Topic: DefaultTrust changes - page 119. (Read 85606 times)

Each user's number of "votes" in the last two criteria will be limited to floor(earned_merit / (10 or 250, depending on the criteria)).

Could you give me a few examples?

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There are rules set for this forum, as well as guidelines. If they are not followed and a new member gets negative trust for something that was against that, is it not deserved? I'm not really sure that it affects as many people as you paint it out to be.

I'd also like to request an example of organized crime that is being protected by the current trust system as that sounds like a conspiracy theory at best.

And I want to insist on my suggestion regarding trust: guest should see some trust.

With your suggestion neutrals would be seen as soft negatives so we'd need to differentiate soft-positive and soft-negative neutrals, otherwise just seeing the total amount of neutral without knowing why those were awarded wouldn't be useful at all.

What is more centralized and untouchable authority than you unilaterally getting to exclude people from default trust no matter how many others trust them?

The trust system is constantly abused for political as well as likely organized criminal purposes. It provides cover for these people to abuse honest contributing members of the forum with impunity. The question is not if they help, it is at what cost? The cost is consistently driving away MANY new users who simply didn't understand the unwritten mob rules enforced here. The thief simply spends a few bucks on a new account and is back in minutes. Legitimate users burned this way don't come back, perpetually putting us in a feedback loop of driving away the decent user base while providing cover for the cons.

Blindly following the trust is a HUGE issue. There is no way to even know if the same person is truly in control of the account any more at the end of the day, and purporting otherwise is disingenuous and only harms the people it was designed to protect most, the newer users. It is at its best little more than a notification system for people to warn others of suspect behavior, and at worst a system of protecting organized crime and mobbing cliques.

"The only people you see complain are mostly the ones that have actually been caught with doing something bad.."

That sounds like something dirty cops say when some one tries to get the cop to follow the law too... the rules are for thee and not for me.

I don't think it's quite that easy. There's plenty of people who have a bad trust rating here yet they are still able to do business without much of an issue. I'm not sure the change you are proposing would have any real effect.

As for the self proclaimed scambusters, I appreciate their work around here. It helps me when I'm managing signature campaigns and looking for users to enroll. Blindly following the DT is not really an issue IMO. The only people you see complain are mostly the ones that have actually been caught with doing something bad..

What you want is pretty numbers that everyone is taught to blindly trust. The trust rating should be a QUICK REFERENCE at most, not a rule by which to judge some one trustworthy.

Nothing stopping everyone from leaving neutrals or making scam accusation posts. Again, if you are teaching users to due SIMPLE due diligence (like reading a trust rating page), this is not an issue. What you want is pretty numbers that everyone is taught to blindly trust. The trust rating should be a QUICK REFERENCE at most, not a rule by which to judge some one trustworthy. At the end of the day the trust becomes BENEFICIAL for thieves if the standard is the trust rating should just be followed blindly. This way they can PERPETUALLY just buy burner accounts and no one ever gives it a second thought. IMO the only reason this wasn't done long ago is complaints from obsessive self proclaimed scambusters who have no other way to raise their public image here than to search for people to harass to give the impression they are fighting fraud. THIS is the primary problem of the trust system and THIS is what needs to end.

I don't see which part of your post(s) answers my question so I'm gonna have to guess. The signed agreement idea? It seems to ensure that a scammy trade gets max one neg so a crafty scammer can probably scam quite a few newbies before getting significant negative feedback. Or the scammer can coerce their victim to opt out. So who's going to enforce all that and how?

While we are implementing changes to the trust system can we give neutral feedbacks a visiblilty with a counter alongside negative and positive in the trust line. I say this as I think the trust system is going to have a larger reach and more users feedback may become visible to others.


I think this would encourage a better range of feedbacks being left throughout the forum. This way when someone does something you disagree with or feel should be noted about that user you dont have  to leave a negative.. This way we dont get stuck leaving red tags for personal or opinion matters, and can save them for scams or scammy behaviour.

Obviously there won't be any hard and fast rules, but by making neutral visible alongside the others people may appreciate having a third option with the same visibility.

And I want to insist on my suggestion regarding trust: guest should see some trust. Default trust would make sense but any trust. Non registered users are still being scammed by known scammers because they don't see the tags.

Let me know when you read the post.

The same way it is enforced now, only with less steps. The community, only we have a clear set of rules we all agree to follow as opposed to a murky equation with ambiguous terms and tons of exceptions.

I don't think that amount-risked should have any weight towards the Trust-Value. For exactly the reasons you mention. I understand the intention behind it, but I very rarely see it being used for it's intended purpose and see it being abused much more often. In addition to that, the amounts required to have any weight are unlikely be thresholds that are hit, so that increases the likelihood that it will be abused more than used. Am I missing something or is that more of a liability than an asset?

Using amount risked in any calculation does not work for several reasons:

Who's going to enforce those principles and how?

If you want to fix the trust system we need 2 tiers of trust. One for trade EXCLUSIVELY where a loss is incurred and can be documented in some way. The other for peoples opinions and feelings about everything else. Trade trust would be calculated into the average, and the other trust would not, simply amounting to a public notice.

The primary issue with the trust system is it is used as a political weapon to not only punish people for speaking out about bad behavior, it allows those same people punishing people for speaking out to destroy anyone lower than them for doing so. This is difficult to do if the trust is restricted to trade. People can retaliate this way all day with meaningless gripe trust and not affect their overall rating calculation. Anyone they trade with who is overzealous with a rating automatically has the same opportunity to leave their own negative rating that is calculated.

You could even potentially automate this to an extent by having an internal forum version of signing an agreement, enabling both to leave a rating at their will. IE I agree to enter into a trade with Bob, Bob and I both click a button confirming we are engaging in a transaction, opening the possibility of a weighted rating to be left. In this way the only weighted ratings left are from those with direct engagement, and not as a political tool by 3rd parties.