share their ideas on that forum? Who doesn't care about the merit system

(quotes shortened)
The suggestion was for a new board, not to impose the "earned Merit rule" on the existing altcoin boards. So genuine newbies will unfortunately not be allowed to postt here, but they can still post in the currently existing boards.
It's not ideal for them, but it's not ideal now either. At least this would give some users a board to discuss altcoins without so many useless posts.

who suggested what sounded like post jail for newbies on the altcoin discussion board, in which I provided some challenges such development would cost honest newbies.

Think of it more as Serious Discussion/Ivory Tower, but with earned Merit requirements instead of a certain (grandfathered) Rank.

[Welsh]

The question would be: what about newbies that do put in such effort, but are simply more interested in advanced cryptocurrency aspects, maybe especially in the realm of smart contracts and this sort of stuff. They might be easily overlooked since most long-time visitors of the forum just ignore the Altcoin section due to the sheer amount of spam to sift through.

Even if they don't care about merits at all, they will have a hard time finding people to talk to when it comes to these technical subjects, because Altcoin spammers have no clue (nor interest) about those topics and technical Bitcoin people stay in the much better moderated Bitcoin sections.

Which definitely happens. It's much harder to strike up a decent conversation in the Altcoin section, than it is in somewhere like Development & Technical Discussion on the main Bitcoin section. This is because of two reasons; the altcoin section is somewhat boycotted, even though interesting discussion does happen, and in fact would benefit users Bitcoin knowledge, and be more aware of some of the issues Bitcoin might have, and what users are trying to implement to make alternatives better, which might in the future mean that Bitcoin implements something similar. This is a rare occurrence definitely, but I think it's because of the lack of involvement from most users.

Then, there's the second issue where generally speaking; the altcoin section attracts more lower quality users. That's not to say that all of them are though. That's something the moderation team needs to sort out, since most of the Altcoin section isn't getting reports, probably due to the first reason. It's boycotted. I'm hoping to get into the deep of this problem. However, at the moment we're kind of catching up on older posts made in 2017/2018. Most reports in the announcement section as an example, are from this period. I'd say 90% of reports made in those sections are on old reports.

I can't speak for other moderators, but once I feel like I'm getting a grasp on the announcement section, I'll be moving onto the other sections like Altcoin Discussion, which I've tested recently, and can report a ton of reports in a very short amount of time. So, that section is a behemoth of a task, but I'm sure we'll eventually be able to get on top of it.

I don't even want to look at the statistics of how many posts have been removed in the announcement sections, I can imagine it's well over 100k. I've easily removed hundreds of pages of spam this year alone, and I know mprep is very actively managing the section too, as well as some patrollers, and other global moderators.

Call me mad, but I genuinely believe we're starting to make an impact on that section, and given enough time I can't see why we can't get on top of the rest of the sub sections. I'm willing to put a ton of effort in to reclaiming the altcoin section, however I'm not sure that the reputation it has will ever be forgotten, and it would continue to be boycotted regardless of how clean we get it.

[philipma1957]

The question would be: what about newbies that do put in such effort, but are simply more interested in advanced cryptocurrency aspects, maybe especially in the realm of smart contracts and this sort of stuff. They might be easily overlooked since most long-time visitors of the forum just ignore the Altcoin section due to the sheer amount of spam to sift through.

Your concerns may be true about the situation on the Alternate cryptocurrencies board regarding the merit system, but actually I don't think the board is completely ignored by merit sources or other merit users. At least 101,174 merit have been distributed on the Alternate cryptocurrencies board since the merit system was introduced, and average 521 merit were distributed during January - June 2022 (not including July). The average sender was 122 users from January to June, and the average recipient was 167 users. The total of merit distributed on the Alternate cryptocurrency board from January to date is 3372 merit (including this month). Check here: https://public.tableau.com/shared/K38WY9Z2Y?:display_count=n&:origin=viz_share_link

Even if they don't care about merits at all, they will have a hard time finding people to talk to when it comes to these technical subjects, because Altcoin spammers have no clue (nor interest) about those topics and technical Bitcoin people stay in the much better moderated Bitcoin sections.

About this I agree.

Both of you cut out the point of my comments, My response was directed to LoyceV, who suggested what sounded like post jail for newbies on the altcoin discussion board, in which I provided some challenges such development would cost honest newbies.

Sorry about that, mate. While LoyceV has not responded to you.

I gave 69 on that board Jan to July. Mostly because I mine BTC and Eth,LTC,Doge

I have to work hard to merit that board as there are huge amounts or poor content posts.

But since I do believe that alt pow coins are necessary for crypto I support the board.

[skarais]

I gave 69 on that board Jan to July. Mostly because I mine BTC and Eth,LTC,Doge

You must be joking, 69 is not a real number but it is something    because based on history, you have submitted 134 merit on the Alternate cryptocurrencies board especially on the altcoin mining board from Jan to July.

I have to work hard to merit that board as there are huge amounts or poor content posts.

But since I do believe that alt pow coins are necessary for crypto I support the board.

One of the reasons why altcoin board are ignored by many merit source is that it is difficult to find good posters and understand something that is true. I think you've made that clear, but I hope the posters there don't lose you as a user distributing some merit.