Any penalty for selling merit? Still need a statement.

mdayonliner

copper member

Activity: 630

Merit: 420

We are Bitcoin!

Quote from: hilariousetc on March 22, 2018, 12:37:39 PM

There isn't really any rule against it per se and it's not really enforced at an admin or staff level, so it's more of a community issue right now much like scams and other such shady behaviour. As far as I'm aware the only thing that is currently prohibited is merit sources selling their merit though I'm not sure what the punishment for that would be other than them being removed as merit source.

Quote from: mdayonliner on March 22, 2018, 12:34:00 PM

What about on selling merits? It only says: disallowed but no clue about the penalty.

Can we expect any update on this statement about selling merits by regular members like us who are not merit source.

What action will be taken if a regular member sells (to anyone) or exchange merits (with their friends).

I am seeking your attention (@hilariousetc) since FAQ: Everything you need to know about forum 'activity, account ranks and merit is your(Alt) post.

Thanks

PS: I just changed the title of the topic just to get your (@hilariousetc) attention.

Apology to everyone else especially jackg, jerry29@., greeklogos, MainIbem, The Pharmacist, sitnikov, audaciousbeing, Lehbane, tranthidung, digaran, Kim Ji Won, selezneve, krishnaverma, coolcoinz, Maldini07, ilcapitano, Ginzink. I appreciate the feedback you guys made. It means a lot to me however I really need a clear statement for reference. And IMO hilariousetc is the best one. Hope you guys understand it.

Ginzink

full member

Activity: 462

Merit: 118

Quote from: digaran on March 23, 2018, 10:43:56 PM

$5 per merit, you should donate $5 per sold merit to the forum. selling merits to garbage posters would cost the forum, you should cover that cost. if you are going to pay, try to buy a copper membership and send $250 to that address if you have sold 50 merits.
This link will take you there. note that forum is not asking you to do this, I am suggesting you to do this and then show your TXID to the person who has left you negative trust. show some remorse. https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=credit;promote

I just realized i would probably have actualy paid for a copper membership if that gave me the merit to rank up.
That was a suprise, i really do not like that people are buying selling merit. Double standards from me then.. Or just a weak moment Huh

Thankfully it is not an option Cheesy

mdayonliner

copper member

Activity: 630

Merit: 420

We are Bitcoin!

Quote from: coolcoinz on March 25, 2018, 09:38:12 AM

That would be seen as a greedy move. This forum was made to be a place for free discussion and for people to learn about cryptocurrencies. If people started seeing that they have to pay to be able to ask a question on a forum they would get discouraged. I guess i'm not ready for discussion because I wouldn't pay for registration. I'd move to free forums like reddit. Nobody is inviting spammers here. They are coming of their own will!

This will ruin the idea of a forum so to speak.

Quote from: jackg on March 25, 2018, 06:41:29 AM

Not finding all, just the ones you can find.
You forget it's not against forum rules to farm/sell accounts or to have alts here. Charging $10000 or ~1BTC is more expensive than buying a legendary account outright (depending on account quality).

You don't need to find all to convince people to not do something, you just need to find "most" to show you're making some sort of impact to those who participate in this sort of thing.

-I was only using an example to explain my point.
Again this is why I think it's a bad one... that idea will bring more workload because these people will never come forward by their own to pay the forum.

ilcapitano

member

Activity: 462

Merit: 14

It doesn't make sense because anyone in the forum can buy/sell sMerits (more exactly to called them sMerits buying/selling, not Merits) if they want, regardless of their ranks.
Additionally, your words make me feell like you are not able to buy sMerits (maybe lack of money, lol).
Honestly, I strongly think that those users who try to exchange sMerits have chosen the wrong way. It is side-effects of merit system, but only a small group of users doing this. Mostly come from spammers and account farmers.

Quote from: Maldini07 on March 25, 2018, 11:23:31 AM

Selling or buying merit is not good for forum, thats is unfair for newbie or jr.

