Topic: Merit Distribution Slowing? (Read 373 times)

I wouldn't draw that conclusion. I think theymos is someone that is very methodical and will not make changes on a whim. He'll want to give the system enough time to settle down and then take his time planning and fully thinking through any changes to it. Usually, he takes action on things long after I've given up hope of them ever getting fixed. There were several months from when he first proposed something like merit and asked our opinions before implementing it.

Here's another example https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/forum-feature-request-set-alt-text-by-default-for-all-embedded-images-solved-2967890 proposed on 17th Feb and a solution on 22nd June.

I think Theymos doesn’t care much (and maybe he hasn’t much time either) because with the current sources exceptional posters rank up according to activity. They usually get merits before their reach the required activity.

The problem is for ok-posters and good ones. It will take longer for them to rank up than it will take to reach the required activity but that doesn’t seem much of an issue.

What I would expect are some changes to improve the system because many proposals have been made on this board but none of them have been implemented and although the system has had an impact on the forum there is still a lot of spam and shitposting.

After seeing how long it took LoyceV to be accepted and even then it was only after digaran quit, I came to the conclusion that there weren't any vacancies. I hope I'm wrong as I do really think there are too few people assigned too much work. It would work far better if there were twice as many merit sources with half as much sMerit each.

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Not as upset as the hampster was.

I'm a bit of a loose cannon really. Looking through lists of posts to award with merits smacks too much like a job. I'm a treasure hunter, and I like reading threads for knowledge, especially the interesting and unusual ones. I get quite a few ideas from them. I get quite annoyed when all I find are threads like -

Vod ate my hampster
or
Dear Vicar, sir, I'm sorry I stole from the church plate, but God owes me a Lambo. Please let me back into the church, as I don't have enough money yet

Of course those are fake examples, but I think they illustrate the level of many threads and posts these days.

From my observations of the merit system it's not anything to do with the system itself that will be it's downfall it's the fact that merit sources would as Vod suggested need to be regularly maintained to assure that we have active sources. I also don't think theymos has time to remove inactive sources, and there probably isn't any harm in other inactive sources. What I would be concerned about is the amount of merit sources that will be added. Although, it seems to me that he would prefer people to make applications rather than manually identifying merit sources as that would require a lot of work regularly which could be spent elsewhere.

That might just be the issue. At least publicly there hasn't been enough users applying to become a merit source.

I really need to get around to posting that list for you. I've just been swamped recently. Plus, I've happened upon some merit recently, and merited a few of the posts. As well as others have merited quite a few of them since I initially added them to the list.

From what I have noticed so far: Remember at the onset of this whole merit saga, each member from member level to the legendary level were given a stipulated amount of merits, now when it was initiated many good people were enthusiastic and gave out merits to befitting posts. now here is the magic if those who merited posts, their own posts were not merited in return, they definitely ran out of merits and can't keep giving what they don't have.
The truth of the whole matter while the merit system seems to have slowed down is that a lot of people have run out of merits to give. My thoughts tho.

Hah. I would rather believe if someone says that signatures are banned but this- no way.

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Oh hell yeah. People rather find it much easier to merit people who they know and people who post in real discussions. Everyone else don't get enough merits or merits at all.

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The reason fittotalk failing might be because of lack of interest from others. Ain't anybody any shitposter got time for that. He would trade merits than doing some hardwork. Kudos to you,Jet Cash,you have done a great job being a merit source, but the standards should be little reduced. They are one main reason causing the merit distribution to slowdown.

That's true, Bitcoin Discussion is the second favourite place for spammers (first one is the Off topic), or maybe the third, because the really second one is the Alt discussion.
I've started again to report spam topics from the Bitcoin Discussion thread. Today's stats: there are 8 (!) pages of topics (40 topics per page) with at least one new post from today (approximately 320 topics just for today). I've quickly ran thru the subjects and opened the suspicious ones, in the end, I've managed to report 50 topics, that were obviously spam or scam, etc... It's 15% just for today, and it's just the topic count, not the post count. Spammy topics and spam megathreads gathers the spammy posts much quicker than the normal topics with meaningful discussion (because it's not easy to post something useful...), so the ratio of the spammy posts compared to the normal ones must be much worse...
We need more people to report, unless something solves the spam problem...

You are forgetting merit sources. I've got a load of source merits, and if I award them, they get replaced, so there is no incentive to hoard them. However, I don't want to give them away 'recklessly', so if crap posters stop me finding good posts, then they are stealing from the posters who would have got the replacement merits that I don't receive.

Its not only you though and I think the enthusiasm that came with it has reduced to a large extent and for me I think its normal for any policy but the moment we all adjust to the fact that its not going anywhere and its essential as much as the desire to rank up, gradually people will get accustomed to the situation. I believe the trust system might have face the same thing at some point and now that its literally something that give a form of conscience, its achieving its objective. Another reason again is because it can be exhausted and a lot of people who have created threads to give out merits have finished it while those ones that remain wanted to keep it as long as possible just like they guide their password.

I was going to convert that into English for you, but i can't understand your basic premise.

