My contribution to a near-perfect Merit-based ranking system for Bitcointalk

[Ucy]

Today I was going through a topic on Merit created by Theymos (on Jan 24 2018) called  "Merit & new rank requirements". I spent some reasonable amount of time reading through the post and digesting it in order to understand why the merit system was really created. Atlast I realized the intention was genuine... I didn't pay too much attention to the reward system in the past because I concluded it was going to be abused as long as human being is concerned. For example, human biases or emotions as it relates to such reward systems is a very important factor that has to be considered if you want a near perfect reward system. If some people are disliked by much of a society due to their impartiality and strict adherence to good morals they will likely not benefit much from certain reward system and the society will definitely suffer for not being guided by their best. It's more like hating humans in zombielands who are trying to persuade full-blown zombies to stop killing people and sucking their blood, plus other hate going to half-turned zombies for liking the posts of the humans. How do we solve this problem? The problem should be solved by using a reward system that incentivizes everyone to search for solutions (generally called useful contributions) and faults/issues in the works or posts submitted by people for review, preferably in an anonymous/privacy-friendly environments to grade/reward them accordingly. The anonymity will help in the case of those who aren't liked that much or those who fear rewarding those that are hated for their good/revolutionary views.
Every single work or post should have a chance to be reviewed by other people. We could have a little "submit for review" button below or above each post which will enable other members go through a work to review it, earn reward for the review as well as  reward those they are reviewing, in privacy-friendly manner. No need to know your reviewers so you don't create a situation where everyone will be trying to please certain people for reward, whether they are right or wrong... or situation where people will be afraid to give certain kind of reward in order not to be hated.  There is a reason why the eyes of images of judges with sword and scale are covered.


The Merit-based ranking system should really be based on Merit otherwise it should not be used to prevent people from ranking up or qualifying them for Signature campaigns.
Only post with little to no fault/issue should earn high merit. We can aswell grade all the posts and give them the merit they deserve(whether high or low merit), meaning most/all will be going through merit system in order to be graded rather than being outrightly ignored/neglected.





* Really give good rewards to only good works/posts otherwise you will share in the punishment reserved for evil posts/works that you reward.

* Good Work/Post is solution with useful contributions that solve problems properly and increase the quality of life/existence, without creating more problems.

* Be sure not to call evil Good or Good evil... as it's written "Woe to those who called evil Good and Good evil

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[digaran]

Having just a thumb up 👍 and thumb down 👎 on every post box could be very productive. When more people give you a thumb up, it would automatically motivate you to do better. On the other hand, seeing that one of your posts receives more thumbs downs than ups would make you rethink and revise your future posts.

This system would motivate members and should not be dependent on work. With my humble suggestion, we would see more quality and constructive content in the long term.

Even if only 10% of active members are merit sources, there are still 90% of us who would like to contribute to the community. I currently only have 2 merits and read at least 50 posts every day, with about 10 of them being merit worthy. However, when I don't have any merits to give, I simply move on. There are certainly thousands of other members like me. Imagine if thousands of members actively rewarded good posters every day!

If this system were implemented, it would reach a point where you could simply go past a post that has no thumbs ups or only a few and just read the more interesting posts by looking at their ups and downs. This system would really benefit the forum.




Revised by AI.

[Helena Yu]

@OP although it's better if we don't know which user send his own sMerit and people also doesn't know which one send him merit, but it will increase of abusing merit.

Example: you have 5 accounts and then you share sMerit with your each alts, does anyone know if you're abusing the merit system? No. Only theymos and Cyrus might know since they're an administrators.

It will increase the administrators work, so I don't think they will keep watching and moderating the merit flows between each account.

Having just a thumb up 👍 and thumb down 👎 on every post box could be very productive.

I currently only have 2 merits and read at least 50 posts every day, with about 10 of them being merit worthy. However, when I don't have any merits to give, I simply move on.

It doesn't make sense to have thumb up and merit in the same time, someone need to click thumb up and giving merit which is double work for merit sources.

If you mean thumb up is merit and thumb down is demerit, there's few people have made proposal about it, but it seems really hard to implemented, abused etc.