Don't worry! Moderators will ban all of them when evidence shows up

Quote from: Maldini07 on March 25, 2018, 11:23:31 AM

Stop to try sell/buy merits and i hope mods will be ban or delete account if they suspected farming merit abuse

Maldini07

newbie

Activity: 205

Merit: 0

Selling or buying merit is not good for forum, thats is unfair for newbie or jr.
Stop to try sell/buy merits and i hope mods will be ban or delete account if they suspected farming merit abuse

coolcoinz

legendary

Activity: 2814

Merit: 1192

Quote from: selezneve on March 24, 2018, 12:44:10 AM

Members are always going to look for shortcuts and it will be time consuming for senior members to find the abusers. I do not understand that why the admin simple closes new registrations here or makes it paid or so. Members generally interested in discussions will anyway be ready to pay for this privilege. The members who do not want to invest any money for this can read the threads here without registering also. Currently, you are first inviting spammers, let them do spam and then spending time to ban them.

That would be seen as a greedy move. This forum was made to be a place for free discussion and for people to learn about cryptocurrencies. If people started seeing that they have to pay to be able to ask a question on a forum they would get discouraged. I guess i'm not ready for discussion because I wouldn't pay for registration. I'd move to free forums like reddit. Nobody is inviting spammers here. They are coming of their own will!

jackg

copper member

Activity: 2856

Merit: 3071

https://bit.ly/387FXHi lightning theory

Quote from: mdayonliner on March 25, 2018, 01:24:29 AM

Quote from: jackg on March 24, 2018, 07:53:12 AM

Quote from: digaran on March 23, 2018, 10:43:56 PM

$5 per merit, you should donate $5 per sold merit to the forum. selling merits to garbage posters would cost the forum, you should cover that cost. if you are going to pay, try to buy a copper membership and send $250 to that address if you have sold 50 merits.
This link will take you there. note that forum is not asking you to do this, I am suggesting you to do this and then show your TXID to the person who has left you negative trust. show some remorse. https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=credit;promote

That's not actually a bad idea in order to act as an incentive to stop users from trying to sell/buy merit. Get both members to do it, not just the seller.

- You do realise this will create more mess? Someone with money can be ranked easily.
i.e:
1. You can be a Hero member if you are willing to spend $2500 to the seller plus $2500 to the forum. So it will cost only $5000 to have 500 merits to become a hero member. And someone who will spend $5000 to become a hero member will defiantly do everything to get return of his investment = scamming with may be ICO project?
2. Same way to become a Legendary member you are going to spend only $10,000. If you have solid plan to scam people then spending these $10,000 can return you million.

-Now come to anther point. How would you think you will be able to identify all these merit seller/buyers? The forum will be a kios.
Bad idea, sorry.

Not finding all, just the ones you can find.
You forget it's not against forum rules to farm/sell accounts or to have alts here. Charging $10000 or ~1BTC is more expensive than buying a legendary account outright (depending on account quality).

You don't need to find all to convince people to not do something, you just need to find "most" to show you're making some sort of impact to those who participate in this sort of thing.

mdayonliner

copper member

Activity: 630

Merit: 420

We are Bitcoin!

Quote from: jackg on March 24, 2018, 07:53:12 AM

The abuse worsens when you're on DT or a higher ranked member who actively searches for scams across the forum.

If they have bad intention and try to take advantages then yes it's worse but someday they will get caught for sure.
In my opinion earning a high rank or getting a DT needs a lot of hard work. Someone with those ranks will not try to abuse anything by risking their hard earned reputation. Again yes people change.

