[April fools] Adjustments to Merit calculation

[stompix]

I have a great idea for a real prank for April 2nd, something like

Guys, I've made a slight mistake when making the April Fools script and forgot to back up the data, so long story short, all the merit you lost yesterday is lost forever!

That’s correct. Theymos is clearly trying to ruin the forum. He probably has something against beginners ranking up, he doesn’t add merit sources and has come up with a new system to make it harder for accounts to rank up. Sad day for bitcointalk.

No, it's not just a sad day for bitcointalk, it's a sad day or humanity!

[1714572088]

1714572088

[joker_josue]

Has anyone asked @LoyceV or @TryNinja to make a list of users with the most negative merits?

_{Characters to add negative merits.} 

[aesma]

Nice one.

Seriously though earning for reading isn't a totally bad idea. And maybe limiting the number of posts in a day, or losing merit for every post after 10 per day or something like that. Although it's in the nature of a forum/social media that on some days a lot of things might be happening, with a lot of posts as a result, in a heated discussion, not shit posts.

[garlonicon]

You know those free Merits are not real, yeah?

Of course, but I have enough merits. For me, activity is harder.

I guess, theymos` idea was not just in scrolling the walls.

Well, points are given unconditionally, if you just load some page. You don't have to read it.

a new system to make it harder for accounts to rank up

Harder? Getting merits under a new system is as easy as winning in a Cookie Clicker.

[UmerIdrees]

In recent years, it seems that a lot of people have been making low-value posts just to get paid. To address this, I've added a merit "cost" to posting: from this point forward, for every 15 characters you post, you will lose one Merit point. This should eliminate any incentive to make low-value posts.

Any halfway-decent poster should be able to earn much more merit than they lose due to the penalty. But I recognize that some good posts are occasionally overlooked. So to counterbalance the penalty, I also added a system whereby you will earn a bit of merit just by reading posts. If you want to write a lot, you'd better do some reading as well!

For both the penalty and the bonus, this applies only to your merit score, and does not affect sendable merit (sMerit).

Let me know what you think of these adjustments.

I have been closly watching these April fools edits for many years now and i believe this one is the most difficult to understand. I have tried to read it twice, thrice and many times but still don't get it, as how it works  

I understand that every 15 characters or less post will lose a merit point how will you be able to calaculate how much time a person is spending on reading only ?
Ahhh, seems a difficult merit new calculation...

[JollyGood]

I was about to create a thread in Meta to ask about what was going on with my merits, then noticed a couple of other members that seemed to have had their merits reduced therefore I took screenshots last night with the intention of creating a thread later to raise the issue. Then I read a post in this thread stating April Fools Day.

I suppose that is the end of the matter  

[3dOOm]

That's evil.

[o48o]

I am too ashamed to tell how much time i spend for thinking that something is messed up in my memory, as i was sure i had something like 7 merits less, and there was no new merits recieved since last time i checked. Well maybe i am ok, even though i am wondering why i fell for bitcointalk's prank every year. After all this is the only site i know that has april's fool day's prank every year. Elsewhere iit takes me under 5 seconds to realize what is a prank. Now i had a small panic of what's real and what is happening to my brain.

So kudos to you, you got me.

[🏰 TradeFortress 🏰]

This calculation is unfair to German speakers.

A LLM should be used to identify the language, and calculate the "reading weight" of each post made.

[bocyaj]

Actually I would like to see my smerits update after the post on this thread.Hope Theymos using his style of April fool and this going to be opened up after 24 hours which is 2nd April of 2024.If this is true,it will eliminate the people who use to post few lines for the payment of campaign alone.It also increases the post quality of the user at the end of the day.Let’s see how this end at the end of 24 hours,very eager for the update. Lol

[aylabadia05]

Let me know what you think of these adjustments.

Good.
One post with any number of characters created today will reduce the existing merit.

theymos. We have passed March and there are many new targets this April.
Almost forgot that today there are big celebrations all over the world, including here.
I thought the celebration this time would be in the form of a dice rolling game, but apparently not.

This time you will handle the celebration yourself.

[pooya87]

I wanna be neg!

[LoyceV]

I wanna be neg!

Be careful what you wish for!

[Fyafir.sats]

I agree with the proposal to add a merit "cost" to the post to combat low value posts. The penalty of losing a merit point for every 15 characters will encourage users to be more concise and creative in their posts.

The initiative to reward users for reading posts is also interesting. This will help increase engagement on the platform and ensure that quality posts are seen by more people.

It's important to note that the penalty and bonus only apply to the regular merit score, not the sendable merit (sMerit). This is important to ensure that users who create high-quality content are still rewarded fairly.

Overall, I think these changes are positive and will help improve the quality of content on the platform. I'm looking forward to seeing how they work in practice.

[Coin_trader]

Campaign manager will be having a rough time counting post for this week especially to those shitposter and loudmouth already.    

Anyone can point out to me how is someone turn into shit/loudmouth rank already after just posting a few post? I saw some user that already have the shit badge of honor for just having 3 to 5 post. What kind of shit they do to get easily that badge.  

[pooya87]

I wanna be neg!

Be careful what you wish for!

-354883 damn.
Why are you always on top of the list from both ends

[Plaguedeath]

This really hurt me.

I'm a person who keep checking my profile (including merit) even though I'm not regularly earn merit, so this make me need to click my merit history and then found out there's no change at all.

Seriously though earning for reading isn't a totally bad idea. And maybe limiting the number of posts in a day, or losing merit for every post after 10 per day or something like that. Although it's in the nature of a forum/social media that on some days a lot of things might be happening, with a lot of posts as a result, in a heated discussion, not shit posts.

The thing is, we have no way to verify between people who read the posts or just clicking any thread as much as they can.

[sportis]

Would be a good idea. Why not?

[MusaPk]

I wanna be neg!

Be careful what you wish for!

-354883 damn.
Why are you always on top of the list from both ends

Your merit count is 10368.

I guess the negative count is visible to account owner only.

Mine is -39.

[Lucius]

~snip~
-354883 damn.
Why are you always on top of the list from both ends

Today is the man's birthday, so he deserves a special status

Happy Birthday @LoyceV🎂