Topic: Conflict of Interest on DT1 - page 7. (Read 2732 times)

Suppose it is an allowed practice, then. It was plenty tolerated back in 2016 and earlier (AFAICT): loans could be made and liquidated more easily with account sales.

I cannot think of a good analogy but I do not believe that social changes should retroactively punish users. And this is a social (community) change of ideas rather than a rule-based one. I'm not talking about any moderator actions in my previous post, rather the thought process behind tagging account traders in current times.

Oh, sorry. You must be confused. I am talking about Red Tags, not moderation actions. Please keep discussions about moderator actions in the staff section. If you are not staff, then your post is outright dishonest.

If a certain action or business practice makes you a scammer, then the time a certain action happened does not matter. If y action makes you a scammer, then this remains true going back to 2009, and extending to infinity.

When I entered the forum, account selling was the norm. Plenty of users, DT included, were trading accounts freely. Although I can't say that the post quality was amazing back then, I can say that the quality now vs. then is much worse. With the explosion of ICO's and bounties, the forum began to quickly degrade in quality.

I can say that the situation back then was different than the current one. Just as it's not justified to try people (at a later date) after a law has been put in place, the same theory should apply here.

I don't have a specific time in which the forum shifted toward an anti-account sale community ideology, so I'll say any account sales in 2017 and later should be tagged.

---

If I have any negative feedback that tags someone who sold pre-2017, then let me know and I'll change it.


I'm not making any cases toward the "contribution" that any particular member has made to the forum. That is character evidence and should only be used in extreme cases.

Thank you.

I created this account out of fear of retribution, as many within Blazed's trust list receive a Red Tag when they speak out against anyone within his list

To the OP: Good luck trying to piss against the wind here mate 

Here is where you are wrong. theymos built the merit system so that "merit abuse" does not matter as one merit received equals roughly 0.97 merit that can be sent to sock puppets. The merit system will be unaffected by "abusers" as long as no merit source is involved.


Good, we don't have to discuss this. Now explain why you have not Red Tagged those those listed in my OP who have very clearly sold accounts in the past, including Blazed.

Just going to respond to the point regarding me.

Gotta love coming back to this. There may have been a disagreement between theymos and I regarding the merit farming tags (to which I changed some ratings) but it's a matter of perspective. Stating that any merit abuse would be a 'rounding error' is true but allowing it to pass shouldn't happen on principle, in my opinion. Might be a slippery slope fallacy, but I don't think it's good to allow that kind of scummy behavior since it begins to build the foundation of false thinking, leading to recursive scumminess.

Should I start?
The account farmers I've been tagging are more current-age than in the past. In terms of tagging the users that abuse bounty campaigns, it's simply breaking the rules. Users have no excuse. In regards to account trading, I believe that it is common knowledge (or with a little bit of thinking) that the act results in either scams (from the actual trade or post-trade via the account) or participation in a signature campaign. The former is obviously bad so we don't need to discuss this.

However, it seems that in the local sections, users believe that account trading is fine, normal and is perfectly fine because it doesn't violate the rules. Many marketplace sections have built entire communities based on account sales and I don't think it should be this way. Firstly, if users are congregating in the Local sections to trade, they may not understand English well enough to create substantial posts that would be useful in the English main sections. In that sense, the account sales may produce unwanted spam. The other problem is that this creates a culture that accepts account sales and creates justification for the act (a precedent). "It's not against the rules so it's fine" is a common point that they may bring up which falls apart when you consider that scams are also not against the rules. I don't think this is great, especially when Newbies enter Local sections as they begin to believe that account sales are normal on the forum. It also begins to morph the forum not into a hub for discussion but rather a place to nab a half dozen accounts and farm bounty campaigns. Plenty of people have PM'd me stating, "I want the red trust removed so I can participate in bounties again" (paraphrased). That's not right.

Those trust ratings are pre-DT addition. And Hhampuz was added by SaltySpitoon, not Blazed.

As for the ratings post-DT (from me to others), I have rarely given out positive trust. It should be only a few members (IIRC I was added in January) that were given trust after the addition.

