Topic: possible answer to getting rid of all the trash threads here - page 2. (Read 770 times)

This is a forum where every newbie is really expected to post something that is new for them. It might be a trash post from all of us who already have lots of information about crypto but for newbies who have less knowledge about them it is a genuine question. There are some newbie accounts that are merely for leveling up there rank to join signature campaigns and some bounties. Even the merit system wasn't able to solve the shitty and spammy posts but it lessens the potential of making bounty and signature armies to make a living. The best thing to clean this forum from spammers is to remove altcoin section where newbies are spamming their shitty coins just to get a piece of money. The forum should be all about bitcoin only, since it's bitcointalk.org. The removal of bounties and signature campaigns from ICOs will help clean this forum from spammers and shitty posts from newbies ranking their way up.

Have you not seen the newbies which come here ask a question thats already been asked before a dozen times and then disappear? Reddit is probably a better option for them because its already a cesspool driven by a popularity voting system.

Bitcointalk is for discussion relating to the crypto space. Sure questions can be asked and answered but if they are going to ask questions relating to Electrum theres several different other platforms which are more suited like stack exchange. These questions are not unique.

I will tell you something I just thought that will show how this idea would be bad for the forum and to the newbies.

Imagine someone who has a legit question, someone who doesn't even know this bounty/spammers world exists.

He writes on Google something like "how to recover a wallet from Electrum"

He sees two main websites, bitcointalk and reddit. He immediately open two tabs, one for each.

This guy comes here, creates an account, and try to find the right board for his question. He clicks new topic and he sees a message saying he can't post there. He can only post in the newbies session.

This guy will immediately close bitcointalk tab and post on reddit. He will be answered in reddit immediately and will never come to bitcointalk again.


Later on, because reddit is filled with altcoins shilling, he "discovers" bitcoin is a shitcoin with old technology and sells all his btc and buys bch, nano, iota etc...

And spammers will continue spamming here because they already have old accounts and nobody reports them.

Well let's be honest reading the replies from most it seems they are not getting what the idea exactly is. It seems they think they  are getting all  posting rights revoked.

I think a vote from senior members and above might be quite a useful poll.

Please validate why stopping people or bots having immediate posting rights on the main board without first demonstrating they are willing to be useful willing participants in the spirit of the board is a bad thing...

Even though they will have immediate posting rights on a junior board where if they do prove to everyone with smerits to give that they are useful or even just willing to abide by the board rules ...then they will in a decentralised way be approved for starting topics on the main boards.

There has been no better alternative offered and leaving it as it is now is just turning the board into 90% garbage actually more likely 95%

They removed noob jail because it was not possible with the volume.... this is simply a noob jail that is able to cope with huge volume due to more or less decentralising the mod process.

Like we said they dont need to give anonymint level posts or answers just show they are genuinely interested and helpful.  

You're sort of asking the newbie jail to be bought back. Stopping people to post in the main boards is not a good idea. Although you can still merit users in any board you want to. That is much better because more the boards, more the posts to merit.

I believe no one has so far liked this idea, it would be better for a better suggestion, a user friendly one, or you could just merit users, report a few and have good discussions, eh?

Please re-read what the proposal is.

I have no idea why you are saying this.

You will be able to post and ask just like now but on the junior boards right from the outset. You will also hopefully receive an abundance of help from people hoping to be of use and in return receive merit. Rather than your thread instantly going to page 20 under my ico is best for x reason and copy and pasted news threads, nonsensical bot threads etc.

You are 100% correct that rank is not really a measurement of whether you are a great poster or not although I would suspect the number of hero and legends that are bots or pure sig/ico spammers is rather low in comparison to the proportion of new accounts. Most legends that have built their account from noob jail in the start would have a genuine interest in crypto.

Again there is no logical reason to not go ahead with it. It will for certain improve posting quality and reduce most of the trash from the main boards. What remains will then be suitable for manual moderation.  I don't think we should say because the solution is not perfect that it is not worth implementing. Certain behaviors are not easy to auto moderate so identifying those and manually moderating is the only option but you need to get to a volume level that is manageable first.

I think you are taking away each and every peoples privelage to learn and ask things about bitcoin here in the forum. Your suggestion will surely defeat the main purpose of the forum.

Sometimes the search button is not enough to answer my question because it is slightly different from the previous topic.

I remember the rules and regulation that the rank is not a measurement whether you are a good poster or a bad poster.

I guess what you meant is topic, not thread, isn't it?

This is the way shit projects operate its campaigns to pump their ANN topics with help from shit-posters, spammers.

I think the best way and most effective way that Theymos can do (it might be the final solution for BTT forum to clean up shitty members) is "Prohibiting Junior members and below to join any bounty, campaign in the forum".
Only Member rank and higher ones can wear signature codes and join campaigns.