Quote from: jackg on March 24, 2018, 07:53:12 AM

Quote from: digaran on March 23, 2018, 10:43:56 PM

$5 per merit, you should donate $5 per sold merit to the forum. selling merits to garbage posters would cost the forum, you should cover that cost. if you are going to pay, try to buy a copper membership and send $250 to that address if you have sold 50 merits.
This link will take you there. note that forum is not asking you to do this, I am suggesting you to do this and then show your TXID to the person who has left you negative trust. show some remorse. https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=credit;promote

That's not actually a bad idea in order to act as an incentive to stop users from trying to sell/buy merit. Get both members to do it, not just the seller.

- You do realise this will create more mess? Someone with money can be ranked easily.
i.e:
1. You can be a Hero member if you are willing to spend $2500 to the seller plus $2500 to the forum. So it will cost only $5000 to have 500 merits to become a hero member. And someone who will spend $5000 to become a hero member will defiantly do everything to get return of his investment = scamming with may be ICO project?
2. Same way to become a Legendary member you are going to spend only $10,000. If you have solid plan to scam people then spending these $10,000 can return you million.

-Now come to anther point. How would you think you will be able to identify all these merit seller/buyers? The forum will be a kios.
Bad idea, sorry.

jackg

copper member

Activity: 2856

Merit: 3071

https://bit.ly/387FXHi lightning theory

Quote from: mdayonliner on March 24, 2018, 03:51:37 AM

Quote from: jackg on March 22, 2018, 02:29:16 PM

You might want to post a summary of your thread or a link to your thread here if you haven't already done so just to ensure everything is in a centralised list.

I just did as you suggested assuming this will help to be discovered by DT members.

Quote from: The Sceptical Chymist on March 22, 2018, 04:48:47 PM

Quote from: mdayonliner on March 22, 2018, 12:34:00 PM

Should I remove the red trust knowing the person sold the merits?

No, you should not. Not even if they send you a message telling you their kids will starve to death because of your feedback (because that's a lie, as is any idiotic plea like that).

I had bring a second thought in it eventually. With some terms and conditions am removing the red trust. Motive is to keep a proof that they admit their misuse. I wish I was a DT member or a high ranked member to save my ass.
mdayonliner's Red Trust removal T&C

The abuse worsens when you're on DT or a higher ranked member who actively searches for scams across the forum.
Aha yes, that's a good list of the so-far stuff.

Quote from: digaran on March 23, 2018, 10:43:56 PM

$5 per merit, you should donate $5 per sold merit to the forum. selling merits to garbage posters would cost the forum, you should cover that cost. if you are going to pay, try to buy a copper membership and send $250 to that address if you have sold 50 merits.
This link will take you there. note that forum is not asking you to do this, I am suggesting you to do this and then show your TXID to the person who has left you negative trust. show some remorse. https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=credit;promote

That's not actually a bad idea in order to act as an incentive to stop users from trying to sell/buy merit. Get both members to do it, not just the seller.

mdayonliner

copper member

Activity: 630

Merit: 420

We are Bitcoin!

Quote from: jackg on March 22, 2018, 02:29:16 PM

You might want to post a summary of your thread or a link to your thread here if you haven't already done so just to ensure everything is in a centralised list.

I just did as you suggested assuming this will help to be discovered by DT members.

Quote from: The Sceptical Chymist on March 22, 2018, 04:48:47 PM

Quote from: mdayonliner on March 22, 2018, 12:34:00 PM

Should I remove the red trust knowing the person sold the merits?

No, you should not. Not even if they send you a message telling you their kids will starve to death because of your feedback (because that's a lie, as is any idiotic plea like that).

I had bring a second thought in it eventually. With some terms and conditions am removing the red trust. Motive is to keep a proof that they admit their misuse. I wish I was a DT member or a high ranked member to save my ass.
mdayonliner's Red Trust removal T&C

Quote from: krishnaverma on March 24, 2018, 01:50:02 AM

Some questions here:

1) Why is it allowed to send up to 50 merits for a single post ? No doubt, such cases are easy to spot and the member will be punished but what about the merit points wasted. Those 50 merit points should have been given to a deserving member.