If certain people are leaving Red Tags for certain business practices, but neglected to do so for Blazed, he benefits by way not avoiding the Red Tag, regardless of if these people are in DT or not. This cannot be disputed.

If you believe those listed in the OP are still selling forum accounts (you cannot dispute they traded them in the past, or attempted to do so in the case of Lauda), then the ability to Red Tag others engaged in similar business would be indisputably beneficial to those listed in the OP, and as such, Blazed may be receiving a portion of the profits. In other words, Blazed may be selling the ability to Red Tag the competition.

If you reject the above, it is very difficult to dispute that those within Blazed's trust list all have an abnormally high number of ratings from each other, so DT2 spots may be being sold, and purchased by those in a trust farming ring in an effort to make certain signature/bounty campaign managers appear more credible/trustworthy than they really are.

That isn't true, not by a long shot.  The gray area is the whole reason why scammers aren't banned and DT members have to take care of them with feedback.

I have indeed removed feedback from users when they've proven themselves to be good members of bitcointalk.  It's rare, but it's happened.  I consider people who deal in bitcointalk accounts to be guilty until they prove themselves otherwise.  My thought is that when you are buying an account, you're either going to use it for its reputation to scam, or you're going to use it for its rank to get into a campaign--probably to shitpost with.  Either use is pretty sketchy.  But people have earned positive trust and have proven themselves to NOT be shitposters eventually, and I am willing to give second chances in those instances.  
You don't understand what we're dealing with here.  My inbox is not filled with rational arguments for feedback removal, which I certainly would consider.  It is filled with stuff like the following:
Because they haven't earned my distrust.  Lauda & Yahoo62278 definitely have earned my trust, mexxer-2 much less so.  I'd probably leave mexxer-2 a negative for scamming Lutpin if I thought it would make a difference, but it wouldn't.  I'm leaving that entire matter to Lutpin and Lauda, who have already negged him and know far more about what happened or didn't happen than I do.

Perhaps I'm missing something, but what is the conflict of interest? How exactly does Blazed benefit by adding people who share trust with one another? You raise some valid points, but I don't really see what he stands to gain from this.

The ratings you describe apply primarily to scam loan requests by new users, whose purpose serves to warn against sending money to a brand new user. In the cases of a Red Tag removal, this threat no longer exists. Further, no one in this thread has a similar policy, some will actively ignore requests to remove Red Tags, and after misreading my concerns, The Pharmacist said he will keep his Red tags on indefinitely, so I don't think this is an apt comparison.

(If a brand new user asks for a loan in their very first post, a reasonable person will think this person is a scammer, once this person activity participates for a few months without any scam attempts, then it might be reasonable to say this person is no longer a scammer).

 
Negative trust actually means "You were scammed or you strongly believe that this person is a scammer", so you should be a scammer, either because you scammed someone, you tried to scam someone, or you are planning on (trying to) scam someone in the future, the fact that someone is suspicious of you doesn't cut it. Unless I am missing something, the rational behind the Red Tags by those listed in my OP is that the act of buying, selling, bidding on, inquiring on, or whatever, forum accounts makes you someone who will plan on (trying to) scam someone (to try to help someone scam someone) in the future.

If you accept the premise described above, then existing trust does not matter. You are describing an environment in which someone who steals money after building up a lot of trust is given a pass because they have existing reputation....in other words, someone who pulls a long con is given a pass because they have reputation and are allowed to continue to scam. That logic is simply irrational.

My OP is implying that Blazed is in the center of a trust farming ring that selectively Red Tags users that are not a part of the ring, including accounts controlled by those within the ring, and intended to be sold by the ring. Your argument is that Blazed's trust list is part of a good 'ole boys club, which would not be as bad, but would still not be good for the community.

Maybe there needs to be a discussion if Red Tagging is appropriate in these situations if there are many instances in which users have engaged in this business activity, but have turned out to not be a scammer. I would welcome this discussion and might give my own input.

I disagree. Would a now Staff member who sold accounts be more or less trustworthy than some random who was selling accounts? Negative trust means that you do not trust the person, not necessarily that they scammed someone.

