Topic: An Alternative to Merit (Read 785 times)

BUMP

Some might think that way, but if you've been to Reddit, there are both karma system and awards. Karma is basically the upvotes/ downvotes you get from others while awards are mainly paid gifts or customized Merits.

Therefore Reddit's awards are harder to earn than Bitcointalk's Merit but good contributions/ posts are often awarded with them. Just like Merit and likes.

Your first submission about the purported draw back. I don't see it as a draw back, if you continue giving likes and bank merit, where will you use the merit later? Still in the forum.

About the different way you suggested to treat it, you cannot achieve it without first adopting the like system alongside the merit system.

Your right mate,Merits system is like the man power of the community and implementing another law is not really obtainable in order to favuor those who don't have sendable merit is not encouragable, because i understand that it's because of adoption of merit system that is making the community to be competitive and also interactive in terms of discovery, so given alternative to merit will make it lose it's potentiality or regards from my perspective, the existing policy is highly adorable because any amount of merit earned determine the amount of user sendable merit.

The only drawback of having both the merit and the like button is that most people will like the post without given the merit (as merits are rare and precious).
I personally don't like this idea. Again it can be treated in number of different ways like you press the like (shown publicly) and other people may give them merits thinking that the person who liked the post didn't have smerit to spend.

If I remembered correctly, you can actually do that but I'm fine with PMs within the same window. Less clutter

Moderators get notifications of reports via a queue that is very similar to PMs. I don't think many people use this, but it is also possible to get a popup window when you receive a PM. Either of these could be implemented for merit sources.

I'm pretty sure there is, that's why we see those Merit GA threads from time to time. Some get drowned among the repetitive replies, and then the local boards though since the exposure is lower.

About the +1, I feel it's more of a complementary feature. Think of it as a reaction. Let's say you post a thread on Bitcoin Lightning Network Satosheeesh v69 (just for discussion sake) detailing its new features and how-to.

People visit your thread and get intrigued. Since the "Like" reaction is pretty much one-click and "free", they'd be more inclined to react positively. So perhaps like 6 hours later, you revisit it to see 35 likes and 7 Merits thrown in.

If the substance is good, it's pretty easy to distinguish it among the rest. Sure, we might see some sockpuppets liking their own posts but all it takes is just several seconds to scan and we can tell if they're BS or not.


Without setting up Telegram/ PM/ smart watches, notifications would likely be seen in the Epochtalk ʷᵉ ᵐⁱᵍʰᵗ ˢᵉᵉ ⁱᵗ, ʷᵉ ᵐⁱᵍʰᵗ ⁿᵒᵗ. ʰᵒᵖᵉᶠᵘˡˡʸ ᵇⁱᵗᶜᵒⁱⁿ ʷᵒᵘˡᵈ ˢᵗⁱˡˡ ᵇᵉ ʳᵉˡᵉᵛᵃⁿᵗ ᵇʸ ᵗʰᵉⁿ

Merits are already enough. Implementing like just for those who doesn't have sendable merits would just simply eradicate the idea of meriting. Why? Merit already boosts someone's confidence when he/she receives one (a rewarding-like feeling for your efforts), and "Likes" on the other hand tends to give you the same feeling and worse is some can be boastful about it (if calculated on one's profile). It is not that necessary to implement a "liking" system for a forum that already has a better one.

I highly suggest that you ignore his reply as it does not make any sense at all.

What you suggested may sound good on paper, but in reality, it kinda defeats the purpose of the merit system. As what many have already mentioned, the purpose of merits is to reward users who contribute quality posts in the forum. For every two (2) merits that you earn, you are rewarded with one (1) sendable merit that allows you to merit another post in which you find valuable. The reason for this is clear and obvious- which is to prevent abuse.

To solve your problem, you can always save the post in which you find valuable, then merit it later on once you receive one.

Please sir, can you enlighten me on how the introduction of likes along side merit will increase the level of plagiarism in the forum?

You can still come back to the posts you want to merit later on when you have sMerits to give. You don't need likes for that. Just bookmark the post or save it to a new document that you keep on your computer for posts you intend to merit later on. When your stash of merits goes up, find a post you like from your saved history and merit it.

I believe we should start worrying about the merit system when established members who have received thousands or merits start speaking out against it. If they deem it unfair or bad even after having received so much, then we have a problem.

I guess I would ask if there are many posts that deserve merit that have little to no merit? If so, the number of sMerit that sources have should be evaluated or the number of sources should be evaluated. I don’t think adding a “plus 1” would add much value. In addition to the potential for abuse I mentioned above.