2) Regarding buying/selling of merit, how are the deals happening outside the forum going to be caught ?

If we take responsibilities (if possible) in our hand trying to find these abusers and find a way to warn them with proofs (i.e: my removal t&c) then give them a second chance. After that if they do the same mistake/abuse then staff or moderators should ban them, no mercy (my opinion). May be we will see it will start to reduce dramatically.

krishnaverma

full member

Activity: 1442

Merit: 108

Quote from: Kim Ji Won on March 24, 2018, 12:08:23 AM

IMO, selling merit regardless of the posting quality of the user is an unethical behavior and must be punished appropriately. So tagging them or giving neg trust is okay. This wrongdoing creates more chaos in the forum about merits, like for example a certain user is selling merits to another that can be considered to be a shitposter/spammer, the merit awarded will be then questioned by the community as to how that kind of post got merited while their own posts who they thought to be much more deserving got nothing. A long, repetitive and useless discussion about it will eventually occur.

Some questions here:

1) Why is it allowed to send up to 50 merits for a single post ? No doubt, such cases are easy to spot and the member will be punished but what about the merit points wasted. Those 50 merit points should have been given to a deserving member.

2) Regarding buying/selling of merit, how are the deals happening outside the forum going to be caught ?

selezneve

jr. member

Activity: 132

Merit: 1

Members are always going to look for shortcuts and it will be time consuming for senior members to find the abusers. I do not understand that why the admin simple closes new registrations here or makes it paid or so. Members generally interested in discussions will anyway be ready to pay for this privilege. The members who do not want to invest any money for this can read the threads here without registering also. Currently, you are first inviting spammers, let them do spam and then spending time to ban them.

Kim Ji Won

full member

Activity: 350

Merit: 110

IMO, selling merit regardless of the posting quality of the user is an unethical behavior and must be punished appropriately. So tagging them or giving neg trust is okay. This wrongdoing creates more chaos in the forum about merits, like for example a certain user is selling merits to another that can be considered to be a shitposter/spammer, the merit awarded will be then questioned by the community as to how that kind of post got merited while their own posts who they thought to be much more deserving got nothing. A long, repetitive and useless discussion about it will eventually occur.

digaran

copper member

Activity: 1330

Merit: 899

🖤😏

$5 per merit, you should donate $5 per sold merit to the forum. selling merits to garbage posters would cost the forum, you should cover that cost. if you are going to pay, try to buy a copper membership and send $250 to that address if you have sold 50 merits.
This link will take you there. note that forum is not asking you to do this, I am suggesting you to do this and then show your TXID to the person who has left you negative trust. show some remorse. https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=credit;promote

tranthidung

legendary

Activity: 2310

Merit: 4085

Farewell o_e_l_e_o

I agree users who are selling sMerits, exchanging their sMerits should be wipen out of the forum through permanent bans.

However, there is no official rules about banning due to selling sMerits (should call exactly as sMerits, not merits). Therefore, I think that Theymos should add new point of rules (#34) to avoid any serious arguments about permanenent bans due to merit exchanging.
Unofficial list of (ocfficial) bitcointalk.org rules, guidelines, FAQ

There are more than 200 accounts which banned immediately after found and banned permanently due to merit farming.
More mass merit farming

Lehbane

newbie

Activity: 112

Merit: 0

As far as I can read, they have red mark on their accounts, especially when they looked that their wallets had been linked together, and having red mark from D2 is hard to join in any bounty.

audaciousbeing

hero member

Activity: 1330

Merit: 569

The origin of the problem of any society is people failing to live up to ideals and expectation of the community. I can't imagine that some people are bent on frustrating this merit system to make it ineffective despite the amount of thought that have been put into bringing it into reality. I agree that it's not perfect but if everyone can just play their part and focus on doing the right thing rather than cutting corners, it would have been the best upgrade the forum would witness because whether we acknowledge it or not, its surely working.