Despite Blazed's "untrustworthy" actions (I personally believe that account sales do not warrant a negative trust), I would certainly trust him with all my coins.

This type of activity is either an indication that someone is a scammer, or it isn't. There really is not a lot of gritty area here.

Your response about being selective about who you Red Tag for dealing in forum accounts makes it sound like you don't want to debate your trust ratings on their merits, and avoid doing so by avoiding Red Tagging anyone who has a decent chance of having supporters, or anyone who has a decent chance of making a coherent argument against your Red Tag. Lets be honest, most of those that you Red Tag, especially those that you Red Tag for this reason have no one supporting them, and can probably not speak english well enough to make a coherent argument to support the Red Tag is inappropriate.

You should be willing to defend every one of the ratings you leave, because every rating you leave has the backing of your reputation. If the exact same concerns come up multiple times, you can point to a previous discussion if you wish. Ignoring concerns is not okay.

OSS is not the only person that avoided a Red Tag in that thread, and he is not the only person you skipped over (in chronological order) that posted in that thread. There were others that did not appear to have any meaningful reputation at the time.

Since you solicited the question, why have you not left Lauda, mexxer-2, or yahoo62278 a Red Tag? They all engaged in similar business activity that you are very actively Red Tagging for today, and in the case of one of them, made a post asking about the price for 10 forum accounts, which if you believe to be a serious request, would make him a very serious/major account dealer/farmer. I don't know if you have heard the expression "going after the big fish", but this means you want to go after the most serious offenders, and someone who is buying up 10 forum accounts at a time is someone who fits this description.

I don't think that's a very reasonable link to show abuse. Many DT members rarely leave feedback, or almost never. If you were to look at all the positive trust feedback given, I'm guessing that a large proportion would come from a small group of them. Doesn't mean there's anything bad with that, it's simply because some are more active than others. I took a look at the DT2 list, and there's a lot of names I haven't heard of. Blazed is a fairly new addition to DT1, and therefore his trust list would be comprised of more newer active members, while the other DT1s might have added them a few years ago and just left them.


IIRC actmyname went back and removed a bunch of his ratings after this, so that his ratings were more accurate.


Going back is somewhat unfair in my opinion, though from what I've seen, they've only tagged those who haven't contributed to the forum and those who didn't do anything better than spamming and/or account farming. I know many DT members (ie Vod) will remove their ratings depending on the severity if the user has contributed afterwards. I've sold accounts in the past, however I've stopped, and I think I've proved that I'm reasonable trustworthy.

You don't need to have a trade history nor to be a "businessman" It's how you behave in the community that matter, how you help it, how you contribute in.

It's a valid point, however, it's maybe a big message to say that it's not welcome anymore, to be sure everyone understands it (I'm not saying it's the right way)

Perhaps because he knows it won't have any effect (don't know what people see, if a DT tag another DT) His point is to tag people to clean the forum since we all know a user tagged won't come anymore since he can't cheat the forum and his/her account is useless. You can red tag members like Blazed, Ognasty, etc they will still come here... And this kind of people are real users with interest in the community, in cryptos.
The one disappearing once they get a red trust are here only for hunting the ICO, Airdrops, bounties, whatever you call it.

No the decision by Theymos doesn't prove anything. Maybe actmyname have rushed too fast by tagging people but it may be because he was motivated to contribute in the community, it may be because he was frustrated to see the mess here (like a lot of members btw)
A message from Theymos to Actmyname could have been enough to correct this behavior (maybe directives were not clear to him). Shit happens we are all humans, we learn from mistakes not really from success. But communication resolves the majority of problems

You can be DT1 or DT2 you are not forced to insert in your list each DT1 or DT2, because you are not forced to trust the user list

I removed all my negative ratings from people who posted in that particular thread that you linked to, out of respect for what Lauda and MadZ said.  I'm not going to kill the forum by doing so, and there weren't that many negs that I left there.

