Topic: Attaining legendary rank - is that the end? (Read 1262 times)

Good suggestion. If implemented , it will help to distinguish between deserving ranks and the members who just got lucky.

I don’t see any real reason to do so. Regardless of the rank, people are entitled to take a break or pursue other goals with their time. It would, in any case, be more reasonable to tie it to other variables as well (i.e. number having not received any merits in the last x posts within a given timeframe). Instead of introducing a negative factor (losing Merits), it should suffice with not receiving a positive stimulus (not receiving Merits).

Like loosing activity, when your posts are deleted, users should lose merit when they havent received new for a long time. This will stop "I am legendary, I have achieved everything, I can rest now" kind of things.

Grandparent Legendary is a good name for above 10k merits warmer but it's look like they are already seniors citizens   just kidding
For now we have 2 user here in forum, o_e_l_e_o and LoyceV  already reach 12k merits and another 2 user who reach 10k merits fillippone and theymos, and I called them as Reign Glorious Legendary because they are like a kings of our forum which is they are the best of all legendaries out there.

For the majority here, it is to become eligible for higher payouts in signature campaigns or sell something with credibility of higher rank.

I think the ranking system has to do something with the purpose of the individual- like does he want to rank-up in order to get higher payment rates in signature campaigns; or does he think that ranking is immaterial in his/her overall stay in this forum?

Users like LoyceV and others who attained thousands of merits have one (1) common purpose- which is to contribute to the overall experience and knowledge about this forum. So I do think it boils down to the purpose of the individual on why he/she joined in this forum in the first place.

I am not insulting legendary members here but legendary members getting most merits will not always mean that it is because of valuable content only, there can be many other factors also behind this. Like by time , you become legendary , you are already experienced of the topics and sections which get more merits. You make same type of posts and in those same sections and earn lot of merits.

However, in general, I agree to the comment you made and which I quoted.

I'm just curious. How will you address members like o_e_l_e_o and LoyceV who've earned over 10,000 merits on their own? You'll call them, "Grandparent Legendary" or something in that line? 🤔

In regards to the title of this thread which says "Attaining Legendary rank-is that the end?" For me, I will say both Yes and No. That is, "Yes" because when it comes to forum ranking, legendary is indeed the last rank, and "No" because when it comes to forum/Bitcoin journey, legendary is actually starting point, as it has no limit to what anyone can exploit when it comes to Bitcoin and it's ecosystem
So, according to the chart given by @ imamusam, it clearly shows that "legendary" rank receives the highest amount of merit on the forum, due to the fact that those guys provide valuable contents, and have got more knowledge about the forum and Bitcoin in general, and could offer help or best advice as quickly to anyone in need, which in return get a merited reward

There have been ranks from the start to show how progressive you are on the forum, if you have been active and constant on the forum, but there was a discovery made to stop and tackle spammers from ranking up on the forum and the best means was to introduce a merit system, this merit system will restrict shitposters and spammers from ranking up on the forum, ranking up actually is a choice but if truly you wanted to build a tangible stay on the forum then you will know better on the importance of ranking up, atleast we have some members trolling around the forum, some come and once there's solution to their challenges they left, should the forum allows such to be ranking up? not until you define your purpose for coming to bitcointalk then you may not understand why things are been done and why some aren't.

Yes, that's a misunderstanding and to be honest, I really want to say that bad posters have been prevented by the merit system from rank up to Legendary. Good posters earn the right to rank up because of their quality and many of those posters are on their way up their respective ranks, and I'm sure many of them have already reached Legendary.

Theymos said about merit system:
Of course I remember it well, but the merit system didn't stop me from rank up especially since I care about post quality. It seems that you also know, mate. 

You don't need to predict anything about the ranking system--just read my posts above, because I know whereof I speak.  Back when the forum was created, I'm guessing it was no big deal and if you achieved Legendary it just meant that you'd been around long enough and posted enough to get there.  But ever since the beginning of signature campaigns, that changed.

Wait, are you saying the merit system has done more harm than good?  I can't tell if this is a misunderstanding due to language or not, but if that is what you mean I'd say that the really good posters should be well on their way to Legendary if they're not at that rank already.  I won't argue that the merit system has made it harder for everyone to rank up, but it was a necessary evil.  You weren't around in 2015-16, but you were definitely here before the merit system so hopefully you remember how bad the shitposting problem had gotten.

There's also "Double Legendary" where you have the 1,000 airdropped merits, then you earn an additional 1,000 merits through hard work and determination thus reaching the nominal "Legendary" status with 1,000 earned (instead of airdropped) merits.

The key is to never reach legendary by just not getting any merit when you get really really close

Not many users care about rank including me if theymos don't introduce a merit system. Why? Ranking can be reached to Legendary by anyone if you always actively post and accumulate enough activity without any merit before January 2018. But the merit system has succeeded in preventing more users who deserve to be in the highest rank than giving all users the right to rank without high quality posts.

If you know what the purpose of implementing a merit system is, then you will also know how much the current rank means to most users.

The purpose of ranks from the forum owner or website owner point of view is mostly to make the rank holder feel proud and thus contribute more on the forum or website. It is obvious on many sites. What exactly is the reason behind ranks on this forum, I cannot predict exactly though.
But saying that a legendary rank means nothing will be wrong. These ranks existed before the merit system but have become more relevant after merit system as now ranks have to be earned. It can be and should be made more tough for legendary rank to hold these ranks.