For those selling merit as ordinary members, its a matter of time for it to get exhausted and nothing can be done about that. But for the sources of merit members, this should be frown at seriously by anyone who wants the best for the forum because to be regarded as a source of merit means some level of trust has been deposited into you which by selling merits, you have betrayed that trust and such individual should not be welcomed in the community. My opinion...

greeklogos

full member

Activity: 658

Merit: 152

Quote from: hilariousetc on March 23, 2018, 06:31:28 AM

Quote from: sitnikov on March 23, 2018, 12:37:31 AM

Quote from: greeklogos on March 22, 2018, 02:28:22 PM

I guess selling of merit is happening out of the forum or through PM, so such cases are going to be hard to prove ones. But in the case if such deals will be uncovered I believe those users will get negative trust as well.

Deals happening outside forum: If these are happening in online marketplaces, it can still be traced. It will require a lot of work on the part of staff though and I do not think they have that much free time. If you notice such a thing on any marketplace like Freelancer, you can bring it to the attention of mods.

Deals through PMS: Why are these hard to catch for the moderators ? Can't they check the pm of other members ? This is done on other forums I am part of .

This isn't going to happen. Only Admins (and the NSA Cheesy

) can read people's private messages and they're not going to invade peoples privacy just to see if people are trading merit. Admins don't get involved in this stuff and is usually left up to the community to police or enforce certain standards.

You forgot about KGB Cheesy

I think even if moderators or managers have opportunity to read other users' PMs they can't to track each case, it is obvious that they have many other forum's work besides that.

jackg

copper member

Activity: 2856

Merit: 3071

https://bit.ly/387FXHi lightning theory

Quote from: hilariousetc on March 23, 2018, 06:31:28 AM

Quote from: sitnikov on March 23, 2018, 12:37:31 AM

Quote from: greeklogos on March 22, 2018, 02:28:22 PM

I guess selling of merit is happening out of the forum or through PM, so such cases are going to be hard to prove ones. But in the case if such deals will be uncovered I believe those users will get negative trust as well.

Deals happening outside forum: If these are happening in online marketplaces, it can still be traced. It will require a lot of work on the part of staff though and I do not think they have that much free time. If you notice such a thing on any marketplace like Freelancer, you can bring it to the attention of mods.

Deals through PMS: Why are these hard to catch for the moderators ? Can't they check the pm of other members ? This is done on other forums I am part of .

This isn't going to happen. Only Admins (and the NSA Cheesy

) can read people's private messages and they're not going to invade peoples privacy just to see if people are trading merit. Admins don't get involved in this stuff and is usually left up to the community to police or enforce certain standards.

As hilarious states only admins have access to PMs but they're extremely busy with other stuff to start wanting to police merit.

Also, since we're a forum based on cryptographic currencies, someone might encrypt their messages for the receiver to get with hashing algorithms.

hilariousetc

legendary

Activity: 2954

Merit: 3060

Join the world-leading crypto sportsbook NOW!

Quote from: sitnikov on March 23, 2018, 12:37:31 AM

Quote from: greeklogos on March 22, 2018, 02:28:22 PM

I guess selling of merit is happening out of the forum or through PM, so such cases are going to be hard to prove ones. But in the case if such deals will be uncovered I believe those users will get negative trust as well.

Deals happening outside forum: If these are happening in online marketplaces, it can still be traced. It will require a lot of work on the part of staff though and I do not think they have that much free time. If you notice such a thing on any marketplace like Freelancer, you can bring it to the attention of mods.

Deals through PMS: Why are these hard to catch for the moderators ? Can't they check the pm of other members ? This is done on other forums I am part of .

This isn't going to happen. Only Admins (and the NSA Cheesy

) can read people's private messages and they're not going to invade peoples privacy just to see if people are trading merit. Admins don't get involved in this stuff and is usually left up to the community to police or enforce certain standards.

Topic: Any penalty for selling merit? Still need a statement. (Read 452 times)