Lets talk about the altcoin section again

[Blazr]

People are often tempted to dictate what other people can and cannot do. It is a temptation to be resisted.

I prefer to make my own decisions about what to view and what to ignore. I do not share OP's value judgments.
One size does not fit all, even when intentions are the best (especially when intentions are the best, imho).         

The Ignore Poster button is a wonderful thing. Extending its granularity is a welcome development.

An old joke comes to mind because it seems to fit the situation:

An old lady repeatedly phones the police to complain about the carryings-on next door that she sees from her window.
The exasperated officer taking the calls finally suggests that she just draw her curtains.
She replies "yes, but I can still see them if I peek through the corner".

Seems like many repliers here are taking me up wrong. This is BitcoinTalk, I think it makes sense for the main topic to be about Bitcoin and not other projects/currencies, does it not?

One could argue PayPal is an altcoin because it is a service that uses cryptography (SSL) to authenicate payments of fiat currencies. Maybe we should have a PayPal section too?

[cakir]

I think there's a way to reduce spam on Altcoin Section.

"Newbie accounts shouldn't be able to post in this section".

If At least JR Members post in this section, it'll be better.

These Newbies tries to FUD coins, And puts money into scam shitcoins etc.

If they can't see/post till they became JR, At least they learn a bit of what bitcoin really is.

[Blazr]

I think there's a way to reduce spam on Altcoin Section.

"Newbie accounts shouldn't be able to post in this section".

If At least JR Members post in this section, it'll be better.

These Newbies tries to FUD coins, And puts money into scam shitcoins etc.

If they can't see/post till they became JR, At least they learn a bit of what bitcoin really is.

Problem is the spammers already have hundreds of accounts and they post in all sections.

[SaltySpitoon]

The original motivation that is still heavily a factor, is that if the alt coin section was removed, we would just have people spamming the rest of the boards with alt coin stuff. Essentially the same argument as having the Off Topic section. It doesn't relate to Bitcoin, but its a place to put things that shouldn't go into "Bitcoin Discussion" or the likes. Another point is, people rush to call Alt Coins a scam, or that bad or seedy behavior from some Alt Coin players leaves a bad stigma on Bitcoin or something. That is sort of hypocritical, talking about Alt Coin scams is the same as talking about the Bitcoin scam because of Pirateat40, Nefario, or MtGox. A few bad actors shouldn't be the motivation for changing the rules that apply to a group. I'm sure that's a philosophy many of us hold dear. "Scam coins" are incredibly rare. A Scam coin is not a pump and dump coin, or a coin designed to make the owner rich, a Scam coin is something that compromises your other wallet.dats. If you invest in a shitty coin and it goes under, that's business. Do better research and invest accordingly, I can't believe that people especially here don't understand that.

I agree Alt Coins are not Bitcoins, but there is a huge double standard going on. Prevent Regulation! Cheers from one side of the room, and Think about the (children) Newbies?! from the other side. Bitcointalk doesn't moderate scams, it doesn't moderate people with crappy business plans that will most likely go under, because this is a new technology, people should be open to play about with it and see where it goes. If you are a new person, sure playing a 1,000 XCoins is probably a great educational experience for you. If XCoin flops because the Dev is a dutchbag or for errors in the code, hopefully you didn't lose much and got a really nice lesson. If you lost a lot, why the hell are you investing large sums of money if you don't know what you are investing it in?

My post isn't a shot at anyone in this thread in particular, but I've heard this argument so many times before, and it really still baffles me reading people's philosophies in other threads, and then seeing how quick they are to turn and prosecute Alt Coins for the children! or to prevent terrorism! or whatever else people want to yell to rally support. If you want to end what is bad with Alt Coins, do it with education and your bitcents. Let the moderators handle spam, report it if you see it.

[cakir]

I think there's a way to reduce spam on Altcoin Section.

"Newbie accounts shouldn't be able to post in this section".

If At least JR Members post in this section, it'll be better.

These Newbies tries to FUD coins, And puts money into scam shitcoins etc.

If they can't see/post till they became JR, At least they learn a bit of what bitcoin really is.

Problem is the spammers already have hundreds of accounts and they post in all sections.

Well, in that case; there could be an "IP restriction" by posting Altsection.
If spammer has 5+ user account that fits into the criteria, then (s)he shouldn't post from same IP, if it's detected, all detected user accounts should be banned from this section.

[Blazr]

The original motivation that is still heavily a factor, is that if the alt coin section was removed, we would just have people spamming the rest of the boards with alt coin stuff. Essentially the same argument as having the Off Topic section.

This is why I proposed the creation of a new forum. If we kick out altcoiners now, they'll have nowhere to go, but if we migrated the existing section to a new forum for them first hopefully the majority will go over there and won't spam up bitcointalk.

It doesn't relate to Bitcoin, but its a place to put things that shouldn't go into "Bitcoin Discussion" or the likes. Another point is, people rush to call Alt Coins a scam, or that bad or seedy behavior from some Alt Coin players leaves a bad stigma on Bitcoin or something. That is sort of hypocritical, talking about Alt Coin scams is the same as talking about the Bitcoin scam because of Pirateat40, Nefario, or MtGox.

I totally agree. PayPal is a cryptocurrency, their shady business practices shouldn't affect Bitcoin's reputation.

Dev is a dutchbag

What do you have against the dutch?