Automating notifications to merit sources may also be a good idea as was suggested above by Welsh. Sources could set their own criteria as to who they are willing to receive notifications from. 

No doubt that is still abusable, but I think the likes wouldn't carry as much weight as the Merits though.

I mean, the person could always use sockpuppets but in the end the BS would still be smelled out by other members sooner or later.

As an alternative, I would propose that all users be given a regular amount of smerit like we are all merit sources. The amount you get could be based off of some metric like account level, signup date, post count, or some formula, etc. That would seemingly make things as decentralized as possible, although the alt account issue ever looms.

I understand quite well what the OP is driving at and now that it's mentioned again I think theymos could look at it this way — enable a like bottom for newbie to member ranks only. Once a user crosses the member rank they lose the ability to use the like button. I know what it's like to read a helpful or reasonable posts but not being able to hug the poster (that's what merit literally does, isn't it?). Yes, one could report the post to appropriate threads to be merited but believe me it's not every time one reads a post that one has the time to respond to. Again, there may be newbies who don't even know how to report such. A like or hug feature for those ranks won't be asking too much.

I think this should be looked into, especially as the call for it repeatedly is coming up now and then. We all need to review our stand on this.

A like system without limits on the number of likes that can be sent would result in people using sockpuppets giving likes to their alts. Look at this thread, someone has many accounts that were always logged in, why would you think that someone wouldn’t use zero post accounts to give many likes?

A very good idea, I wish the management will see it and do something. Most time you will not have merit and don't have time to begin to type and reply. You will just like the post and move. Anybody can give it at anything. It will  not be hard to include it in the forum. It will not be abused because it will not be used to replace merit

Your Idea may seems right but sometimes if you approach your topic from another angle of reasoning you will realizes that way encourage lazy forum user from being diligent. And also will increase the level of spamming and plagiarism post.

Lol, sendable merit, it's right as you read through the posts of senior colleagues, i think it will give you insights to make a quality post in order to earn merit and also have a sendable merit to give out, because from the scenario of merit if your not awarded merit definitely you will not have Smerit to award another user, so earning merit is via proper research and hard working.

Shall the policy is good, but is not like that in community and it will be very rigid to adopt such, but in the aspect giving Smerit to any user, if you notice a post that deserve your merit, you have to write the topic and the board or you mark the Username anytime any day you have Smerit you slide to the user profile and merit the post, no time merit is been given to user that is wrong, it depends when you earn merit and couple with Smerit.

I'd like to see some quality of life features added onto the existing merit system, such as a button to potentially alert merit sources on a post being good. This could potentially be abused, but maybe it should be restricted somewhat to certain ranks or a limit per day etc.

A like system would probably be okay, I don't see any major drawbacks, and maybe as a result of having a like button we will see less users giving merit because they agree with a post. Since, in my opinion a like system is completely different to the current merit system, which sometimes gets treated as the same by certain users.

I feel like this would just create unnecessary feuds, which don't get me wrong we have already, but would be exaggerated with something as simple as a dislike button. Right now, to show that you disagree with something, you actually have to come up with a decent counter argument on why you disagree with them, a dislike button means it'll be abused to attack certain users. Of course, it doesn't really mean anything, but to the person posting it might. A like button, being only positive, and doesn't actually have any bearing on the post means its mostly for fluff, but doesn't really do any harm either way.   

Alternative for giving someone merit that you don't is very simple, just write a post saying that you agree and like specific post or you don't like it.
I don't want to see any additional like or dislike buttons that can all be abused with multiple accounts.

@lovesmayfamilis, I am trying to understand how the forum works, I didn't even know I was merited, not until I saw the post and checked my profile. I promise I'll learn.
@Quickteller I am definitely going to work harder.  I have learnt to report good post for it to be merited. I also learn to copy down the post link in a notepad pending when I have sendable merit.  Thank you all, I am grateful.

What about "dislike"? I mean, if you want to have "like", why not to have dislike too, seeing so much bs being written all over the place. I know that de-meriting was proposed too, but that would probably be too drastic, but dislike would be nice addition, especially if post that gets enough dislikes get hidden, so something similar to reddit.

Actually they're a nice complement to one another but then we'll have purists saying it taints the whole Merit system as a whole

I think both of you make valid points here. Even if the functionality is worthless, as OgNasty pointed out, it could contribute to a positive impact on the forum and spark new interest among young members.

Reddit and Quora have "upvote" buttons, which are similar to Twitter's and Facebook's "like". But, bitcointalk can have a simple "Thank you", just as many other forums already do.
Unlike merits, thankyous don't need to have any effect other than to acknowledge posts that are helpful, interesting, humorous, or otherwise catch your attention. In this case, I don't see any conflict with the existing merit system.