To me rank is just a means to place recognition for an improved user who has been consistently contributing with important and necessary post they every one could gain from, this rank identify such user for the accomplishment of a growth stage from lower level to higher level with deep knowledge and understandings of bitcoin and the forum at large and what now justifies this is the acquired merits, to me being in a legendary position gives an indication for perpetual years of active contributions and by that rank, a user must have been well established to be distinguished from a newbie, i don't see a reason to continue in rank but rather, those that remains steadfast in their contributions to the community growth may stand a chance to benefit recommendations for openings of opportunities anytime, because I've seen some legendary ranks being inactive over time.

Goddamn, you have a way with words--and pseudo-words, too.  But the above statement is kinda freaky; it's almost as though you knew me in real life (except perhaps for the facial hair).  Freaky deaky, darlin'.

Yeah, but unlike any other person who does manual labor, these idiots keep collecting a paycheck for forcing that peg into the hole it doesn't fit into.  In real life, they'd be fired for being incompetent peg pounders.  On the forum?  Their bosses are just happy to have something with a heartbeat behind the keyboard that types all the nonsense.  Until bounty managers (or project devs) figure out a way to create bots to do what these shitposters are currently doing, everything I described above is just going to keep happening. 

I've been here over 7 years, and it was actually worse when I registered, if you can believe that.

Uhm.... I have to agree with you yeah? Cus you're an ancient advocate,covered on the face by some bibliophilic essence, furrowed on the chin with some grey, hairy stuff (atleast as a sign of profoundness) and a massive protruging tommy , filled with golden-tainted potential, tryna Ameliorate/ solicit just to save the asses of the black Bunny-rats; that all they know is sit in there, unaccounted for , just to 'bear' the tag -- legendary-- .

That wasn't really for all legends,old boy -- sorta ones like you? No! -- those that had the message, know themselves and had been clothed in inferiority complex about -- say since 8765432 years ago --

CHYMIST 😄
You made me LMAO; those dumb heads haven't even decided -- until now -- to raise a standard over their garbage sandwiched brains?? Oh hell come onnnn!!!
So they just tryna fix a SQUARE PEG IN A ROUND HOLE.

Sandra 👩‍🦱

Legendary rank on this particular forum is way, waaay more than just a flattering title.  On other forums, with whatever ranking systems they have in place, that might be true, but I can pretty much guarantee you that there aren't as many (if any) threads created about attaining the highest rank--or even just ranking up in general.

The truth is that bitcointalk is fundamentally different than other discussion forums due to the existence of signature campaigns and bounties, i.e., using avatars, personal text, and signature space to get paid for advertising.  Since you generally get more advertising space the higher up you go in the ranks, if you're participating in a campaign or bounty or planning to, it's of great personal (and by that I mean financial) interest to get to the higher ranks.

It seems strange to me that it's seemingly become less important to members in the years that I've been here, because back in 2016-18 I think there were way more threads in Meta that dealt with ranking up.  And after the merit system was introduced, all hell rained down in the Meta section because it suddenly became so much harder for Newbies to even become Jr. Members--and the shitposters who were used to just having to post and wait in order to rank up now were scratching their collective retarded heads, wondering how in the holy hell they were going to make posts good enough to earn merits.

They still haven't figured that one out.  Probably never will.

It's actually funny when I see alot of peeps in the same line of thinking; legendary is merely a rank, just like every other ranks. Yeah? I know for sure that experience matters alot though but, it all depends on Which.
We have alot of members here that are legendaries but they don't even get a glimpse of the cryptographical part of Bitcoin; how trnx are made -- hashing -- encoding --p2p -- merkle tree etc. They don't even feel comfortable when such discussions are made cus they barely have anything to offer right? Now, if we're taking experience to be a guarantee for knowledge (coupled with the stress and time wasted on getting an account grown to such a rank) why are some left behind the normalized technical processes? Was there a time they left and didn't post but still received merits? ( I'm aware that merits were airdropped so, that's not where I'm thriving at)
That'll make you to understand that varieties of things can be done as a contribution for an account growth -- take a look at donators for instance --
Legendary ranks ain't the highest; to be honest, this whole rank stuff is -- to me -- just a mere formality if, and only if the OPs empty. It's sometimes assumed as flatteries.......
To every title, they must be an entitlement. If it's ridiculed, then, the routewise ain't launched wide, wide enough to get a bull's horn stucked.

Sandra 👩‍🦱

First, congratulations for your new ranking. When Hero? LOL

Did you know that knowledge is actually something infinite? You may not have enough time to learn it. You can exploit many things depending on what you are interested in, say bitcoin.

I'd also probably say the same thing ^{[achieving Legendary status isn't the end of the forum journey],} it's just the highest rank to differentiate forum member rankings. At this point I'd also like to ask the OP, have the responses you've received so far been satisfactory?

Well, don't be conclusive on except you run an anonymous poll on that. It's different strokes for different folks, that's what I can say. I bet you, there are legendary members who are in the race for merit and see it as something abnormal if they don't earn weekly. My position on merit has perpetually remained that it's a subjective assessment. Pointedly, I'm not in anyway against anyone who sees their earning it as a measurement of their contribution or creativity but they should realize that those who don't earn as much as they earn aren't in anyway below their perceived performance.

Of course, I have to tell the truth about this as I have been experiencing it for years. At the time the merit system was introduced, I didn't have much activity to rank higher than Full Member, it kept me stuck at Full Member rank for a few years before I finally got enough merit to become Sr in recent weeks.