Regarding that one, I don't like the fact that Omegastarscream was dealing in accounts, but I do take other factors into account before leaving someone a neg for account trading--and one of the main factors is other positive feedback.  Who left it and when are also important.  OSS had pretty much proven himself to not be a scammer by the time I visited that thread, so I did not think it was appropriate to leave him a neg.  The other users didn't have those reinforcing positive feedbacks, so all I had to go by with them is the fact that they were looking to buy/sell an account.

There are going to be inconsistencies, I don't know what to tell you.  Point them out to me and eventually I'll correct them or otherwise respond to the accusations.

Probably a little bit of both.

I don't go back into old threads, looking for account buyers/seller to neg.  I think I did that in 2016 but haven't tagged someone for ancient history infractions in a while.  I could be wrong and I could have done it by mistake if a thread got bumped and I wasn't looking closely at the date, but I don't actively seek out really old account sellers & buyers to neg them.

This is especially true for those on Blazed's trust list, and you are correct 

Maybe I was not clear (or maybe you did not read very closely). There are instances in which you leave trust for behavior that took place a long time previous to the time you left the Red Tag.

There are 167 users in DT, and Blazed has 20 users on his trust list. Blazed has just under 12% of DT on his trust list, while many people have 63%-100% of their trust ratings from this group of 12% of DT.


His trade history does not exactly make him the experienced businessman that I would expect to be in DT.

You should tell that to those I mentioned in the OP. Many of them have gone back multiple years in Red Tagging users.
 
He Red Tags people involved in certain businesses, but has failed to give a Red Tag to anyone in Blazed's trust list circle. The exclusion from theymos should also speak for itself.

Ouch!!

Are we equating intelligence with being tech-savvy these days?  Because I can tell you that I'm the first to admit I'm a complete dumbass with computers--and the above is true, I don't know how to take a screenshot and make it appear in a post--but I don't think I'm an idiot.

Yes, my trust ratings remain, sometimes years after the fact.  What I've found is that a lot of the people I've tagged in 2016 wind up scamming or doing some other sort of BS, so I see absolutely no reason to remove them because they've "aged".  Most account dealers I don't trust.  I say most, because there are the extremely rare examples of members here who have dabbled in this in the past but have since proven that they're not untrustworthy scumbags.  So you will find that my hit rate isn't 100%.  The world isn't perfectly efficient, nor am I.

Blazed added me to his trust list, I think, because initially I was red-tagging shitposters and he, like myself, got sick of all the garbage posts here.  I'm actually quite surprised that he kept me on his list after the merit system was put into place and after OGNasty and Tomatocage excluded me from theirs.  I do appreciate that, Blazed.

Please note, 1) I've never scammed anyone here, though I've had the opportunity to do so, and 2) I do care about the quality of the forum, and that includes shitposting, scamming, account dealing, and merit abuse.  When I see those things, I will take the time to tag the users.  Thus Blazed has two decent reasons for having me on his trust list; the former is because I've acted trustworthy so far here, and the latter is a practical reason (if my feedback carries weight, it'll make the scammers & shitposters squeal in agony).  If anyone finds evidence that I've been dishonest, let them bring it forward, and Blazed and Hilariousandco will remove me as quick as lightning.  But the fact is that there isn't evidence of that, because I'm not a scammer,  and I haven't done anything with trust or merit that was for self-interest.

I'm not angry, though you implied that I was a dullard.  I think having a discussion like this is very healthy for the community.

I wouldn't really disagree with you there, but there aren't many shades of green trust here on bitcointalk, with darker shades for the experienced businessman.  All I can say is that I don't have a history of jerking people around with deals and have no intention of doing that.  I understand how important (and extremely fragile) reputation is in a world of irreversible money transactions. 

Mexxer-2 got negged by at least Lutpin if I'm not mistaken.  I've always had suspicions about Mexxer-2, but have kept them mostly to myself, as I have no evidence of anything.  It was strange when he and Lutpin got put on DT when they were relatively new on bitcointalk.  I don't know all the details, so I'm not slinging any mud.  The disappearance of Mexxer-2 and the negative given by Lutpin and/or Lauda with no details was strange. 

Ah, the bravery on Bitcointalk....