Provision for increasing available merit every year by some amount

[The Sceptical Chymist]

The forum admin increases spendable merits to some existing merits sources from time to time on request or depending on how active the merit source has been.

I've skimmed through this thread to see if there was anything relating to existing sources getting more sMerits but didn't see anything (and I could have missed it).  My monthly allocation seems to have been upped in the past month or two, but I'm not sure exactly what I was getting to begin with or after I begged for more.

OP actually brings up a valid concern so long as membership here keeps growing (and as long as newcomers make merit-worthy posts, which often isn't the case).  I'd never considered merits in the context of an expanding user base before--but it obviously hasn't been too much of a problem, as there haven't been nearly as many merit begging threads, or threads in Meta about merits in general, as there used to be.  So for now there doesn't appear to be an issue with the merits being circulated or the performance of the merit sources.  The latter I have to make an assumption about since Theymos hasn't ever discussed how he thinks sources are doing.

[OgNasty]

Is there a provision for increasing available merit every year by some amount? This is needed because new members are also joining the forum daily and thus the available merits quantity should be adjusted accordingly.

It sounds like you're saying that inflation is needed for a growing society.  

I personally don't like the whole merit sources thing but understand that it would get abused if it were fairly distributed to everyone.  I digress...

There is a certain level of inflation built into the system naturally, as people can send merits to others just by earning them (and amounts are raised if all merits are used).  I think your comment assumes that merit doesn't get recycled, but it does and quite heavily among certain subsets of users on these boards.  Due to these fundamentals, I would assume that merit numbers will continue to grow.  The only way it doesn't is if merit sources aren't distributing all their merits, which I am guilty of.

[Sandra_hakeem]

Either way, Merit isn't scarce. Good posts are. Prove me wrong!

Cause you get merited on a daily?.. so you assume it's easy to everyone? You've been here for a long time now and you've probably got a high profile -- not because anyone else isn't putting in the work -- but because yours may have been relatively essential prior to the time you started off...  Remember, people have different ways to justify things; my posting pattern might be garbage to you but to another, it's all they ever wanted.

I'm not going to prove anything, so although I don't know where all these distributed merits end up, I haven't received a single one for some time - which leads me to the conclusion that I don't write "good posts" or that most MS ignore me

I DON'T KNOW MANNNN! honestly! Do I make garbage post ? That's a lie ofcourse! The whole thing lies in their discretion - whether or not you gonna get merited.

Do not beg for merit excessively.

Huh? Excessively?

Sandra 🧑‍🦰

[arhipova]

Is there a provision for increasing available merit every year by some amount? This is needed because new members are also joining the forum daily and thus the available merits quantity should be adjusted accordingly.

It sounds like you're saying that inflation is needed for a growing society.  

I personally don't like the whole merit sources thing but understand that it would get abused if it were fairly distributed to everyone.  I digress...

There is a certain level of inflation built into the system naturally, as people can send merits to others just by earning them (and amounts are raised if all merits are used).  I think your comment assumes that merit doesn't get recycled, but it does and quite heavily among certain subsets of users on these boards.  Due to these fundamentals, I would assume that merit numbers will continue to grow.  The only way it doesn't is if merit sources aren't distributing all their merits, which I am guilty of.

Most of the points you raised in this reply , I agree with. But you did not touch the main issue I raised with reason. That is more members are joining the forum and that is the reason why merits should be increased every year. Do you feel this need is currently being addressed in some other way I am missing ?

[DdmrDdmr]

<…> That is more members are joining the forum and that is the reason why merits should be increased every year. Do you feel this need is currently being addressed in some other way I am missing ?

Gathering some very simple preliminary data from BPIP, and assuming that the calculus has been the same throughout all datapoint readings, these are some numbers that help get some insights into the matter:

Today:         56.767 active profiles ('.' is a thousands separator)
19/01/2024: 52.758 active profiles
28/11/2023: 51.661 active profiles
24/09/2023: 51.439 active profiles
31/03/2023: 54.618 active profiles
28/01/2023: 55.754 active profiles
21/01/2022: 91.112 active profiles
28/01/2021: 257.463 active profiles
26/04/2020: 116.163 active profiles

I’ve gathered the data from TheWayBackMachine, with a 2 month window for recent months, and a roughly yearly window from there back. Though there is a logical increase since September 2023 (10% aprox.), the current mark of active members is similar to early 2023, and way less than prior yearly readings. The data seems to suggest that the forum is less active really as years go by, which, at a macro level, doesn’t vouch for the need for an overall Merit increase (if things were to run roughly the same year to year). At micro levels though, we’d probably find gaps to cover, patterns to rethink (i.e. Merit/post being awarded), etc.