I couldn't expect a miracle to come to make my rank Legendary after the merit system was introduced in 2018. So in the end I realized that only with quality posts can I achieve a higher rank either fast or very slowly. Since I don't flash then I think my speed might be very slow compared to you and many other users. Reaching Legendary rank is not the end, knowledge must keep flowing and I believe every Legendary also needs to learn something new and about something to evolve.

I will not argue about this assumption because in fact it is true.

Not all Legendary are knowledgeable, you may have noticed that Legendary rank can be achieved very easily when one of the conditions is met ^{[activity between 775 -1030].} In the past, even shit-posters could easily reach Legendary if they had enough activity. But since merit system was introduced, then I believe things have changed so this Legendary rank can only be achieved by actively posting something quality. One might be able to achieve enough activity for the Legendary requirement, but if they didn't get 1000 merit then their rank would be stuck.

Take a look at this fact, some of the users below have a higher number of posts and activity than me, but because they don't care about anything but money, their rank are stuck. Had the merit system not been introduced, then they might have been at Hero - Legendary rank because of their activity.

You can't expect every post made by Legendary to be quality content. Basically the quality of the content is very subjective and in the end other users' assessment of your content is very different. You also can't say that all inappropriate posts are ineligible content, that mindset shouldn't be true because every user has their own way of distributing merit. That is, if one of your posts gets the merit source's attention and distributes your post with 50 merit, then you cannot expect the other 109 merit source to also send you merit on the same post. It proves that each of them has their own standard in distributing merit.

Not all Legendary cared about merit, they never felt challenged to earn more merit although merit races were of course very attractive to some Legendary. I'm challenged to get merit, that's true but I want to return it to the community so that this system is really useful for others.

Not really. There are many Legendary who don't have regular activity to post every day. They can be active without posting anything so the merit they get is not much, then in this case would you also think they are a traded account?

There are many high rank members who post regular irrespective of their current rank. Even in legendary rank, there are so many members but in your mind there will be few only who post regular and post helpful content for other members. They are not chasing merits. In fact, even if some member is chasing merits, it is not bad , if he is following the forum rules. Some of the signature campaigns require merit to be earned every week to remain in the campaign. That is also a good challenge for legendary members. It will help to distinguish between real legendary members and bought accounts.

from this table --> https://bpip.org/Report?r=mostmerit. we can see that there are many accounts that earn more than 1000 merits (requirements to become legendary) but they don't stop contributing to the forum. they got it because they really have quality posts and also great minds.
in conclusion: achieving a legendary is the final achievement of an account set in this forum (rules set and recognized by all members and founders of this forum) but that's not the end to continuing to contribute to the forum.

They all are senior members. Where did you see Legendary? Maybe they have enough activities to get Legendary rank by now unless theymos introduced merit system. But yeah, there may have some Legendary members who may not have enough knowledge about bitcoin or even about the forum itself lol.

What I know from this forum is that Legendary is the highest rank and being the last achievement that one wants.

There's no need to be afraid to say that some Legendary rank accounts don't have any knowledge on the forums.
@BITCOIN4X has featured several accounts with Legendary ratings which are simply not worthy.

It is very clear that if their brains were sold they would be very expensive because they were never used.

It's possible when the legendary account changes hands because it's found a lot and it's not forbidden to trade accounts.
Why should? even when it comes to fixing about posts from Legendary giving wrong info it should still be done.

But, include data on how many Legendary members who participated in the signature campaign no longer or rarely get merit while those who still get merit will make your statement not just a personal opinion and get better

Legendary is the last Rank in the forum but it is not the end of the user in the forum and it is not the end of the user to earn merits, from the merit dashboard I came to understand that merit earning is limited. Though I was not here was merit system had not been introduced and from the small knowledge or a glance of information gotten from somewhere but forgotten as of then bounty hunters were more and the forum was hot like fire whereby banning and deleting was talk of the day. So when the merit system was introduced most of those users at that time were giving the opportunities to rank up by theymos. Those who could not express themselves very well were having the same grace to rank so coming to this dispensation of knowledge. Those who were bounty hunter (shitposters) become redundant and those who were in main forum boards to contribute to knowledge enjoy the forum now. Yes not every legendary ranks can contribute to knowledge but I believe all receive merits from one board to another. Some receive their merits from their local boards.

I don't understand what kind of responsibility you mean, but I think it's definitely about a quality post that illustrates that knowledge really equals rank. Quality posting isn't just about Legendary, it should be a habit of every rank user. But you can expect some things from Legendary like better knowledge than most beginners.

But you shouldn't generalize all Legendary are knowledgeable about all the issues that users face on bitcointalk. Many of the Legendary don't understand the technical side of bitcoin but they are bitcoin users who are used to talking about it on various occasions.

I don't think that's true, but the average user who cares about merit and rank systems will dream of this highest rank. If you frequent WO threads to post or just read, then you will surely lose a lot of users there don't care about this highest rank. They only focus on the price and future potential of bitcoin rather than on meta or anything else.

The Legendary Ranks had greater responsibilities than Jr. Member or rank above. Knowledge of the forums is more controlled by users who managed to rise to Legendary rank after the Merit system was introduced, they had to work hard to get some Merits until they reached the maximum amount for Up Rank. Unlike users who rank up to Legendary before we know Merit, they can Rank Up automatically when the amount of activity is sufficient.
Being in the Legendary rank is the dream of all forum users, anyone will try to reach the highest rank with maximum effort by improving the quality of their posts. True, Legendary is not an ending. There are still responsibilities that must be carried out on the forum by making contributions that can be taken advantage of for users who have just joined here.

