Topic: IS THE MERIT SYSTEM being used correctly by a small clique of individuals here (Read 1338 times)

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1SAi_b3umCcFJO2dMoLYjWCjNz1JhOLWrsRHhYQK-nb8/edit?usp=sharing

the above stats provided by r1s2g3

very interesting to see certain things there.

I would also like to see merits removed from those given by the top 300, 400, 500,1000 and merits that were given in the meta section removed just to see what the lists would look like.

It is already clear posting on the alt discussion board (main board for those arriving and discussing) is basically a waste of time if you want to receive merit.

That list does have a slight output error but just 1 position out on the left hand side list.

I think for good posts we do not need motivation. There should be a friendly crypto community, then the discussions will be interesting and then an atmosphere will emerge that will contribute to the mutual exchange of useful information.

@DdmrDdmr

I think you forgot to turn the figure into percentage (100 /150 000) *100 -> 0,067% … Arguably the best posters will at some point merit some of the other best posters, since that is what merit is about: meriting decent content, and that content is likely generated by … surprise .. the best posters.

Ah yes thanks for correcting that.
The 0.067 would at some point merit the 0.067 but  already we know that 33% of their merits are received within that group and sent could be even larger (although as you say could be smaller)
Not sure about the best posters since that is a very hard thing to determine.

For sure what is the best post to one person is not to another. You could quite possibly have a conversation with some far lower merit holders and find it was much easier to achieve a non biased logical consensus based upon observable events. One could even reason a poster that has prevented many scams is the best poster in a different way.  I have recently seen some members falling back on quoting their merit score to claim their argument held more weight. This is certainly not something I depend too heavily on. I have seen some claim it proves more worth. Again it can not be used that way imho.

A person with very low merit and indeed rank could spot clues that a project was a scam and highlight this saving investors millions upon millions of dollars and even if their post was lacking in every aspect except to provide this insight it could be reasoned it was more valuable to this community and to crypto in general than all the highest merit posters combined (excluding satoshi and a couple of others of course). Perhaps it can be used though to state you would be statistically highly probable to provide what many others consider to be a post they can agree with and consider good/worthy of merit. Perhaps I being too negative but still merit is not a complete guide to locating the best posters. For sure though if we are being sensible it would be a short cut to locating posters generally worth hearing from.

The overall merit per post on the Bitcoin Discussion I calculated back in July 2018 (a bit has rained since then though) was 0,033/post. For Altcoin Discussion it was 0,009/post. So the ratio is 3,67 times better in the Bitcoin Discussion section compared to the Altcoin Discussion. Nevertheless, the chance factor is not a random lottery equal opportunity based, since each post’s chances depend on many factors, being content one of the core ones. I think there is much more spam in the Altcoin section than the Bitcoin section, which drags the ratio down for the Altcoin section.


Yes I agree with with everything else you said in your post as it seems to make logical sense.

I agree content should certainly be one of the cores ones. To me it should be the only one really.

However, having only been to meta a few times in many years here (perhaps 4x) before this recent period in the last few days. I would estimate 99% of my total posts or greater I have made on the alt boards... since visiting meta it is much easier to give out merits to people that are very helpful and such and without intending to your given merits are soon going to a small group people.  It reminds me of the alt board a few years back but sadly here you tend to find a far far higher proportion of nitpicking ass kissing overly pc people since it is the main place to come and report perceived wrong doing in the hope of some recognition (and of course reporting of real dangerous scammers too ). Of course reporting serious wrong doing, scamming in its various guises is very much needed but the overly pc and ass kissing to perceived authority figures is spoiling it and sucks away from genuine flow of sensible conversation.  It's a shame everyone seems to have retreated here from the alt boards and not to the serious discussion board so logical reasonable threads need not get contaminated by overly pc unreasonable ass kissers.

I think you forgot to turn the figure into percentage (100 /150 000) *100 -> 0,067% … Arguably the best posters will at some point merit some of the other best posters, since that is what merit is about: meriting decent content, and that content is likely generated by … surprise .. the best posters.

The fact for me is that, for example, one can browse through posts made on Meta and feel they are kind of engaging and often well versed and intelligent, with a steady readable conversational flow. On the other hand, there are board sections where you need to swim through a cesspit of nonsensical comments, that do not really constitute an elaborate discussion, but rather a pointless set of monologues waving a signature flag as the only reason behind.