If you see a good post and don't have any sMerit just create report in this thread https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5093271.0

[digaran]

Every single work or post should have a chance to be reviewed by other people. We could have a little "submit for review" button below or above each post which will enable other members go through a work to review it, earn reward for the review as well as  reward those they are reviewing, in privacy-friendly manner.

1. How are the reviewer selected?
2. What is the reward? If it's cryptocurrency, token or fiat, who will pay the reviewer?
3. Is there anyone who can ensure/check quality of the review?

--snip--

It doesn't make sense to have thumb up and merit in the same time, someone need to click thumb up and giving merit which is double work for merit sources.

It could be automated by automatically give thumb up when someone give merit.

You misunderstood me, merit should be in place for ranking up, the thumb up/down idea is for all members, it shouldn't have value for rank etc, more like a quality ranking by the community.

[DdmrDdmr]

<…>

Whilst I’m pretty sure that account names behind posts have a certain influence in general terms, both in earning Merits or not earning them, I believe that content is still the main driver for the most. The system is inherently subjective, as it’s down to each person’s criteria (and capability) what to Merit, and that’s why I prefer having more eyes on the board, diversifying the criteria overall, as well as the scope of read boards and posts.

I’m not a particular fan of submitting posts for review, though there are threads that currently already play that role. Having a system whereby people can submit a post for review at the click of a button, in an sort of anonymized fashion (or else), would incentivise some/many to simply submit all their posts one by one, creating a massive queue of posts to revise. I doubt I’d ever look at the queue, as I prefer to Merit what I see in its context, and not isolated from it.


Note:
Quite a few of us have racketed our brains at some point to try to improve the Merit System, without striking with the key. I was bold enough to propose something 6 weeks after joining the forum, something that I could have done without after a reread from a (my) today’s perspective.

[Lucius]

~snip~
I’m not a particular fan of submitting posts for review, though there are threads that currently already play that role. Having a system whereby people can submit a post for review at the click of a button, in an sort of anonymized fashion (or else), would incentivise some/many to simply submit all their posts one by one, creating a massive queue of posts to revise. I doubt I’d ever look at the queue, as I prefer to Merit what I see in its context, and not isolated from it.

The OP has strange ideas, it's enough just to look at what he has proposed in the last few months, but personally I don't expect anything meaningful from him. I'm also not one of those people who look too favorably on someone reporting their own or others' posts in order to reward them with merit, especially because those who see such posts probably don't have time to read the whole thread, so "good post" can be completely out of context, or just repeating what other users wrote before that post.

There will never be a perfect system, but I think that the current one is not as bad as some may think - of course, except for those who think that they should have much more merit than they currently have, but that is a problem that cannot be solved by changing the system in any way.

[Findingnemo]

I think having demerit button also will make the merit system as complete so we don't need to have another system likes/dislikes features of social media. But its quite hard for me to understand what OP is trying to say or I am missing something and I have a doubt how can we classify a post as no fault?

Already theymos clearly mentioned if you're willing to merit a post then you can and it has cap value of 50 per user so it stops the abuse so making it more perfect may create lot of confusion among users.

[Upgrade00]

Only post with little to no fault/issue should earn high merit. We can aswell grade all the posts and give them the merit they deserve(whether high or low merit), meaning most/all will be going through merit system in order to be graded rather than being outrightly ignored/neglected.

There is no guideline on what post deserves merit and what amount of merits should be allocated to posts, with that said you can only grade posts and give it the merits you think it deserves as it is subjective to you, same applies to other users. A universal scale or consensus based opinion of what constitutes quality would not be effective with the currency system.

Already theymos clearly mentioned if you're willing to merit a post then you can and it has cap value of 50 per user so it stops the abuse

It is capped at 50 per user for every 30 days.