I understood that low quality post or spamming that happened somewhere 2018 was a major reason some old users left the forum. I read it somewhere outside and inside the forum. That made me know that it was so bad then. Thank theymos for the merit system and signature campaign, who knows there might not be any old user here today.
Some left due to bruised ego and gross misunderstanding, but as you rightly noted, those early adopters of bitcoin who might have turned billionaires has no reason to remain here except for passion.


Anyone that has quality must surely produce quality at anytime, even in slumber. It is not something anyone will decide on when to produce quality and when to do otherwise.  Then I understand that old users also care most about quality. That is the spirit.

Do we still have many consumers holding big amounts of BTC at the present price? I bet you that no one, if anyone, will send such a large amount of BTC to contribute to the forum right now. Bitcoin has surpassed people's expectations of what it would be in the last ten years. With what has occurred and what is to come, they'd rather wait for bitcoin's price to rise above its current level than use it for donations now. It now just takes a selfless heart to give out such a large sum.

This will be a difficult thing to do now. With the knowledge of what bitcoin is today and what it is going to be later, it will be hard for anyone to give out even 1btc to a forum like some of you early members did. Bitcoin was worthless then and that was why it was easy to do. At $18,000 per a bitcoin, I do not think anyone can give out that 10btc.


I understand you but the first user could still not have been a Legendary member by now because there is no guarantee that at 770 activities he would be ranked up as legendary. 1,000 is a sure number but not 770.

I never thought of it this way. I never browsed the bounty/airdrop section and was completely ignorant of the spam that's posted there. In reality, before the introduction of the merit system, you simply had to be active enough to earn potential activity points and post in order to rank up. While the required activity is still a lot, it's something completely doable for all these kinds of spammers. The altcoin section is filled with them due to bounty sections. I was unaware of what was going on there.

Putting a stop to this spam was vital and the introduction of further requirements in order to rank up was necessary. Since I was here before its introduction, it's safe to claim that spam has been severely reduced nowadays.

It doesn't really make sense for a Legendary member who in 2017 and 2021 has managed to become a billionaire because of his investment would happily spend a lot of time replying to spammers here. They wouldn't because honestly now they would really appreciate the time to enjoy life in all its luxuries. They can stay here for any number of reasons, but I'm sure it's not for something pointless.

Reaching Legendary during the merit system is something that makes me feel satisfied and I am grateful that I succeeded, but the feeling will be very different from those who were already Legendary before the merit system. But if those users are contributors, then I believe the rewards they get today are much higher than their activity. Legendary is not the end, it's just the highest rank and every one of them should still care about post quality if they don't want to be called spammer or shitposter.

That is it and in same vain, legendary members contributing to the forum and answering newbie questions is not also obligatory as opposed to what Op thinks. Those regular names we see here daily and weekly are passionate about the forum.  It is not easy for some people who were here since 2013, 2014 or even earlier to still remain active. Most of the people who started earlier are no longer here.


I so much believe that if there is a need for such donations again, there are people in this forum who could still donate 50btc. But the question would be if the donation would worth it.

Had the merit system not been introduced by theymos, then I'm sure many users like this would be Legendary by now.
1. https://bitcointalksearch.org/user/cryptoworldwide-979022
2. https://bitcointalksearch.org/user/maykl-989138
3. https://bitcointalksearch.org/user/lastkiss-408030

Check their profile and post history as 89%-93% of their activity is just social media reports. So really, Legendary rank was just a rank that was still easily attainable before the merit system was introduced, but after the merit system was introduced then I believe that users who reach Legendary rank are people with various knowledge.

Honestly, legendary rank doesn't really mean that someone is smarter or has more knowledge or experience in crypto than someone who just joined this forum.
It just means that he joined the forum a little earlier and that's all.
I have personally seen that there are new members who are engaged in crypto business and have much more knowledge and experience than the old, legendary members of this forum.
OP, I think that on this forum you really shouldn't worry about titles or ranks, but you should look at the contribution of each individual member to the forum.

Yes, you cannot rank up further if you have a legendary rank, no matter whether you were a legendary before or got legendary after the merit system was introduced.
However, if you are a person who wants to join signature campaigns, then you will continuously look for merits as most signatures will require you to get a certain number of merits within 120 days and won't count your old merits.

It is no longer possible to get the VIP rank here, except Theymos changes the metric to earn that position, or you get it for free (you have to be close to superhuman to do that though), and let's face fact, even the forum admins know that:
With the present value of bitcoin and the future value being something bitcoiners feel will be beyond our imagination, even if donations were still collected, i don't think anyone will donate 50 or 10 BTC to the forum, they will surely hold it and contribute to the forum in other ways than donating.

Definitely not all the legendary accounts are Gandalfs. You shouldn't be afraid of anyone in the forum anyway. If you think something is right or wrong, then just say it. The forum protects the freedom of speech very well. You will get ignored probably but nobody will put a flag on you or give you a negative trust just because you spoke your mind. (That's it unless it is not some weird shit like murdering people, CP or selling drugs you get the idea)

We also have to factor in a reality that some times meriting a post doesn't denote quality but the likeability of the person meriting it. It could be that the post made them laugh or something else that's not even based on constructive analysis. I'm one of those who believe merit is subjective.

About OP's accusation, I think it's unfounded as they didn't have any data to back it up. Besides, now I guess the OP would've been pointed in the right now by several eye opening responses from other members.