I agree with you.
Sometimes it’s hard for me to watch all these ugly arguments and conflicts on the forum and it would be nice to see something that would have a positive effect on the forum.
Sometimes it seems that everything designed to improve this forum and its quality, as a DT system and merits, has already been abused many times and people are arguing too much about it.
It would be really nice to have something that will inspire people and motivate them to act positively on this forum and that's why I like the idea of OP and I support it.

Jr Member? He's reached the Member status


Hardly. One simple word from an influencer and all the simps will like/ RT.

Sendable merits will be sent to good posts but the fact is not all good posts will receive smerit and not all merited posts are good posts.

Some members use their sendable merit as Like and the forum does not need official Like button. Bitcointalk Like button, I don't support this idea.

If you had searched, you would have found many similar topics.
Merits = Likes, the new standard?

If you use Facebook or Twitter, do you think liked status or loved tweets are actually good ones, in quality?

I gave you enough merit for you to get promoted to a junior member.

Some kind of waitlist for posts that deserve merit would be nice. There is a thread that you can report good posts that deserve merit that is monitored by many merit sources. https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/self-moderated-report-unmerited-good-posts-to-merit-source-5093271

Well, I have used the Watchlist feature here in the forum and I'm quite happy with it. All the important and interesting threads that I would find that possibly would be helpful to me and to other people, I put it there. I'm just not using it as a keeper for threads that I'm probably not going to use. Bookmarking is easier for sure but I don't want to increase the number of bookmarks folders in my system though.

I think adding more positive things to this forum is needed.  So much time and effort is spent by members of this community on negative added value items like trust flags and negative feedback.  It would be nice to see members as proud of how much positivity they've spread or how many members they've been able to help.  Merit seemed at first like it would be a decent addition, but it's been mostly hijacked by merit circles seeking to control who gets to be in DT.  Adding something fun and positive without any negative association seems needed on this forum, even if it is functionally worthless. 

For me I usually just bookmark threads in here that are supposed to be liked, like I would also be able to use it as a future reference in case someone asked a question related to those I bookmarked.
Chrome's enough for me to save few clicks.

I briefly forgot about the new forum software, and if I remember correctly, a thank option was suggested as a new feature in it, although the completion of the new forum has been long delayed, lots of users have stopped waiting for it.

There's no comparison to Facebook, just that a like and dislike option would have little practical use besides popularity if everyone is allowed to give it out freely. Upvote and downvote may work on Reddit, but this forum already has a quality grading system - the merit system. Adding another layer to it is somewhat superfluous, imo.

If you really think a post is worthy enough to be merited, create a sticky note and paste the links there. That's what I do if I don't have any more merit to send and then once I received enough merit again, I will go back to the topic and then merit the deserving post.

You could do that or follow DireWolfM14 and send the links to the topic he included.

What is the purpose of your like for others? Specially if you say you will "like and move on". How it will be useful for others or you want it only to be visible for you? If there will be like button, there must be a dislike button also. I think that will simply make post look bulky. If you really like someone post - I don't know, copy/paste that in a notepad so you can re-read it once again or save as a bookmark. Or send a virtual smile to the screen or simply nod.

You talk about posts that you liked and that you would like to celebrate, but despite this, only one merit has been sent from you, although you still have 2.  Isn't it strange? What are these likes for? On the forum, so, many go crazy about how difficult it is for them to get merits, now there will be a second madness for earning likes or dislikes? The forum is self-sufficient to parody any social networks.

Very well said here, the feeling is strong, atimes I become emotional about it. Maybe I will overcome it in due time. Atimes I feel like I have committed a crime for not appreciating a very good post that is helpful to me.

Yes, I strongly agree with you, there is no harm in trying.

We don't know that. Since the new forum software is still being developed, it is difficult to say what features it will have or won't have.
As every platform changes over time, so will bitcointalk. If enough people show an interest, the administration might take that into consideration.


I don't know why everyone compares the forum to Facebook.
The Upvote/Downvote feature on Reddit is a very useful tool. It is unlikely that the platform would be as popular as it is today without it.

This is a forum, considering it would not be right like social media. I understand what you mean, but it's not necessarily that everyone has to give merit in just one post. You can also appreciate that post by replying to that post. It is a misconception to judge content by the number of likes on social media.

And if the like button is implement on Bitcointalk like Facebook, then it will work differently than intended. Because we see how the like system of Facebook is working, many useless things are also getting a lot of likes on Facebook. So considering Bitcointalk as a social media and introducing the Like button can lead to misunderstandings when using this option. I'm not against the like button, theymos can implement it experimentally if he want.

