Topic: Can we have a true discussion without the sig tail wailing? (Read 481 times)

I couldn't agree any less with you and there are boards and thread where signature posts aren't counted and I'm sure every discussion over there should be a serious one.
And one reason people troop into the forum is the  value they get from here.
Rather than complaining over post quality, why not take some time to access these posts and report them by so doing, you're helping keeping the community clean.

Sure. we can do that.
There is board in forum called Serious discussion that doesn't allow signature advertisement, and for even more serious discussion without any kind of advertising or junk posts there is Ivory Tower sub-board.
Second option you have is to create self-moderated topic, you are moderator and you can allow only discussion without advertisement, deleting anything you consider spam.
You can also have a discussion in Off-topic section, but there are other type of problems in that board.

Let me get this straight, you are bothered by people who wear signatures and their motivations for posting on Bitcointalk? At the same time, a third of your forum posts were written in the Micro Earnings forum probably finding alternative ways to earn some sats. Not only that, but your second favorite board is the Bitcoin Discussion, notoriously known for spam. You tried to get into a signature campaign, it didn't work, so you are now taking what you can and trying to destroy that which didn't work for you for others. Nice!

I don't remember ever seeing you post in technical discussions or anywhere where real quality is shared. Think about it this way.
Tomorrow, you mess something up and can't recover your bitcoin. You create a thread in the technical subs hoping someone can help. Who do you think will have the knowledge and patience to help you, eh? Whose advice will help you regain access to your coins? Let me help you, 9/10 of the best advice will have signatures under their names. 6 /10 of those will wear a ChipMixer signature. Those are the people who will help you and teach you when you need help.

The problem is not the signature. Filter out the information you don't like. If someone is spamming, report their posts. If you don't like how someone is posting, ignore that user.   

Without signature campaign, I think this forum will actually shrink the number of active users.
If signature campaigns are disabled or banned, I really don't know how contributors will benefit from their contributions.

I know they don't expect to be paid for their contribution, but signature campaign hopefully keep them motivated in the forum. So the signature campaign has something quite positive for both the forum and the users, and the spam issue just needs to be reported and handled.

Yeah, those things appear every now but at least we see more realistic discussions there

Yes mate there is some social media platform such as reddit, twitter, telegram and etc. You could discuss there without any post incentive or annoying signature. But we cant fan out it on forum cause its always here. Probably out of 10 people maybe only 99% is only one there not wearing signature and posting his opinion.

Signature campaign is here for a reason and not to sugarcoat money related. But it is one way to make the forum be more attractive place for discussion.

This isn't in anywhere close to the solution at all. How do you ascertain those who posted when they had no signature on and then a few days or weeks later they enrol in a signature campaign. We know how users' campaign logos change to the most recent once they're activated and won't show the recent past. It's the same thing that happens when they didn't have a logo on but later have one.

Sir are you not getting the right answer from all the posters that are participants in the signature campaign? One of the most important rules and guidelines laid out by the bounty manager to all the signature participants is to provide the best possible answers in all the discussions, if you are good at something then why not get paid for doing this is a good incentive for thinking of the best possible answers.
All questions are answered here in this forum, some even go to the extent of doing research to get the right answers.

 

Believe me, this will significantly reduce traffic to this site. Many people come here to learn, but what keeps most of them active in the forum is the signature paid campaign; if it stops, not only will the site lose traffic, but the casinos that mostly advertise here will also lose customers because their advertisements here increase their visibility and patronage. Whatever the reason for people joining this forum, as long as the main goal of the forum is established, they should have no problem with what is going on here in terms of forum discussions.

I use Reddit to keep up to date with things happening in btc because a lot of members post the contents of the post without needing to click on the news site because I disagree with giving news sites which are spreading fud or click baiting money. Any way the /r/Bitcoin and /r/cryptocurrency are both the same and have less quality then this forum. A lot of meme posts and a lot of people saying that they just bought their 1st btc. No real discussion happening but people know what to post to get the karma so they will continue posting the same thing over and over. This forum at least has some good discussion.

Agreed, plus the spam has been drastically reduced after the merit system implement. Anyone with a naked eye can notice the decrease in forum activity and less spams already. (especially the OP, since his account is open since 2014). I find the technical boards very informative now with full of educated replies.