My post isn't a shot at anyone in this thread in particular, but I've heard this argument so many times before, and it really still baffles me reading people's philosophies in other threads, and then seeing how quick they are to turn and prosecute Alt Coins for the children! or to prevent terrorism! or whatever else people want to yell to rally support. If you want to end what is bad with Alt Coins, do it with education and your bitcents.

But I'm not doing that. Don't get me wrong I'm not an "altcoiner" and my reasons for that is I do not see a compelling reason to use one, nor do I know of any altcoins that I trust. I am of the opinion bitcointalk should be mainly about discussion of Bitcoin, and other cryptocurrencies whether they be Litecoin, PayPal, ApplePay or Dogecoin should be mainly discussed on their own forums. I think that BitcoinTalk has gone offtopic.

[SaltySpitoon]

The original motivation that is still heavily a factor, is that if the alt coin section was removed, we would just have people spamming the rest of the boards with alt coin stuff. Essentially the same argument as having the Off Topic section.

This is why I proposed the creation of a new forum. If we kick out altcoiners now, they'll have nowhere to go, but if we migrated the existing section to a new forum for them first hopefully the majority will go over there and won't spam up bitcointalk.

It doesn't relate to Bitcoin, but its a place to put things that shouldn't go into "Bitcoin Discussion" or the likes. Another point is, people rush to call Alt Coins a scam, or that bad or seedy behavior from some Alt Coin players leaves a bad stigma on Bitcoin or something. That is sort of hypocritical, talking about Alt Coin scams is the same as talking about the Bitcoin scam because of Pirateat40, Nefario, or MtGox.

I totally agree. PayPal is a cryptocurrency, their shady business practices shouldn't affect Bitcoin's reputation.

Dev is a dutchbag

What do you have against the dutch?

My post isn't a shot at anyone in this thread in particular, but I've heard this argument so many times before, and it really still baffles me reading people's philosophies in other threads, and then seeing how quick they are to turn and prosecute Alt Coins for the children! or to prevent terrorism! or whatever else people want to yell to rally support. If you want to end what is bad with Alt Coins, do it with education and your bitcents.

But I'm not doing that. Don't get me wrong I'm not an "altcoiner" and my reasons for that is I do not see a compelling reason to use one, nor do I know of any altcoins that I trust. I am of the opinion bitcointalk should be mainly about Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies whether they be Litecoin, PayPal, ApplePay or Dogecoin should be mainly discussed on their own forums. I think that BitcoinTalk has gone offtopic.

Right, I didn't mean to target you in particular, but 95% of the supporters you are going to gather in this thread are going to be here for more than just your reasons, I wanted to try and address as many possible. As far as creating an entirely new forum for Alt Coins, I dont think thats the way to go. With the new forum software I'm expecting there will be some serious improvements to the Alt Coin section and rest of the forum organization, but as far as creating a new forum, there are plenty of others just for Alt coins, but people still come here. While I don't think that Paypal could be considered a Cryptocurrency, for the purpose of our discussion that isn't important.

Unless I'm misunderstanding you, your biggest issue with the alt currency section is how it spills into the rest of the forum. To a certain extent there is no avoiding people posting in the wrong section. The forum staff moves hundreds of threads to more correct location per day, if something is out of place, just report it and we will get to it. I don't think removing the section and moving it elsewhere  or anything else will really prevent people from making the occasional accident of starting a thread in the wrong place, and those that do it on purpose are removed.

I could make the same argument that this is a Bitcoin forum, we shouldn't have a Politics and Society or Off topic section. I am of the opinion that Bitcoin, Alt Coins, and Politics and Society are all interrelated. Close enough to stay on the same forum, but if any measures to prevent spillage from the Altcoin section out could be taken it would be best to do so. The new forum software should open up a lot of doors for that sort of thing, and just waiting and carrying on is our best action.

[Amph]

i think it's running better now, with the moderator, and the sections separated, nothing like the old crazy altcoin section

but it must be pointed that the alt scene is a bit death also now...

[Pecunia non olet]

i think it's running better now, with the moderator, and the sections separated, nothing like the old crazy altcoin section

but it must be pointed that the alt scene is a bit death also now...

everything is dead now including bitcoin. That will change once the resistance around 450$ is broken and nobody will then care about any of this crap because everyone will be busy moving money around. Right now people are just very bored.

[-ck]

Noobs has become experienced after losing money.

Then the noobs you speak of are no longer noobs and you're applying your logic to the last group of noobs. By definition it is impossible for newcomers to be experienced and therefore safe from scams.

[pissedoff]

People are often tempted to dictate what other people can and cannot do. It is a temptation to be resisted.

This.

+1

the big quote

It is because of comment like this that I have no hope Bitcoin will ever go mainstream.

No, Microsoft is now accepting Bitcoin. It is almost mainstream.

edit: hmmm so looks like new users aren't blasted with alt-coin propaganda as much as they used to be. At least that's changed for the better since I've been gone. And apparently new forum software is coming out... honestly I didn't ever see that happening.

The altcoin scam spamming is over. Noobs has become experienced after losing money.
You can only learn by experience. The more you lose, the more you learn.
Any noob needs to get scammed at least few times before being able to identify potential scams.
It is not our job to over-protect/babysit them.

Golden words.

Just because Microsoft have began to accept doesn't mean it's any where near mainstream.