Note that BPIP considers a profile to be active if it has logged-in over the past 3 months (regardless of the actual posting activity it has undergone). The stat can be rigged by bot accounts simply logging into the forum. It would likely be better to see the data based on the number of accounts that actually post in a given timeframe for a more comprehensive approach.

[EarnOnVictor]

Is there a provision for increasing available merit every year by some amount? This is needed because new members are also joining the forum daily and thus the available merits quantity should be adjusted accordingly.

It sounds like you're saying that inflation is needed for a growing society.  

I personally don't like the whole merit sources thing but understand that it would get abused if it were fairly distributed to everyone.  I digress...

There is a certain level of inflation built into the system naturally, as people can send merits to others just by earning them (and amounts are raised if all merits are used).  I think your comment assumes that merit doesn't get recycled, but it does and quite heavily among certain subsets of users on these boards.  Due to these fundamentals, I would assume that merit numbers will continue to grow.  The only way it doesn't is if merit sources aren't distributing all their merits, which I am guilty of.

Most of the points you raised in this reply , I agree with. But you did not touch the main issue I raised with reason. That is more members are joining the forum and that is the reason why merits should be increased every year. Do you feel this need is currently being addressed in some other way I am missing ?

You are on point, friend, the forum is increasing and not decreasing, so this is practical. If the merit sources and the allocated merits are not increasing, I wonder how it would be generously extended to the deserving posts. No wonder people are increasingly complaining these days about the dwindling merit sharing. I've never thought towards your angle though, except for the need to create more merits sources which has never yielded since.

I hope something is done about this to encourage the good posters and also help those who are still ranking up to get there on time.

[Cryptomultiplier]

Is there a provision for increasing available merit every year by some amount? This is needed because new members are also joining the forum daily and thus the available merits quantity should be adjusted accordingly.

It sounds like you're saying that inflation is needed for a growing society.  

I personally don't like the whole merit sources thing but understand that it would get abused if it were fairly distributed to everyone.  I digress...

There is a certain level of inflation built into the system naturally, as people can send merits to others just by earning them (and amounts are raised if all merits are used).  I think your comment assumes that merit doesn't get recycled, but it does and quite heavily among certain subsets of users on these boards.  Due to these fundamentals, I would assume that merit numbers will continue to grow.  The only way it doesn't is if merit sources aren't distributing all their merits, which I am guilty of.

Most of the points you raised in this reply , I agree with. But you did not touch the main issue I raised with reason. That is more members are joining the forum and that is the reason why merits should be increased every year. Do you feel this need is currently being addressed in some other way I am missing ?

You are on point, friend, the forum is increasing and not decreasing, so this is practical. If the merit sources and the allocated merits are not increasing, I wonder how it would be generously extended to the deserving posts. No wonder people are increasingly complaining these days about the dwindling merit sharing. I've never thought towards your angle though, except for the need to create more merits sources which has never yielded since.

I hope something is done about this to encourage the good posters and also help those who are still ranking up to get there on time.

There's obviously been lack of merit sources because I don't think many old posters are that bad in their posting and activities in this forum.
It's a good idea and should be done so as to make the place more lively with newbies and old members motivated to improve on quality of their post.

At least persons who have made more posts with fewer merits should not be in same place with newbies just joining some days back, with fewer post but with same merit, if not more on the average.

[CODE200]

There's enough merit to go around OP, what needs to increase is the quality posts and topics that are being posted on the forum daily but that's a different problem too as there's a limited amount of things that many of us can talk about and would be considered as a good topic, no way around that. Maybe if you're having a problem with your merit acquisition, it's a you problem now and not the system anymore, have you looked inwards recently? Checked your post history and see how you've been doing in terms of interactions and such? Might want to evaluate the topics that you're participating too as that could be a factor why they don't give you merits.

[TheUltraElite]

I'm not going to prove anything, so although I don't know where all these distributed merits end up, I haven't received a single one for some time - which leads me to the conclusion that I don't write "good posts" or that most MS ignore me

Have felt that too many times

Of course we are not a judge of our own actions so we cant say whether our own posts are merit worthy or not. And not everyone here myself included come from a programming or technological background that we can post in those sections of the forum where merit is generously given to tech helpers and shiny coin collectors.
But then I managed to rank up to Leg from Hero since the system started but my mileage has reduced over the years now.

I know we can go back to the old argument that some sections of the forum have more Noise than Signal and thus sources avoid them. But then is there any solution to this?