And guess why such threads are made by ppl who aren't in a signature campaign ? Or maybe never get accepted in any, due to obvious reasons (in the OP's case, its a negative trust feedback given by a DT member).

I always read quotes I get, and people wearing signature comments aren't spammy as people make them out to be. Internet is huge place, you can look elsewhere if you don't like it here.

Yeah, all that echo chambering and karma farming is rampant. Classic Reddit. Wait until you come across r/cryptocurrency, the amount of shills for shitcoin X only to sing a different tune about it days later just for the MOON becomes the norm.

But let's say if it's just r/bitcoin then the posts are hardly incentivized. Let's forgo the karma thingy because that helps keep popular/ top comments where they belong. Tipping is a thing but not everyone does that so posting more doesn't guarantee one gets paid.

Back to the signature campaigns, I'm not against them. Knowing that everyone needs money, this place will be almost as dry as a Sahara desert if it does away with bounties as well. Let's be real.

Shitposters are the byproducts but that's the small price to pay to remain relevant in this kind of business model.

Shortly, no, we can't. Signature campaigns is significant part of Bitcointalk forum and it seems that theymos don't have intentions to remove it. I fully understand your concerns that with sig campaigns discussions often isn't real, people post just to get paid. It brings many spammers here, but at the same time it gives motivatiin for smartest people here to be more active - you probably noticed that most of best posters here wearing paid signatures. You been here for long, and you should remember that before merit system situation here was much worse, or I would say terrible. Now it's much better, though still far from perfect. And it can't be perfect when people have initiative to get paid for for posting.
If you can't stand these paid signatures, you always can look for alternative platforms, but I doubt that you will find something better.

Serious discussion is great place, but there isn't much activity. In past there was more action.
And there is no need to make local rules, better just make self-moderated topics. Spammers just fear to post there.

Nice catch.

Having a true discussion without the incentives that come from the signature is not a problem...

but the real issue that the forum will face to succeed is the lack of retention of users to the forum to keep these conversations going if sigs didn't exist!

By the way, If we compared BCT forum to other successful forums , there is always something that keeps users coming back for more ranging from freebies,

to the financial gain & list goes on... if nothing of this nature exists expect the place to be a white elephant and it's only the sad reality.

Besides, the sigs are not a bad development, the business gets the needed brand exposure, and users on the forum get their token of appreciation, win-win.

I still will but may be I will not have an urge to make a minimum of 25 posts. But when I will lose my interest then I will not even bother the make a single post, the same why applies when I am interested and having fun in a certain topic I will not remember how many post requirement I have.

There used to be a time when I was making over 100 posts a week without even having a signature but there were also time, I am in a signature I have a minimum weekly requirement but I have not made a single post for several months.

At the end for me my own terms matter.

Just about bitcoin?  Are you referring to any sections in particular?  You've been here longer me and it was so much worse prior to the merit system, and you're just now complaining about sig campaigns?

The latter point is absolutely true, but I very much disagree with the former one.  I think if campaigns and bounties were banned, and if there wasn't a monetary incentive to post here, sections like Bitcoin Discussion and a few others would have a lot higher signal:noise.  The shitposters wearing adverts in their signature space greatly outnumber those excellent contributors you referenced, I'm afraid.

Reddit does not have any better quality discussions and there is no incentive to post there except for collecting karma but collecting karma is enough for people to post things that they know will get them karma instead of real discussions so I think it is a problem of culture and not a problem limited to the forum.

Signature campaigns keep this forum alive as much as we might not like to admit to it doing that but it creates activity and we are very low on activity atm if people were not getting paid and not earning btc then btc would probably be less used to because a lot of signature campaign participants cannot offer their services for payment in btc but can offer advertising services by posting good posts.

Spot on! Op, you don't have the right to talk about spammy/serious discussions when you're one of the users who needs such advise. Op has no good intentions; he was disappointed that he wasn't accepted into the signatures campaign he applied for, therefore he's now promoting the anti-signature campaign agenda.

The earnings from signatures are minimal compared to what the forum gets from the enormous traffic we bring to the site on a regular basis. At the end of the day, it's a business. If you believe that the sig has no beneficial effect on the forum, you are mistaken.