[CryptopreneurBrainboss]

What do humans what exactly? Merit has been decentralized to some extent and yet we aren't comfortable with that and now suggesting it get centralized even more?. I bet when your suggestions doesn't favor your account, you'll be among the first users coming back crying for it to be changed again. Why give power to a selected few to have total say on your post been worthy of merit rewarded or not. What's wrong with how the merit system has been designed so far? Right now, you owe nobody an explanation on why you merited a particular post, what theymos strictly advise was for that post to be worthy of been merited and that can be interpreted in so many ways like the post been informative, educative, etc

We all have a chance of encouraging quality contributions when we come across them, how does it benefit the forum to take that away from its members and only give a selective few such privilege when they mightn't even get paid and this might cloud their judgement. Majority of the things done on the forum are volunteering with little pay and this guys have real life too so instead of suggesting putting more duty on them, getting everybody involved more is the only way to go about it and the merit system is just a perfect example.

[Yawa2020]

What do humans what exactly?

Lol you can never satisfy human. Sometimes you will just overlook what they want from you and do what please you. Your opinion and happiness first.

Having just a thumb up 👍 and thumb down 👎 on every post box could be very productive. When more people give you a thumb up, it would automatically motivate you to do better. On the other hand, seeing that one of your posts receives more thumbs downs than ups would make you rethink and revise your future posts.

This idea is not really making sense in my own opinion here at all. Going by this idea would completely change the forum style to social media where people catch fun and cruise.

I think having demerit button also will make the merit system as complete so we don't need to have another system likes/dislikes features of social media.

If I understand you correctly, you mean demerit should reduce the poster merit or how will it going to affect the poster? Well, if it should reduce the merit of the poster then the forum should be ready to accommodate hatred among members.
I think the current merit system is fair enough to cope with. But I see that majority of people are eager to rank up just for the sake of joining campaigns hence they see the present system as an obstacle.

[Findingnemo]

If I understand you correctly, you mean demerit should reduce the poster merit or how will it going to affect the poster? Well, if it should reduce the merit of the poster then the forum should be ready to accommodate hatred among members.

Demerit is an option when someone feel the post that made is completely zero value but still bypassed all the forum rules so can't be considered as spam still not really any use to have one which is more effective too because it doesn't eliminate the spam but also create a fear among the users who doesn't contribute to the forum but to be honest its really too much to have in a public forum and also it may bring more hatred towards the fellow members so current system is doing its job and almost eliminated the spam and account farmers.

[BlackHatCoiner]

Really give good rewards to only good works/posts otherwise you will share in the punishment reserved for evil posts/works that you reward.

That assumes someone dictates what's "good post". We better have the freedom to merit whatever we want, even if there's some abuse.

Be sure not to call evil Good or Good evil... as it's written "Woe to those who called evil Good and Good evil

I'll need a little more context about this.

Having just a thumb up 👍 and thumb down 👎 on every post box could be very productive.

Nope. Thumbs up and thumbs down reminds me of Reddit's toxic culture. Just because a group of people doesn't agree with someone, they don't have to penalize him. As long as he follows the rules, he should be free to comment whatever he wants.

[UserU]

Nope. Thumbs up and thumbs down reminds me of Reddit's toxic culture. Just because a group of people doesn't agree with someone, they don't have to penalize him. As long as he follows the rules, he should be free to comment whatever he wants.

Or just stick with the Like-only for aesthetic purposes. Does the job well without adding another Merit competition. Similar to YouTube's comment voting sans the downvote.

Say if a person makes a post that's highly likeable or helpful, it would show something like this:

[drwhobox]

Having just a thumb up 👍 and thumb down 👎 on every post box could be very productive. When more people give you a thumb up, it would automatically motivate you to do better. On the other hand, seeing that one of your posts receives more thumbs downs than ups would make you rethink and revise your future posts.

That would be a great option for members to judge the quality of posts and also a way to let OP know about his/her post. But instead of every post if only the main topic has that feature it would be great. Implementing a thumbs up and down button on every post will look bad and the feature will also lost its original value.

@OP although it's better if we don't know which user send his own sMerit and people also doesn't know which one send him merit, but it will increase of abusing merit.

Example: you have 5 accounts and then you share sMerit with your each alts, does anyone know if you're abusing the merit system? No. Only theymos and Cyrus might know since they're an administrators.

I don't know how you think that not knowing merit transactions is good for the forum or anyone else. It is the only and a great way of merit abusing.
Do you know what stops merit abusers from abusing merit? because now everyone knows where a user got merit and who sends them merit.