The thing is though, trying to go through the Alt sections to find meritable posts requires first a certain interest on the topic (which many may not have), and then a strong will power to go through a section which, as I’ve stated before, is not normally building up conversation, but rather spam for the sake of campaign’s needs. Conceptually, there should be some good projects there, and so some good stuff could/should be found. Nevertheless, separating the wheat from the chaff will I figure deem a monumental task.

Even so, paradoxically, Ann Altcoins is the most merited section on aggregate (11,44% or 29.891 sMerits), and Altcoin Discussion has received 4,14% of total aggregate merit (10.830 merits). For whatever obscure reason, some have made a pretty penny there with no issue on aggregate. Of course, the number of posts is massive there, so the merit/post ratio is small.

The overall merit per post on the Bitcoin Discussion I calculated back in July 2018 (a bit has rained since then though) was 0,033/post. For Altcoin Discussion it was 0,009/post. So the ratio is 3,67 times better in the Bitcoin Discussion section compared to the Altcoin Discussion. Nevertheless, the chance factor is not a random lottery equal opportunity based, since each post’s chances depend on many factors, being content one of the core ones. I think there is much more spam in the Altcoin section than the Bitcoin section, which drags the ratio down for the Altcoin section.

Top   10 ->  9,57% received merit from Top 10.
Top   20 -> 17,80% received merit from Top 20.
Top   50 -> 26,38% received merit from Top 50.
Top 100 -> 32,69% received merit from Top 100.
Top   200 ->  43,29% received merit from Top 200.
Top   500 ->  50,61% received merit from Top 500.
Top   1000 ->  56,62% received merit from Top 1000.
Top   5000 ->  69,44% received merit from Top 5000.

thanks  for these... so a bit better than I expected at 43.29% not 50% or greater but regardless still a monster proportion.

So allowing for the fact 150k members posted recently the 0.00066% of the board are getting 32.69% of merit their from the same 0.00066% of the board. I know this is irrelevant and would mean nothing but I wonder what the probability of that taking place if merit was randomly attributed between just 150k accounts ...ah if only I was a math master or even just okay at math. Well since it is irrelevant I shouldn't give it much thought.

The stat we can't (or perhaps we can but I am missing it) see is what % of merit given by out each tier is kept inside each tier this would probably be even more interesting to know. I am I correct in saying the top 10 posters could give 100% of their merit to each other and their received % from inside the top 10 could still be tiny if the tiers below gave them a far greater proportion of their merit?

So for the sake of examining circle jerking and back slapping you would really need to know the given stat more than received would you not? as I say stats are not my thing but you seem far more math minded than myself. Is it not more important to know what % they send out of their tiers compared to the % they send within their tiers that what they receive in from other tier and their own tiers?  Am i missing something with this part due to poor math ability? or is that stat already something I should be able to calculate from the provided stats?

Comparing meta board to the alt board of course is a bit of a stretch I admit. The alt board discussion is the board hit the hardest by the ico promotional wave of scammers so to try and compare the post quality is of course not really possible so to compare the merit stats is not really going to prove anything other than you will not get merit on the alt discussion board even for a great post generally because of many factors but primarily because you are going to be much harder to find by those with most merit to give.

 This is sad because most noobs will be primarily interested in alts and will be motivated to join discussions there hence already reducing greatly their chance of any merit to practically nothing. I have noticed some alt sources mention they never visit alt discussion or for some reason

Anyway I agree there are lots of reasons why you should have 0.007% of a merit per post on alt compared to 0.28% chance of merit on meta. That though is a massive difference.

Let's though compare bitcoin discussion which is more moderated and has not been crushed like the alt discussion since it is not meant to have discussion of annoying new and mostly scammy icos. So should be more comparable so pretty much what I had thought 13x more chance of merit per post. Am I interpreting that correctly?

Merit is a good addition though and I think the alt discussion board is slowing up ...so account farmers are dying back a bit.

Interesting to view the received stats you posted though for sure. Thank you for posting those.


@actmyname

I agree with what you have said to a certain degree.

