[POLL] Add tough entry criteria for contests to stop account farmers and cheats?

[JollyGood]

As a result of the thread created in the reputation board regarding the $500 3rd prize winning dubious account in the Pizza Day competition, I am asking a valid question: In order to stop abuse and to discourage account farmers and cheats, should there be a strict entry criteria for all competitions/contests that offer prizes to winners?

This is the thread in question: Pizza Day 2026: 3rd place winner "Sawera2255@" is another suspicious account

If a prize is to be won, then it is expected cheats and account farmers will participate. If there are little to no restrictions place to curb their nefarious conduct, they will infest the forum even deeper than before because the lure of winning a large amount of Bitcoin will embolden them.

To some degree, their nefarious conduct could be mitigated if there were strict entry criteria for any competition that awarded funds to winners.

These are the options added to the Poll but I can update the options and add more if you post your preference:

- Yes, accounts under 6 months old should be excluded from applying
- Yes, accounts under 12 months old should be excluded from applying
- Yes, accounts under 18 months old should be excluded from applying
- Yes, accounts under 24 months old should be excluded from applying
- No, any member should be able to apply

[DubemIfedigbo001]

I would like to use the 120 days mark, accounts which is less than 120 days old in in forum should not apply.
Secondly, accounts which have not been very active from 120 days prior to the contest launch should not also apply.

This would deter creating new accounts just before contests to abuse it and also deter those who just wake up accounts just to cheat in such contests from applying as well.

[Lucius]

Such competitions should not have cash prizes if the criteria for participation are extremely low in my opinion. Your suggestion wouldn't help much, because even if you allowed those with accounts that are 2+ years old to participate, you still wouldn't prevent bad people from manipulating such contests as is the case this year.

I would raise the criteria to a much higher level, at least with regard to merits of at least 500+ (no airdropped), and that those who are caught cheating will be permanently banned.

[Majestic-milf]

 Personally, I feel cheats would still abound even if stricter rules are placed. Look at scammers for instance, how they always find a way despite the fact that people have become smarter in their ways. This is a forum with different characters and behaviors and thanks to the competitions that have occurred in the past, we've seen very great talents whose accounts are not that old so does that mean they'd get exempted just because they don't meet the criteria?

[Redhut]

Alt farmers can create multiple alt accounts and Merit them in advance so that they can be used to voting for the main account but this case it totally opposite.

The voting should be like this
Yes, accounts under 180 activity should be excluded from applying
..............

[un_rank]

Stopping account farms from participating will not be easy. Even with those limitations they will still get in and also influence who wins it at the end of the day. I also think these competitions could be a way to bring people to the forum. I could know someone who is a really good at something and would excel in such competition here. If I introduce them to join in they would look like cheaters joining to game the system, but they atr just artists being drawn to a contest and could become good forum members after that.

Setting hard rules like merit count or days registered reduces the camaraderie that should come with these things, but not as much as cheaters do either.

- Jay -

[vapourminer]

if we dont we will be overrun with alts AIs etc.

so i voted 6 month restriction. which will simply delay those accounts for 6 months but its a period that can be referred back to. ie join, do basically nothing for 6 months, proceed to enter contests. not a good history.

[JollyGood]

I would like to use the 120 days mark, accounts which is less than 120 days old in in forum should not apply.
Secondly, accounts which have not been very active from 120 days prior to the contest launch should not also apply.

I think the activity (specifically number of posts before any contest is open) is probably better but if you indicate one of the two, I can add your selection to the poll.

I would raise the criteria to a much higher level, at least with regard to merits of at least 500+ (no airdropped), and that those who are caught cheating will be permanently banned.

I have added a minimum of 500 merits as an option in the poll.

if we dont we will be overrun with alts AIs etc.

so i voted 6 month restriction. which will simply delay those accounts for 6 months but its a period that can be referred back to. ie join, do basically nothing for 6 months, proceed to enter contests. not a good history.