Rank has nothing to do with merit, and members are discouraged from the reckless awarding of merit regardless of the quantity of sMerit they may have.

It is clear sir, only one weakness is, not everyone will give a reward even though our position is qualified, because if not wrong there is a limit of each rank in giving reward, so it will make people will not give reckless merit.

I may be one of the culprits in this slowdown. I've got quite a lot going on in my life, couple this with the fact that it seems even harder to find meritable posts, and I'm not awarding as many as i could. I'm back in 3 figures with awardable merits, and I'm starting a few threads in the hope that they will generate a few decent posts. The Fit to Talk English project seems to have gone quiet, and this may be my fault, as I haven't given it the time it deserves recently. I'm disappointed that the non-English members have not been using it, and this is despite the promise of at least 5 merits for some good translated posts from the local language boards.

Please don't blame the merit sources for the slowdown. The excessive pollution on the boards, and the difficulty in finding decent posts is discouraging for us.

All forum.

I agree. Whilst it would be nice to be ranked higher and quicker its all about contribution to the community and just like any other thing its the journey that counts. If getting the merits were simply based on posting irrespective of the content then merits value would be entirely diminished.

Those numbers are forum-wide? Taking all users into account, or is this a particular testing group? Those numbers are suggesting to me that merit is slowing, but the rate at which it is slowing is also slowing; this tells me that we're approaching some sort of equilibrium, and we are most likely going to continue to drop for months to come. If a surge of merit sources are implemented, then maybe this would "combat" the decrease in merit distribution. Again, I'm not sure what pace we are attempting to achieve, and this is originally one of the things I was aiming to get a better understanding on.

I can't really complain though, it seems to have a positive effect on the community. My biggest concern is the restrictive nature this might impose on someone planning on becoming a serious member of the community down the road, but I suppose it's a work in progress.


All you do is post in spam mega-threads with one-liners that contribute nothing to the conversation. More often than not your posts are deleted and removed by moderators. Newbies will not be receiving merit if they have posting habits such as yours, maybe a big part of the merit distribution dropping is the removal of abusers and users that are meriting newbie one-liners.


How low was the rate of merit distribution intended to drop? I wasn't privy to this public announcement. A flood is less likely each day, it would seem.

Old account in the sense, they are only using their accounts for signature spamming, reporting their fb and Twitter posts. This doesn't mean that those 200+ activity Jr.Members should receive merits to rank up to Full Members or at the least Members. Ranking up of accounts should never depend upon Activity or Posts count. There should be something similar like merits or whatsoever. I had been a  member in some of the forums where admins used to rank up the members manually. Since it can never be done in such a huge forum like this, merits will help them to rank up. If a person receives some decent merits, it distinguishes him from rest of the community further indicating that he has contributed to the community.

Those 10 posts or activities which newbies posted would have contributed to the forum and helped someone and they would have eventually awarded them the merits.

Merits are working as intended, so don't think about merits and keep contributing to the community and someday you will see that merits are flooding in your account.

Not as common place as would seem necessary for it to continue as a "viable" implementation. Ranking up is still meant to be attainable, isn't it?


They got me all infatuated during the honeymoon phase, and now I get to see the real person. Tsk Tsk.


This is mostly what I'm wondering. I expected it to slow down, but it would seem that now it is overcompensating for the fervor that came with it originally. I'm wondering if now we are expecting it to pick back up again, or if this trend is likely to continue until merit is at a halt.


Easy boy! You'll get your piece of the pie when theymos believes you're ready.  Realistically though, I do agree that some delegation would do the forum some good. It's felt like forum resources are always strained, and there is seemingly no reason for that to be the case (outside of security concerns?).

I keep wondering if newbies will ever get some merits for upgrade. i see a lot of old account with activities of over 200 without a single merit while some accounts with 10 activities and 10 merits.

Now we are in a position where:

- Airdrop sMerit for most users is over
- Montly sMerit given is = sMerit generated from sources (This month probably it will be under)
- Some sources are afk for whatever reason (they have a life outside the forum/they don't care about merit/they can't find posts to reward)

This is the result so far (missing 3 hours on May calculation).

Merit used to be new! and exciting!  Now it is common place.  Can't expect merit sources to continue with their enthusiasm indefinitely..

Merit distribution will still happen, but it is expected to slow down.  The list of sources should be updated regularly, but I don't think Theymos has the time.

Delegation of authority is something he needs to prioritize.  This forum is now a lucrative business, and should have appropriate resources, like any other business. 

I haven't been doing any crazy investigation, or even looked at many numbers, but it would seem to me that the rate of merit distribution is slowing down. I might be incorrect, and it might just be going to places that are unaccounted for, by my lazy eyes, but it seems like it is slowing down noticeably. I am wondering if this is the intended pace, and if I am wrong about the pace changing, any input would be appreciated. I'm not particularly concerned about receiving merit, but it seems strange that the "Top-Merited Users" list remains stagnate when the users on the list are certainly not receiving merit at their original pace.

Help me understand the state of the merit system, in this regard.