Also you're not being specific here, are you saying one should post here without wearing a signature campaign code or thise that should post under the thread should be those not participating on a signature campaign, you need to get this right that making post here on the forum has it own advantages alot either being a signature campaign participants or not because we offer something that is appealing to read, learn and got informed about, not everyone posting were under a signature campaign, if you post and it's off topic the moderators delete the post, so there's no hidden agenda that people post because of their signature campaign and if it happens that way, it's part of their own benefit they gain by contributing heavily to the bitcointalk community, joining a campaign is a choice and not by force.

What he meant likely is that he doesn't want to see replies that are made just for the sake of posting, even with the signatures disabled.

Unfortunately not gonna happen because capitalism, unless he just sticks to sites like Reddit.

If you think about why the OP is annoyed by the responses of people from subscription companies, it comes to mind that he is talking about subscription spam. That is, in his opinion, about low-quality posts. But I looked at the merit count, which usually reflects the quality of the posts the OP writes.
I was surprised that he received all 50 of his merits in 2018. It is worth considering what a person wants, whose reputation is not entirely clean. I would advise the OP to start with himself if he is talking about forum changes.

It's hard to say for sure what people are thinking, but not nearly everything that campaigners spew out on forums is at least as much brand mention as their attributes.
The problem is not with the forum settings, more precisely you are judging too much from a revenue perspective regardless of the point of the discussion.

OP if you agree to what you are saying, why have you applied in a signature campaign in past.

Is it the rejection by campaign manager that caused change of heart and now you hate signature campaigns ?

Honestly I don't want to be dick, but you're also have an intention to join a signature campaign, just saying.


If you was accepted at that time and the campaign manager doesn't kick you until now, I believe this thread won't exist and you will be very proud since you've joined one of the most high paying signature campaign in this forum.

I think this is what the true discussion is, users who joining a signature campaign need to post on topic and maintain their quality, otherwise people will report their posts or get kicked by the campaign manager.

And what is wrong with members wearing signatures of services that promote Bitcoin?

You do realize that there are so many bitcoin services that have launched and thrived due to adverts and exposure in this forum, right?
Aren't you the same people who keep yearning for Bitcoin adoption?

It's a free world here, If by any chance you don't like Bitcoin paying signature campaigns in the posts and replies, then create a telegram group or discord server where you can discuss without any sigs  

If signature campaigns don't exist then it will be hard getting the whole community engaged and traffic on the site will as well reduce. Report to moderator button is open 24/7 to report suspected spamming, In as much as signature campaigns are gateways to unavoidable spam, it cannot be done without especially when the forum in question deals with an asset that has no physical representation.

Signatures do not affect the discussions about BTC and other things on the forum, as far as i have personally noticed, most of the best posters are on signature campaigns, and i learn a lot about BTC from them, why would i mind if they wear a signature or an avatar, i only care about what they post on the forum. People who don't like sig or avatars have them already disabled in their profile, and if you see spam posts report them to the moderators.

Sure, come on over and visit us at ivory tower: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?board=251.0  though you'd be forced to jump over the tower out of boredom.🤣 I will talk to you forever, just come on over, I have a cat who plays football.😉

And if you do not want to see them you can set it in your profile under look and layout not to show signatures.

But in the end signatures / tag lines / ads have been on forums forever. Some are more like here where people can pick and choose and apply, others places they are sold through the forum itself.

Not a bit deal IMO.

-Dave

Post in serious discussion where signatures are not displayed? Some people do that because they are annoyed of the signature spam. You could make a local rule where you stop people with advertising signatures from posting in the topic and then report them when they do. Those are your solutions but if you expect signature campaign participants to not spam everywhere I think you might be expecting too much from them....

Like it or not, signature campaigns is what keeps Bitcointalk afloat in terms of traffic and activity.

If you personally think that post quality is bad because of signatures, you can start a self-moderated thread and simply delete the replies that you deem useless/spammy. Alternatively, probably try the Serious Discussion[1] section(though it's a general discussion section, not necessarily a Bitcoin one).

You can also help contribute concerning post quality by reporting posts that you deem useless/spammy.

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[1] https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?board=250.0

Guess the title says it, can we have a true talk without it for the sake of it about Bitcoin? Not like you're paid to say something.