Is it even possible to attain "Donator" or "VIP" status anymore?

According to https://bitcointalk.org/donate.html, donations are no longer accepted.

While the program was active, it looks like 153 people donated a total of 3,050BTC (38 x 50BTC + 115 x 10BTC) which at the time amounted to less than $70,000 (according to the previous link).

So, the average "Donator" contribution was ~$230 and the average "VIP" contribution was ~$1,150? I'm not sure why, but I imagined it would have been more than that. I wonder how many modern members would contribute (if needed) at those price points?

Anyway, we should all be grateful to past donators for chipping in when the forum needed it. There have been two occasions (that I could find) where these statuses have been handed out for free:

I haven't reached Legendary yet, but almost, because I am Hero and I have enough merits to reach the next level. What can happen is that the lower ranked members, if they write in a decent way, the fellow forum members help them to rank up by giving them a bunch of merits all at once. That happened to me several times, even when I was a few short of 1,000, which is the merit requirement for Legendary. From then on, nobody will "help" you, and it's logical, now you have to help those who still have ranks to climb.

But other than that, it is clear that as has been amply shown in this thread, the Legendarys receive the most merit.

Seriously?? Wait a second, is you a source? Cus I thought you HODL Smerit for your meriting topics on B/H?

OG Nasty, that's an altruistic measure.🤷
You made a donation of 10 btc back then , that's cool. I know you wanna feel like a demi-god for that?  😂 Yeah it's worth it after all.  _{like,I'm actually laughing rn}

But the big question shouldn't be how rich anyone is -- cus you're not in people's wallet and giving is not by how much anyone has-- it should be' : how WILLING is anyone planning to donate these amount? Just as you willfully did?

You're cool dude, alot of OPs in here are billionaires ^{believe it if you want} but they won't dare touch their wallets to support anything. That being said, are you saying that the DONATORS be placed as the highest rank? ☺️

Cheers
Sandra 👩‍🦱

I don't feel obligated as a merit source to distribute all of my merit every month.  Some months I'm busier than others.  When I do have free time I try to reward merit, or when I see a post I think deserves it I'll click the button.  You are right about it being free work though.  The biggest reason I do it is because I like making people happy and being a contributor.  Handing out merit is a simple and easy way to do both. 

I always considered VIP to be the highest rank here.  We should all strive to reach that someday.  I guess my question is, if you got rich in Bitcoin, how rich would you have to be to donate 50 BTC here, or even 10 BTC to become a Donator? 

Of course you are right, the available data proves your argument about Legendary members. Legendary is the user who gets the most merit either in a monthly or yearly period. I checked the data through the merit dashboard, it's undeniable.

Applying to be a merit source is a desire to contribute to the users in this forum, but I don't think merit source is a obligatory type of work where they have to spend all their merit every month. They can stop doing it for some time, it's just free work. True, some people don't care about the merit system, some don't care about rankings either. That should be normal for this forum.

This is not correct and can only be correct when you back it with data or evidence. All the merit data I have seen in the forum points that legendary members recieve more merits than lower ranked members.


Not all legendary members has answer to newbie questions, even if they have not all are ready to share solution. Many people have other things doing apart from being in the forum and the lil time they will have for forum may not permit them to tour the whole forum providing answer to questions.


Apart from some users getting the legendary rank by merit airdrop. Most of the legendary accounts you see today are controlled by lower ranked members. These accounts have changed hands over time and you can't guess the knowledge of the person using the account.

Many people don't care about the rank, many people don't care about anything in live maybe save money.
You can notice that many people are applying to be merit sources while some who are merit sources don't care to distribute.
No strong feelings, here is just a discussion forum.

Can you get the data of how many legendary members were active this year and haven't got any merits? I think there were not only 420 high-ranking members in the forum so what happens to the rest of the accounts? They are stolen accounts of the ownership of those accounts been changed?

Accounts that got merits in airdropped and inactive for a long time should erase their merits. Many of those accounts end up being in the account seller's hands.

Good, so now have you come to a conclusion?

If you find them doing it then you can conclude that it's a bad post or something that doesn't make sense, then I agree that the post should be reported to moderator.

I just know that not all Legendary members are very knowledgeable user who understand much about bitcoin or forum rules well. Some Legendary were obtained before the merit system was introduced, they are not all the best posters who made major contributions to previous forum to date. So I don't think all Legendary are ready to be called quality posters because not all of them are supported by knowledge, one of them is technical knowledge in my opinion.

If we turn the table around, I can say, "the same way many lower rank  members do not receive more merits than the legendary members".
Atleast, I know may legendary accounts that get far more merit than any lower rank account - and with this, I will like you to know that earning merits has absolutely nothing to do with what rank a user is, but it has all to do with how knowledgeable a user is.

Legendaries that earn more merits earn it because they are giving out something useful to the forum, and likewise, lower ranks that earn more merits earn it for the same reason as the legendaries - knowledge.

A "yes" with a straight face.
The rank "Legendary", to the lower ranks on this forum represent "knowledge", if you permit me to liken this forum to a university, I did say that the legendaries are the professors.
But unfortunately, the rank "Legendary" in this current time does not truly represent "knowledge", because like NeuroticFish said in his/her post you quoted, not all legendary members active now attained that rank through merits, some of them were already legendary members before the merit system was introduced, and like a king that is already sitting on the throne can't be easily dethroned or removed, they were allow to keep the rank, but the merits only went to those legendary members that truely deserve the rank due to their level of knowledge.