One-liner - Not gonna happen.

But don't worry, you will get along with it.. give it a time. This is common every new member coming from other social media platforms carves for this option but trust me this "like" feature has peen proposed like gazillion times. and here are reason its hasn't been implemented. What you think when theymos introduced this merit option would not he have thought of "like" option which is much simpler and easier to implement.

If you have noticed even Facebook somehow ditched this option with emotions. Also when you bring "like" button, automatically you need a "dislike" button and that brings additional many ifs and buts with it. So I guess this simple "merit" systems working fine for years and that's something exclusive to Bitcointalk. I guess only thing which we should not be asking for is "Where is the new forum software?".

Ive understand you OP. The urge to express our feeling over something we like is strong that a like button is sounds like missing here but thats a different case since this a forum and not can be compared with social media sites such as facebook and twitter.

In case you have encounter a lot of good post that you reallt admire or like. Drop a merit if you have, but its not necessary since you are still a newbie. Anyway I am not against of this like button but more in favor.

Theymos can implement it as trial since many already requested the featuee and just remove it if turns out to be funny in the end.

Thank you very much for this link. If something like this exists, that means my thirst for introduction of like is 50% quenched. I am grateful to know this.

This topic has been discussed extensively on the forum and the admins have taken no action, so it's safe to say, it is not being considered;
Like button idea ?
Downvote / Dislike button
The like button
I keep looking for the 'Like' button

• You do not have to engage a post to show appreciation, you could simply read through and pick the important information,
• If necessary, you can report the post in the link giving in the first 2 replies or PM the user,
• Like buttons on social media are mostly useless and just a popularity contest, there's no need to replicate that here.

I don't really think it's too late; it's a matter of the community and Theymos thinking that a "like" feature is superfluous given that we have the merit system.  I'd suggest that if you see a post that you like and don't have enough sMerits, the world isn't going to end if you don't express your feelings toward that post--and you can always do as DireWolfM14 said and report the post in that thread.

This topic has come up numerous times since the merit system was implemented, and I've seen many threads by newbies (and higher ranked members, too) wanting something equivalent to a "like" button.  Every thread has ended the same way, i.e., it died off and that like button was never created--so OP, the bottom line is that it isn't going to happen.

The merit system has been so helpful in making this forum achieving quality posts, I do not think there should be any changes if it is working good, I mean there should not be any introduction of likes. Like me, I do send some people PM(s) if I have seen their post helpful for me (especially when I have no smerit(s) to send, I do not need any like button at all. All I can still prefer is to be a merit source so I will be able to have enough smerits all month long that I can send to the posts that are worth it. You too can try to become an established member on this forum and request for merit source. Also know that many of us do set the telegram bot to notify us of anyone that send us new merits and that also mention us, if you report such posts on [self-moderated] Report unmerited good posts to Merit Source, the user will be notified through telegram bot, and if the post you report are worthy to be given merit, you will see merit source and other users meriting such posts. I have done it several times and it has been working good for me.

Know that the posts on this forum is not about like or not, it is about having quality, if merit system can work this good so far, like button is not necessary. There is other platform called cryptotalk.org, the site make use of like and hate button, but the forum is full of spammers. Sticking to worth is working good is enough than advancing it to worth what may not later do the forum good.

The reason one has to earn merit before he can send merit is prevent abuse.  Many newbies are likely abuse their sMerit by sharing it amongst their newbie buddies (or sockpuppets,) thus undermining the point of having a merit system.  The premise is that if you've earned the merit, you're likely to know how to send sMerit.

If you find a post worthy of merit, but don't have enough to send yourself, report it here:
https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/self-moderated-report-unmerited-good-posts-to-merit-source-5093271

It's a bit too late to introduce a "Like" button in my opinion.
The users are so used to the Merit system that they will keep using it instead of the "Like" button

Besides it, while it can useful, I don't see the need to turn the forum into a Christmas tree and overload it with so many things. There is a choice to make between both and a "like" button wouldn't have encouraged the users to improve the quality of their post.
Secondly, if you notice how the Merits are sent, you can see the users already confuse it with a "Like" button like on Facebook.

As a newbie, I read many posts that has quality. After reading the posts I'll feel like to merit the post, but as a newbie, I might not have a sendable merit, I will have no option than to slide on.
Assuming there is an alternative to merit just like "Facebook like" along side merit, it would favour me.

Atleast if I don't have merit to give, I will just click like and move on pending when I'll have merit to award the user.
This proposed "like" might likely not be used by admins, or neither shall it determine ranking, but it should just be a mere appreciation for a quality post when merit is lacking.