Although  it is nice to take a deeper look at how things are actually taking place so far with merit.

10x the posts does not mean 10x the quality. I would rather try to find an exceptional topic in Meta bereft of spam than a decent topic in the Altcoin boards where there are not more than 3 spam posts on any given page.

From what I see, the more general a board is, the heavier spam it generates.

I’ve continued scaling the Top X Merited for the following groups:
Top   200 ->  43,29% received merit from Top 200.
Top   500 ->  50,61% received merit from Top 500.
Top   1000 ->  56,62% received merit from Top 1000.
Top   5000 ->  69,44% received merit from Top 5000.

I wouldn’t go down further than top 5000. Below this level, people start to have few sMerits really to award (5 or less in general).

Sure, but you can’t really compare the content quality of the posts on Meta vs Altcoin boards really. In Bitcointalk – Posts per Day - evolution during past six months, section 4 (Merit per Post Ratio) I calculated the merit per post for a given board (section/subsection). Sure Meta is way above Altcoin boards, but no wonder really. Also note that Meta is not one of the easiest boards to get the first merit at all (see: Analysis – The Merit Path – Where we start off and the path we follow).

At first glance looking at this I would say that it is not quite as bad as I had initially suspected however it still is along the lines of what I thought it would be and this data could  actually not be clearly demonstrating the circle jerk/ back slapping within the top 100 or 200 users that is going on.

If we look at this

Top   10 ->  9,57% received merit from Top 10.
Top   20 -> 17,80% received merit from Top 20.
Top   50 -> 26,38% received merit from Top 50.
Top 100 -> 32,69% received merit from Top 100.

This is received  and i think looks a little better than what i had expected due to those being merited by those hoping to get some merits in return.


I expect by the time we expand this to the top 200 we would notice that 50% or even greater are received by other members of the top 200. This data to me does not rule out that much higher % for example 70 - 95 % of merit given out by the top 200 does not just remain within the top 200 .


Also worth noting is that meta absorbs such a high proportion of merit compared to the number of people actually posting here. I suspect  the alt board (where most new people post) and even the btc board that have 10x the number of posts actually has far more than 10x more people posting there. You can likely say 100x of times more people posting there. Then seeing the number of merits that meta absorbs is a lot.

Now there will be some who will say you can always interpret data how you prefer to. Since I don't know the % of merit given out by the top 100/top200 (which is still let us say realistically 0.01% of real posters taking out bots and scammers) which ONLY goes to other top merit 100 / 200 holders we can not really rule out a definite circle jerking back slapping pattern here.

Having said all of that it is not a big deal. Merit works well for stopping new bot accounts powering up and account farming and provides some way to show appreciation for views they share and other useful things. Therefore is working well but we have to be careful regarding what other conclusions we automatically draw merit scores.

Just from my curiosity,
If user A sends X amount of sMerits to user B and receives the almost exact number, can we count that as abusing merit between buddy, provided that the amount is not lower? Also, user A receives 39% of his total merit from user B.
Sorry, it's quite off-topic for this thread. I don't want to create a topic for knowing this only.

Yes, that is the correct interpretation.

I could retrieve the data, but instead of doing that it may me more flexible for you to use the Merit Dashboard, or whatever other tool/list you see fit (namely provided by @Piggy, @LoyceV and @Vod). The Merit Dashboard in interactive, and has multiple views of the Merit System, with charts, aggregates, lists and so on, filterable by different conditions (time periods, boards, nominal profiles, etc.).

For example, the top 10 Meriters or Merited can be seen on the "Rankings Tab".  You can click on them to go to their Bitcointalk profile, or copy their name and go to the "Personal Summary" tab, paste the name into the top right box and press enter. You will get a full summary on that profile (activity, posts, merit, received merit, sent merit, broken down by month, rank, board, etc.). In addition, you can filter the information to a certain period of time and/or forum board (section/subsection).

The maximum is 50 sMerits per person you merit per 30 days. Any highly abuse activity will very likely show up in one of the available tools, and be spotted and brought to the light by one of the forum members that use them.

You can always reply to the post if you can add value to the comment. If you can't add value, then it is better to keep silent, as multiple posts that are simple agreements can kill the thread discussion.