If memory serves correct, the entry rules were changed last year but more changes should be contemplated because CryptoVar won the first prize of $1500 and Sawera2255@ won the third prize of $500 in the 2026 competition. As the prizes are significant in value, it attracts many of those with nefarious intentions. I hope a situation such as this does not repeat itself in future.

[Rikafip]

Yep, a (much) higher requirement is definitely needed, especially considering how high the prizes are atm. It won't entirely eliminate cheating, but it will make it harder and that is a step in the right direction. Hell, the very first pizza bakeoff was organized on Discord and while prize pool was "only" (iirc) $200, it still didn't stop one member to try cheat by bringing ~15 alt accounts, so you can only imagine what some are willing to do when prize pool is x10-x15.

Another bonus of such approach would be that alt account farmers would have less opportunity to sort of "jump start" their brand new accounts with a bunch of easy merit (which is a common practice in all similar contests on the forum).

[cryptoaddictchie]

I would raise the criteria to a much higher level, at least with regard to merits of at least 500+ (no airdropped), and that those who are caught cheating will be permanently banned.

If such competitions referring to the likes of Bitcoin Pizza Day, Id earlier suggested the same in the thread made by JollyGood in the reputation about the issue on the previous event.

I agree with this, maybe 500 earned merits as entry barrier not airdropped as one of requirement? I dunno anything to avoid gamers.

Honestly a tight criteria for participants should be implemented even with longer users but just a sleeping account can be awaken for this purpose at all. The 12 or 24months choice seems plausible for this but basically an active account with merits is a good basis too.

Also voting process can be subjected to change for an internal decision method to avoid biases.

[PostQuantumBTC]

You did not make the poll complete, I will prefer only legendary to be given the privilege to compete in any contest on the forum. This is the best way you can avoid two accounts or multiple accounts cheating in the contests.

But some people will not agree because they think the contest will not be very engaging.

I am not talking about those gambling sites contests but I am talking about those Pizza ones.

[JollyGood]

If that was happening years ago on Discord for just $200, you can imagine what the grand scale of abuse today might be.

It is nothing more than an attempt to insult our intelligence if we are supposed to believe that it is a coincidence that the Sawera2255@ account was created just six days before the Pizza Day contest and it was supposedly unaware that there was a pizza contest with prizes for winners about to start. Sawera2255@ even claimed to have baked a pizza daily for a week before deciding on the one to enter the competition. That is what the Sawera2255@ account claims.

Stopping account farmers from entering competitions might be an impossible task but at least slowing them down and disrupting their nefarious intentions is a good place to start and to further build upon.

Yep, a (much) higher requirement is definitely needed, especially considering how high the prizes are atm. It won't entirely eliminate cheating, but it will make it harder and that is a step in the right direction. Hell, the very first pizza bakeoff was organized on Discord and while prize pool was "only" (iirc) $200, it still didn't stop one member to try cheat by bringing ~15 alt accounts, so you can only imagine what some are willing to do when prize pool is x10-x15.

Another bonus of such approach would be that alt account farmers would have less opportunity to sort of "jump start" their brand new accounts with a bunch of easy merit (which is a common practice in all similar contests on the forum).

[libert19]

...

I would raise the criteria to a much higher level, at least with regard to merits of at least 500+ (no airdropped), and that those who are caught cheating will be permanently banned.

I don't think it's a big deal to earn 500 merits via local board circle jerk, and neither the account creation duration have any strength to ward off account farmers imo. My answer for topic question is IDK for which there is no option.

[khatarnak]

- Yes, accounts under 24 months old should be excluded from applying

My account would not qualify anyway because of my rank, but account age should matter for contests.
If someone has been around for years, that should count for something.
It makes it harder for freshly bought or farmed accounts to show up just for the prize.

[Free Market Capitalist]

- Yes, accounts under 6 months old should be excluded from applying

I have voted for this option as the least bad one but I would also tie it to activity and merit. So, 6 months old and at least full member. I see that there are differing opinions on exactly what the restrictions should be, but most of us (except for the cheaters) will agree that they need to be enforced.

