As I said previously, careless and or stupid people will be parted from their money no matter how many warnings we give them or how many users try to play whack-a-mole. When this community began there was no one really around "scambusting" like they do today. People had individual transactions, and if they went bad they were then themselves free to make accusations and it was generally judged on its merits. Since the community is much larger now and more filled with less technically proficient people, and more scammers this kind of individual attention to cases is restricted. Yet in spite of this the level of penalty enforcement has not decreased along with the decreased standard of evidence against users.
This results in a very divisive and destructive type of infighting that is counterproductive in building trust networks and simply results in making them a tool of extortion and harassment because everyone is ready to engage in a witch hunt. How do you think the first of us around here had to learn these things? We did it BY BUILDING OUR OWN TRUST NETWORKS, and taking managed and informed risks, not relying on green and red numbers. In the end all the scammer has to do is make a new name. Does playing whack-a-mole endlessly on random usernames really stop them?
What is an acceptable level of innocent people caught up in this? How much is an acceptable amount of their money, time, and effort burnt because of a careless false accusation? Can the cryptocoin community really afford to be burning people who want to honestly contribute now days? We are doing more to burn the users who want to contribute here than we are to punish the scammers. This policy is doing far more damage to this community than scammers ever could. And for what? Just to make the scammer change his username and try again.
The current trust system will reduce the number of people who will carelessly send money to scammers. The default trust system makes it so newer users (and users who have little/no trading experience) to get somewhat of an idea as to how safe it is to trade with someone. Any potential trade with extreme caution tag would hopefully cause a newer user to do additional research prior to trading with someone and hopefully finding a trusted escrow provider who can provide some additional level of protection for both parties. This is especially true with newer users who receive negative trust as their reputation is worth nothing and can easily create a new account without such tag.
As I mentioned before it is always appropriate to ask the "tough" questions to someone trying to do business. If they are honest they should have no problem either answering such questions or being honest they either do not wish to answer or cannot answer such questions. If it is any of the later then they likely have something to hide and it is likely the fact that they are trying to in some way scam. Anyone operating legitimately has an incentive to answer the "tough" questions because doing so adds a layer of legitimacy to their business.
Playing wach-a-mole does stop the scammers because they either need to buy a new account (which takes money) or need to create a new account which comes with time intensive countermeasures against scamming and are largely ineffective for scamming. As I mentioned before decreasing the scam rate, even marginally will help the bitcoin economy and the chances of bitcoin's success.
As you become a more experienced trader you should rely less on the default trust network and rely on your own trust network. You should either update your trust list or remember in your head who is trustworthy and who is not. Once you are an experienced trader you should give out negative trust only when someone has either scammed or when they are attempting to scam, or appear to be likely to attempt to scam in the future. You should not give trust to anyone you have a personal disagreement with as anyone who trusts your opinion may not want to trade with such person in the future over something personal. I do use an alternate account to view someone's trust feedback from the point of view that someone sees it by "default" as well as looking at feedback from my own trust network. I will share my trust network, you (or anyone else) is free to create a similar trust network or to add myself to their trust list to stay up to date as to whose feedback I personally deem accurate
theymos
Gavin Andresen
gmaxwell
~TECSHARE
Vod
John (John K.)
Tomatocage
BadBear
Blazr
DannyHamilton
~jasonslow
escrow.ms
Stunna
DefaultTrust
hilariousandco
~redsn0w
OldScammerTag
Without some kind of "default" trust network then a newer trader is not going to have any way of knowing who they should trust and who they should not trust.
Any potential false accusation can be openly discussed here for anyone to see (as well as in the sales thread if an accusation is made via a posting instead of via trust). Any party potentially considering to trade with such person can take such discussion into consideration. Just because someone screams "scam" does not mean that something or someone is a scam, trust me I know from personal experience (I have had plenty of people be upset with me for various reasons that do not have to do with my potential to scam and have made false accusations against me, it did not negatively affect my ability to trade and if anything it highlighted my previous success).
This is horse shit. I have very little in positive, so because of this dip shit
Trust: -2: -1 / +1(1)
Warning: Trade with extreme caution!
When using the above trust network I see you as:
I do see you as you describe above when only using the default trust network. I find my trust network more accurate.
From the looks of it you do not trade very much so I would find it somewhat unlikely that you would be affected in ways other then ego (not that I am defending this apparent trust rating that is probably not warranted).
I think it would be very appropriate for Vod to chime in to give some kind of explanation regarding his trust report to the OP
Well,
I just lost out on a $1500 deal because of my rating. Shady yes, I tried to explain it away, but nope
I've done deals with people who havn't left feedback, as I've left more than I've gotten.
I'm not some random. I run an ATM in a major Canadian City.
Look here's me on the far right :O
![](https://ip.bitcointalk.org/?u=http%3A%2F%2Fbtcwpg.com%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2014%2F02%2FIMG_1616.jpg&t=665&c=3KEEgHyx_frqQA)
Had VOD asked for an explanation. Details or even commented to question before slandering me without reason. It could of been an easy fix.
Edit:
I know, I'm a sexy bitch... But he's been online in the last 12 hours since this went down.
And sorry but minuts = days on the internet, one deal dead over this. and I frankly can't move on with anything else until it's fixed, as most people with a normal trust system see me as a big red flagged scammer.
This never should of happened in the first place, and frankly the system needs to be fixed
Some sort of thread, admin or mod needs to be put in place to be able to at LEAST counter claims like this.