So to put it clear, I would say that one of the ways to differenciate or know true legendary members is to look at their post history and merit score and history, this is the easiest way to know those who truely deserve the rank and those who are keeping the rank for old user sake.

Can't disagree here. I have seen some members who were very active before they got enough merit to reach Legendary. Here "active" means they used to create guidelines, hunt scam and report them, create informational threads for newbies etc. But when they reached Legendary, they stopped creating new guidelines, informational threads or hunting scam. I'm not saying these are their duty to do. Of course they are not liable to do so but this proves one thing- they are here for signature campaign only. Otherwise, they would still be creating helpful guidelines as some of the Legends still do.

Legendary rank is the highest rank that anyone can reach in bitcointalk as of now but I don't think merits were distributed less for the one who reached legendary rank because if you look at the highest earned merit profile then its legendary if I am not wrong. But in general merit sources may encourage more new members so the quality will increase in the discussion and that is why actually the forum was created for.

Well, Maybe he didn't check the data. But, Maybe he noticed some specific signature participants. 1xCrap is one of them. Most of their Legendaries are bullshit, and they don't even know what they are posting. Most of them are sold or hacked accounts. Stake.com signature campaign participants took 2nd Place. I visit https://loyce.club/active/ every other day to see if there are any spammers around. Most of the time, I see some Legendary members (who wore stake signatures) making 10-20 posts per day, and 90% of them are on gambling boards. Their primary focus is making money. If you check their profile, Most of them could not earn more than 20 merits in the last 120 days. I guess OP was thinking the same as mine. That doesn't mean all legendaries are the same.

That's why sometimes a no-minimum posting requirement on a campaign can be a good thing to consider, but you can't stop someone from achieving a max post requirement. I don't think reaching the max post count is against forum rules, but when the quality is low or maybe very bad then it should definitely be reported.

But your discussion is now biased towards other things which may no longer be the main purpose for which you created this thread. You started talking about campaign participants who don't care about post quality but they rank high, so let's hear my suggestion: Report spam posts or low quality posts to the moderators, it can solve all your confusion.

Not really.
Legendary members can also be spammers, trolls, and even scammers, like any other member ranks.
We all know the fact that bitcointalk forum accounts can be sold and purchased, so you can never be 100% certain if account didn't change hands.
Reaching Legendary rank is not ''the end'', you can still become DT Default Trust member, some people even became moderators, and you can always contribute forum with reporting spam.
There is no rank above Legendary for now, but I know some excellent member that are not highest rank and they still write great posts and make great forum contributions.

Some Legendary members are classic shitposters who reached that rank in the system without merits, and some do not have paid signatures and are not very active on the forum. Therefore, it is easy to conclude that we can classify them into several categories, and those who are the most active, certainly according to the data already presented, are not those who have not been awarded with enough merits.


This forum is still (mostly) visited by people who have lives in the real world, and it is foolish to expect that everyone can be active all the time. Maybe you will understand some things if you ever get to the stage where you can say that you have been active on the forum for at least 5+ years and regardless of ranks, merits and signature campaigns, you will be able to be active every day.


Value to be Legendary? The members you are talking about never cared about the forum or the rank, but only about the profit they can make. It is true that reaching the Legendary rank in the new system has a much greater weight and is therefore more valued, and those who managed to collect 1000 merits in an honest way in that system proved that airdropped merits on them are not an unfair reward for the time they spent on the forum years before that.

I understand why theymos is being quiet about addressing these questions. It's never going to stop. If theymos were to add one more rank for let's say +5.000 merits, someone would come along and say what about those who have 10.000 merits? Can't they be in their own club? And what about when someone reaches 50 or 100k merits, can we do something special for them now? 

I believe legendary rank members are receiving more merits on the forum due to their quality posts they made on the forum and which is why they have attained to the highest rank on the forum.Those who have registered before the merit system implementation were airdrop certain merits according to their rank at that time and still there are legendary who are stuck at 1000 airdrop merits because they didn't contribute anything useful to the forum so they don't get anything in return.

But if you see the above charts then you would find lot of merits distribution on the forum and legendary rank is always the first one to get more merits as they have more knowledge and it's required for merit distribution.

There have been some discussion to add some more rank or distinguish between legendary who have attained more merits but still there is only legendary rank to the top on the forum at this time.The system has helped to reduce spam to some extent as they cannot rank up to high rank if they don't post quality stuff.

In terms of ranking up, Legendary is currently the maximum you can be here. When you achieve that rank, one of two things can happen:

1. You become content with it and the quality of your contributions decreases because you know there is nothing higher/better.
2. You don't let the rank affect what you do on the forum and you continue with your quality contributions.

Since you mentioned signature campaigns, campaign managers will check the post quality of applicants. Low quality posting won't land you a place in a good campaign no matter your rank. Your chance of being accepted is greater if you are of a lower rank with many merits than a legendary with just a couple of them. Not that long ago, ChipMixer accepted a member who couldn't even wear the signature because his rank didn't allow it yet. He still got accepted despite dozens of Legendary members applying for a spot. 

Merits and rank are not always a sign of superior knowledge. And if Legendary accounts didn't continue receiving merits, you wouldn't see people with 2k, 3k 5k, or 10k merits to their names.   