Example: you have 5 accounts and then you share sMerit with your each alts, does anyone know if you're abusing the merit system? No. Only theymos and Cyrus might know since they're an administrators.

If the forum does not have the option to see merit transactions then 5alts accounts can share merit from each other's accounts and continue doing that abuse until theymos or any mod detects the abuse.

 

[Helena Yu]

I don't know how you think that not knowing merit transactions is good for the forum or anyone else.

Because when you get merited by X, it will increase the possibility you merit him back even though his post is just common sense or have same point with the other user. I don't think I'm wrong with this, anyone can easily spot it.

If the forum does not have the option to see merit transactions then 5alts accounts can share merit from each other's accounts and continue doing that abuse until theymos or any mod detects the abuse.

That's why I said it's need a decision from administrators or mods, but I don't think they will want to handle that because "scam" didn't even get moderated in this forum.

[digaran]

Nope. Thumbs up and thumbs down reminds me of Reddit's toxic culture. Just because a group of people doesn't agree with someone, they don't have to penalize him. As long as he follows the rules, he should be free to comment whatever he wants.

I didn't mean like that, but I do agree it could become a social manipulation tool, however this could increase the interactions between social groups, e.g, I could see which of my posts had the most likes and know what the community thinks of me, that'd encourage me to do better.
A kind of "was this helpful" 👍👎 yes or no question, that way the community won't be able to do behavioural engineering and show their agreements, disagreements about a certain political opinion.
Merit could have a single function which is ranking up, but again we are going to agree to disagree anyways.

[BlackHatCoiner]

Or just stick with the Like-only for aesthetic purposes.

Or just have merits, so you don't recklessly like everything.

Similar to YouTube's comment voting sans the downvote.

It isn't a good analogy, because YouTube isn't a forum. People may have some serious concern on whether what they watch is clickbait, scam etc., and that's where dislikes can help the situation (again, if the creator doesn't want them, they can disable having both likes and dislikes). On the other hand, bitcointalk is just a place to have conversations. If you feel someone's a fraudster, use feedback.

And they did disable disliking. Imagine.

I could see which of my posts had the most likes and know what the community thinks of me, that'd encourage me to do better.

Merits already allow this to happen.

[drwhobox]

Because when you get merited by X, it will increase the possibility you merit him back even though his post is just common sense or have same point with the other user. I don't think I'm wrong with this, anyone can easily spot it.

Yes you are right about this, X will have a good impression of me, but that doesn't mean I will merit him back on any average activity on this forum. But yes if I see anything good I won't hesitate to merit him back. Yet it doesn't manipulate or abuse the forum. Good feedback from X on my thread or post also motivates me to give merit him if I saw any good activity from X.

That's why I said it's need a decision from administrators or mods, but I don't think they will want to handle that because "scam" didn't even get moderated in this forum.

As I said, mods don't really have the time or will to moderate scam/abuse merit. It is the members who need to figure out the merit source for X is normal or a scam. Also, an Alt account can not be moderated by mods too, Anyone can create and use a different account with tor/VPN. In that case I don't know how mods can figure out an alt account.

[digaran]

Merits already allow this to happen.

Merit is structurally pyramidical, should serve as a rank-up system, I don't know if merit has the ability to increase seo? But I do see google results showing other forum topics on top because many members reacted to the topic by liking it or marking it as helpful.
With the numbers of posts here on different topics, having what I'd suggested could increase the site seo and also help people searching on google. Pointing them to this forum.

[drwhobox]

Merit is structurally pyramidical, should serve as a rank-up system, I don't know if merit has the ability to increase seo? But I do see google results showing other forum topics on top because many members reacted to the topic by liking it or marking it as helpful.
With the numbers of posts here on different topics, having what I'd suggested could increase the site seo and also help people searching on google. Pointing them to this forum.

I don't see any points for merit to serve as a SEO factor. Google search ranking triggered by many factors but merit is not one of them.

But I do see google results showing other forum topics on top because many members reacted to the topic by liking it or marking it as helpful.

Those articles have a good amount of words, a better optimized picture and most importantly the website is SEO optimized. The forum developers also have SEO in mind, so their forum posts come up in google search results.