They aren't, they shouldn't, and they can't be forced to do so. This only really poses a problem for people that are desperate to get an account (or multiple..) quickly ranked up.  I wonder what "legitimate" reason one would have for this.

I believe that is what they called "Reciprocal Merit", it is when they send back sMerit/s to the one who have given them sMerits. This happens commonly and there is nothing wrong about is as long as the post is "meritable". Sometimes when a good conversation is happening and they have known each other in the forum they send back and forth the merits as a way of appreciating what they have said previously even on the past threads they have conversed with. These merits are not wasted as it is given to someone who is worthy of it. The wrong way to use reciprocal merits is when they use it as means of ranking up their own accounts and use it to produce more merits in order to sell, you can even see that the posts receiving the merits are really shitty to even be given one.

Many users agree with many posts, if they would all post just to say that, it will cause a tremendous amount of useless posts. That's why it's not allowed, and that's what makes Merit so much more than just a "Like".

Initially, theymos said to Merit high quality posts. Later, it was backed down a bit to "good" posts. My interpretation is that anyone who's not a spammer, shouldn't be restricted by the Merit system. So more or less anything that's worth reading deserves some Merit. I've merited your post, not because I agree, but because it's worth reading and I don't think you're the typical spam bot.
It's a very strong system to be able to Merit a post you totally disagree with, but which is still worth reading.

As I see it, the merit system is the only way to acknowledge a post on the forum, and show you appreciate the post and are in agreement with its content and (or) suggestion.

As per theymos unofficial rules, meriting posts you agree with solely because you agree with it is wrong, but the rules also states that one worded replies like;

...are not allowed, so members can not comment their support of the post/comment as that would count as spam. And can not reiterate what has already been said, that would count as spam also.

So there is no other way to show your agreement or approval of a post or comment, since the quality and acceptance of a post is weighed by the number of merits it gets.

Sure it is abused in some instances (there is no flawless system).
But I don't think any action can be taken; users can only be accused of merit abuse when discovered to be meriting their alt accounts or selling smerits. Except to take those members off the merit source list (if they were a part of it)

A like or dislike option would reduce the use of merits if it was introduced and counted for nothing except your agreement with the post.
But it would be abused if everyone could use it and would lose relevance.

I truly support your opinion. In fact I have already made a thread related to it here

I would like getting your opinion there.

Sorry, for doing it buy sending a merits to you but your opinion was worth considering.

     What the f**k are you talking about? I'm a merit source and I have only earned 156 merits, which is less than what you have earned. I hardly consider the amount of merit that I earned an "abnormal amount."  I only have 250 extra merit a month to give. I can't possibly hunt the whole forum and give merit to everyone who deserves it. I'm really getting sick and tired of people complaining on how we merit sources are doling out the merit. What on earth do you people want? We are trying to combat all of the shitty posting done by signature spammers and account farmers. Want to go back to the old way, where someone just has to post a couple of shitty posts a day to rank up? Furthermore, a person with very non-mainstream views, can rack up a bunch of merit. For example, Anunymint earned 127 merits in 40 days before he was nuked. If someone with unpopular views starts spouting off, they are going to attract fanboys. Especially if they know how to put together a good argument.
    

From what I can tell, merit is very frequently given for posts that the merit sender agrees with. This is the circle jerking the OP is referring to. This will lead to new users mirroring the opinions of those in power. This diminishes the free flow of ideas and makes it more difficult to dissent from popular opinions. Even in this very thread, multiple posts have merit that fairly little effort was put into said post, but that the merit sender likely agreed with what the post said.

I also suspect that people send merit to those who are believed to have a lot of merit to send in the hopes of receiving merit in return. This results in merit sources having abnormal amounts of merit.

Merit sources are people who have the capacity to send more merit than than they can spend with the sMerit they get from the merits they receive. They demonstrate this by pointing out posts that should have more merit than they have.

Also, merit sources should be sending 1/2 of the merit spent. This ignores the merit that can be spent from the airdrop. Everyone doesn’t spend all the sMerit they have so the percentage will be somewhat below 50%.

thank you for your help.

Top merited topic of all time
This list counts merit on only OP.
Top-merited replies, all-time

Top merited topic of all time- Most merited topics (SUM of OP + posts) (Fixed!)