Just a minor addition from the Merit perspective:

If we go to the Rankings Tab on the Merit Dashboard (where I’ve added the current Rank), we can see on the right hand side those that have received most Merits:
https://public.tableau.com/app/profile/ddmrddmr/viz/BitcointalkMeritDashboard/Rankings

If we then delimit the timeframe to say 2022, the top 100 Merit Receivers correspond to the following Rank distribution:


If we go for the top 200 Merit Receivers we get:

And if we go for the top 500 Merit Receivers we get:

Note: Rank represents the current Rank, not the Rank at the time of receiving Merits.

In light of the above, it would seem that a fair share Legendary accounts have the least difficulty in earning largish amounts of merits individually. This denotes, to the least, that those aggregated in the above stats are active and manage to make some decent content.

What's the value of being Legendary exactly? It only shows you've probably made an effort to reach a particular rank. To acknowledge the contribution of a user, you just look up their earned merits. If most are airdropped, make your own conclusion.

Absolutely. Ranks don't grant knowledge. Earned merits (hopefully) do, and it depends on which sub-boards they're earned.

I didn't come to a conclusion yet, I just come up with this out of curiosity. Thanks for providing this useful data, my curiosity is now answered.








The replies i have gotten so far have changed my initial thoughts. It is true that some people post to maximize their earnings. i was only expecting more from high-ranked members which shouldn't be so, everyone is good in different aspects of the forum and can contribute to the forum irrespective of rank or merits earned.

I beg to differ on this your opinion. From my little observation since I joined the forum, I noticed that more merits circulate between legendary rank members than the rest of the ranks. Was even thinking of coming up with a topic "why do legendaries circulate merits within themselves" but after coming across some thread, especially just like the one from reply above me, I don't see it necessary again.

There was one interesting topic, here on the meta.

Here Is One Reason Why Legendary Members Get So Many Merits

She completely refutes what you said. I think you will change your mind about legendary accounts getting less merit. Also, take note that beginners who are just trying to get on their feet don't always pretend to be who they are. A lot of "manuals" created by beginners are subsequently challenged by more senior ranks. What does it say? Don't try to be cooler than you are. I see that legends get merits easily; they are natural. In addition, it is possible that they do not go in cycles for merits; the latter comes to them easily. 
If you just live on the forum and slowly increase your rank, it will come to you as quickly as possible. 
"Any action gives rise to a reaction." Just let go of your observation of who and how many merits are received.

As others have already suggested, OP's statement isn't true. I've noticed that legendary members still acquire a ton of merit, despite not practically needing it in order to rank up, but because they're worthy members of this community. I think there's even a thread here showing how merit has been distributed.

Although it may suck for newcomers, I didn't find it too hard to rank up. I was here before the introduction of the merit system and had managed to rank up to Sr Member. In approximately 2017 or 2018, the merit system was introduced. I a little after Bitcoin's crash, which took away all my interest in Bitcoin. I quit shortly after, not because of the merit system, but because I completely lost my faith in Bitcoin. Signature campaigns were much more popular back then and finding one wouldn't be that much of a hassle, but most of them were paying in terms of BTC and not USD. Thus, the rewards were minimal due to Bitcoin's value. At least in the campaigns I participated in.

I returned in early 2021, during the Covid-19 quarantine and after Bitcoin had skyrocketed once again. I didn't have any merit except the 250 I was distributed due to being a Sr Member. Within approximately 1.5 years, I earned more than 250 merits without acknowledging too much of Bitcoin's technicalities in order to further assist the community. I didn't have too much available time between university and a full-time job, but I managed to rank up by trying to make worthwhile discussions and posts and being patient enough.

You shouldn't post solely for the merits in the first place. Merits should just be the cherry on top due to the quality of your posts, not necessarily the goal.

Also, while I really don't need merits per se, I'd like to maintain my fairly decent Activity:Merit ratio.

What you're saying is undeniable and that's what we see a lot of but regarding Merits then I think that a good Legendary rank that is not a Merit Sourch will still NEED Merits. So making quality posts is still a must if you want to get Merits.

why do they (Legend) need Merit?
because they must have a limit of sMerit that can be distributed. While they also definitely want to help beginners or motivate beginners to make quality posts. sometimes sending Merit makes the beginner more motivated to make his writing better.

the contributions of the legends are indispensable. Even I saw many useful threads written by Legendaries.
and feel free to give them Merit. because They also need Merit to be sent back to the members under them they want to encourage so they can be more excited in this forum.

I also don't deny that there are some Legendary members who only make posts to fulfill their obligations in the signature Campaign they participate in. but that's their right. and I hope that if one day we become Legendary, then we should continue to be useful to the people in this forum.

Don't care about Rank, if the member makes a post that is useful and deserves Merit then just give it, no matter what the Rank.

because even Legendary Ranks (who are not Merit Sourch) need Merit so that they can contribute to meriting the Members with Ranks below them as well.

Even a Merit Sourch deserves a Merit if they make a post that is useful and deserves an award. because that's one of the Merit Functions in my mind.

but it's up to everyone to make a post useful or not and it doesn't matter what rank it is.

Yeah, the legendary rank is the last formal rank. The rest are being appointed sequentially or based on the forum's criterion.

No,Not all legendary members are knowledgeable. I know a handful of them that can't even express themselves or proof a point on a thread. They'll sometimes-- just to increase post-count-- make an unleveled point or some unnecessary propaganda which, in turn becomes a nuisance.

I was afraid too just like you said but , I knew I had to keep it together so I went ahead till I realised most newbies are gonna make good LEGENDS someday.
I don't wanna say anything about the merit system cus almost everyone is doing that and I feel you understand enough.