In my opinion, the restrictions should allow deserving low-rank members to participate—in other words, we shouldn’t turn the event into an exclusive competition for high ranks.

Therefore, a minimum of 6 months and full members could be one option.

[LoyceV]

should there be a strict entry criteria for all competitions/contests that offer prizes to winners?

You're posting this in Meta, so I assume you want this to be a forum-wide rule. Therefore, I voted No. This is the second time today I'm quoting parts of this post:

the forum's mission to be as free as possible.
~
Limiting newbie participation is very harmful for a community. ~ When barriers to participation are too high, then the best people often just won't go to the trouble of joining, and the people who are willing to jump through the hoops are often people who aren't good for the community: people with nothing better to do, scammers, get-rick-quickers, etc.

If only accounts older than 6 months can join, anyone who wants to abuse a contest can create a few accounts and wait 6 months for the next contest. Unless you keep changing the rule: "accounts created after August 2026 can never join a costest" (but that would be ridiculous).

That being said, if this would have been posted on the Reputation board: anyone who creates a campaign is of course free to set whatever requirements they feel are needed.

[Nathrixxx]

if we dont we will be overrun with alts AIs etc.

so i voted 6 month restriction. which will simply delay those accounts for 6 months but its a period that can be referred back to. ie join, do basically nothing for 6 months, proceed to enter contests. not a good history.

It can also be in the format if there's going to be a loophole with the suggestion you raised, senior members ranks or above for instance and also have a particular merit in the last 120 days before applying.

I am very sure that most of the contestants that do apply with newbie accounts are alts from this forum and not genuine newbies who don't know about the forum, they may either choose to use a newbie accounts to build alts because if merits or to win the prize and neglect the account.

[SuperBitMan]

JollyGood I think you should attach being active on those options.
Reason being that, major contests that happens in this forum are done once in a year, and this guys can decide to open many account and keep it till it pass the criteria and they can use it to cheat on any contest.
So the best way is to include being active in those options.
So all option should carry, if you are not active for 1 week, 2 weeks, 3 weeks, 4 weeks, 5 weeks, etc.
All there farm accounts can’t be active regularly since they can easily be caught if they are regularly active.
Lastly if an account has not be active for 2 months upward, and the account became active a month or 2 months to any contest, the account should not be allowed to participate.

[Btcdeybodi]

No matter how strict the rules are made, there will always be those who will make their way through regardless. Cheaters will always find a way to cheat. For instance, the recent cheating that was discovered in the pizza contest were all high rank accounts. Cheaters can be patient enough to wait until they have met your criteria and then continue cheating. 

Most of the contests I have seen in the forum had some set of rules like not using alt accounts to apply, being a full member rank, earning a specific number of merits to be eligible and all that but people still find a way to cheat.

Hosting a contest on the Internet without any cheating is unrealistic because even if you want to track IP addresses, some cheats will still make use of different devices in order not to get caught. Many people are not even scared to get a red tagged for cheating, maybe applying a ban punishment for cheaters (after evidence of cheating has been confirmed) will help save the situation.

[Mia Chloe]

Personally, I feel cheats would still abound even if stricter rules are placed. Look at scammers for instance, how they always find a way despite the fact that people have become smarter in their ways. This is a forum with different characters and behaviors and thanks to the competitions that have occurred in the past, we've seen very great talents whose accounts are not that old so does that mean they'd get exempted just because they don't meet the criteria?

I believe the idea is not to say certainly there will be zero cheats because I don't think you can totally eliminate that as a factor. The idea is just to make the rules more rigid just to ensure that there's barely room for them to cheat. There's a positive side to making membership a stricter requirement to be part of forum contests.

It generally should be a way of giving back to those who have been around here long enough contributing is cheaters are hijacking it they are definitely depriving those that really deserve these rewards.