Sandra👩‍🦱

Ranks below Legendary members must post higher standards for merit. Because the better posts they can earn a merit as a gift. So that he is a little more interested in posting later, we should support younger users and bring them up. Because there are many legends among them who we need to know through the post. We must select the one whose post is the best, a legend person.

Legendary it's not the rank of knowledge, but the ranking on the forum. anyone can be a legendary member even without spectacular knowledge or knowledge from another domain. does it have to be crypto?
It is also possible to be Legendary from scratch with less Bitcoin knowledge, even with the current merit system (without airdropped merits). Such users exist.

if you perform in a good manner, there is no reason to be afraid of talking to Legendary members.

I for one do not see a reason to be particularly curious on how member's of a certain rank act or behave on the forum, that is too much of a chore imo. I'd rather say each user should contribue their own quota towards ensuring the forum is a decent enough place to communicate in, and thus if you find a shit post (from any rank/user) you report them, and you also make sure you aren't a shit poster yourself= great forum experience.

About this, I think Imamusma has answered you.

Regarding ranks and merit, only members below Legendary would still need merit to rank up where the required requirement was up to 1000. For the rest, you'll probably know that every merit they get is an award they receive for contribution and the quality of their useful posts. But I think you already understand that.

Some Legendary might care about the amount of merit they get, it's some kind of race or just fun. But honestly, I don't think they will post for merit even though some of them want to get it ^{[non-merit source]} to distribute to other users. However, they also need to maintain the quality of their posts even if they've rank up to Legendary. I've reported a lot of bad quality Legendary posts, that means even Legendary should still care about post quality.

Yes, you will probably find plenty of evidence if you want to browse the forum more often.

OP, are you familiar with the history of the merit system, i.e., when it was implemented, what the forum was like beforehand, and why Theymos created it?  It doesn't sound like it, but you'll probably get all the answers you need from the replies here and I suggest you read them all. 

My answer to the above is that there were tons of Legendary members prior to the merit system (before Jan. 2018), and they didn't have to earn merits to get there.  Any member who was below that rank on the day Theymos came down from the mountain and bestowed upon the shitposters, account farmers, and all the assorted reprobates his tablets of merit requirement, they immediately had to earn merits in order to get there.  If you were a Hero member the day before and were right about to rank up, you then had to earn 500 merits to get to Legendary. 

Obviously it was, and still is, much worse for newcomers to the forum.  But to your second statement above, anyone can contribute whatever they want, whenever they want.  That's not exclusive to Legendary members.  Nobody needs to rank up.  That's a requirement people put on themselves, usually because they want to maximize their campaign/bounty earnings.

Not sure what sections you frequent most, but there are plenty of Legendaries posting all the time.  Sure, many of them who've been members for years are less active, but that's to be expected.  People lose interest or have less time to participate in discussion forums all the time.  And once more, it isn't necessary for anyone to post, earn merits, or anything else on bitcointalk.  Members you see posting very rapidly or very prolifically are usually shitposters trying to hit their campaign's post quota for the week.  Again, those are usually the members with the least to say.

How would you come to such a conclusion if you didn't have the data?

I have data that I can show you about how many merit a Legendary rank receives each month and how many Legendary receive it. Look at this image, and check on the DdmrDdmr tool. https://public.tableau.com/app/profile/ddmrddmr/viz/BitcointalkMeritDashboard/MeritSendersReceivers



As of September, there have been 322 Legendary who have received merit with a total of 6.814. Isn't that a pretty high number?
There are an average of 420 Legendary during this year who have earned merits every month (excluding September), but if you want to know the full data, please visit the merit dashboard.

Definitely there are some users that received the merit airdrop, some are bounty hunters and they never had more merits again. Such people are poor posters.

Some received the airdrop, sell their accounts (and probably they have many). Who supposed to be a newbie bought it. I regard those and some other bounty hunters as newbie legendaries because of their newbie kind of posting.

Yes. But those that started as newbies and were able to rank up and the the ones that were able to receive more and more merits after the merit airdrops are good posters if they continue to receive merits as long as they are actively posting on this forum and having quality contribution.

I've been noticing this particular aspect in this forum since I joined in February of this year. Many legendary members do not receive more merits than lower rank members, in my opinion. This led me to believe that they had attained the highest rank and didn't require merit to move up. They can contribute whenever they want or not, and even provide detailed answers to questions that deserve to be answered. They only comment when they feel it is necessary and add to their post count, which is especially important for signature campaigns.

What I’m curious about is that only a few legendary guys are always active in the forum and providing lasting solutions to questions posed in the forum. Others that are active only post to complete their signature posts. Does that imply that after getting to legendary rank, making posts or comments to be merited is not necessary again? Kudos to those legendary guys that are always active and provide solutions to questions even when they’re not on any campaign. They’re amongst the real heroes here.

Many people used to come here to shitpost before the merit system was implemented. Merits were airdropped for users back then; is this why they don't understand the value of being a legendary because they didn't earn it through their knowledge contributions to the forum, but rather by simply posting whatever they wanted?

I recall a thread from this forum when a newbie asked a question about this: “Is there any specific Boards for newbies to Make Posts/Comments?
This particular reply baffled me and was prompt to ask this question on this topic today.

Can we conclude that not all legendaries are knowledgeable in the forum? I myself was scared to answer or quote legendaries when I initially joined the forum.

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This post is not to disregard any legendary rank member in this forum. I only came up with this topic out of curiosity