After the shitposting attitude that people put up the only way the mods can control it is to trash their posts. We get so many redundant threads everywhere where members are posting nonsense in order to get paid.

That was (and still is) the actual idea behind a forum discussion

Shitposting is not a problem its a cancer to this forum metastasized by the scumbags in the forum who love to get paid for writing rubbish.

I agree with your point because what the OP says - will actually incite more merit trading.

Why could you not post on the junior board?
What reduction in functionality would you experience based on this specific personal example?

The forum main purpose is not fighting spammers.
This is a place where newbies are welcome and they can find a community to help them, answer their questions and help them to discover bitcoin.

I started posting here when I needed  to clear a doubt about btc . I needed to create a topic for that. then I discovered how nice his place was and became a member.

Shitposting is a problem, but the forum is still working. Your solution would take out an important functionality from the forum.

Let's discuss ...

it is to be a decentralised decision of what makes a good or bad poster
my method would leave it to all those that already have sufficient merit to decide upon what is good and what is bad.
the board would naturally through a decentralised process decide who and how quickly should be able to start threads on the main board.

bad would not qualify or at least be very delayed at reaching the main board.

it is not only a matter of good and bad it is also a matter of real poster vs bot

also this is only thread starting on the main board ... although posting at all even in thread could have a 25 merit threshold.


I don't get your point about anonymint ? he was an exception to the rule and was banned due to some disagreement with the mods although obviously a high merit worthy member (imho). I don't think he would have any issue starting a new account and accumulating his merit threshold in a very short amount of time if this ever became an obstacle for him.

I'm not sure how we can argue leaving things as they are now is a better option.

Fella, your logic is based on two false assumptions:
1. 100+ merit -> good poster
2. 100- merit -> bad poster

The first assumption is false. I already showed you the reason, that's because of merit airdrop.
The second assumption is false. That's because of Nullius-like or Anunymint-like members.

I do not follow this logic... that is not to say I am correct and that you are wrong. I am always happy to discuss and learn and change my opinion.

They can still ask these questions on the junior boards. Those even attempting to join in and contribute to legitimate and worthy discussions can be given merit. I would find going there browsing through a selection of good threads, then meriting those making real effort to help or even joining in conversations of worth and interest far more rewarding than reporting 100 spammers, ico bots, post pasting bots and then the mods have to confirm and delete and take action. This is a wasteful and unpleasant process and it is also a very centralised bottlenecked process at the mod level if doing it this way. It is also a very negative thing to report person compared to giving praise and merit.

You are not to expect highly detailed knowledge of conceptual design and coding from anyone on this board including legends of course only a willing and helpful attitude to contribute and converse with others.

I am not really complaining at the obvious tech brain drain and dilution since the days of hardcore bitcoiners - that was always going to happen. Let's be honest what percentage of the board actually would have the capacity to understand many of these designs at a deep math level. I don't think it's essential most need to understand at more than a very basic level. However the board is now nothing to do with the tech or about the aim of creating decentralised trustless networks... it is simply becoming a marketing board for icos through various posting techniques that make the board almost worthless to anyone other that to hammer the search function for specific details you may want to look up from years ago.

Having a sensible vetting period that is semi automated is the obvious choice. This will be a decentralised vetting process since those with the most merit to give will be free to peruse the junior boards and all be mods in a way.

Ranks don't matter anymore in bitcointalk, other than for signature campaigns. A few users don't merit legendary ranks as they think that is a waste of their sMerits, they would rather spend that on lower ranked members. Also just because one user is "legendary" doesn't make him a good poster.

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How could you possibly not see it? This is a terrible idea. Some users come out here to ask legitimate things and not all of them are good posters at start. People have to stop expecting nullius-like post quality from newbies. And I am a fucking hypocrite. This option SHOULD NOT be implemented. I am sure there are other ways to stop people from spamming shit. Why don't you start off with reporting 100s of posts per day?

Let's be serious now 17 since the merit was introduced what about the previous years. Also I don't think it is worth giving merit to a legend since he is already at the top level. I'm sure many others see it the same way.

The idea has merit and you can still post on the junior boards.

Perhaps we can bring it down to 50 merit.

I see things getting worse so I don't see we have any option but to introduce something like this.

I see no actual valid reason to not introduce it.

There has been no good rebuttal so far.

People claiming there can be workarounds is fine but they require more hassle, time and money in most cases this will cause a reduction in the things we all want to see reduced.

Imagine if reporting to a mod is the only way forward. It is just not feasible to have such a manual system for such volume.

The noob jail was removed because it was manual and of course too much work. Still it was something we all had to go through.

The 50 merit is not as bad as a noob jail because you will have many good posters in there still building their 50 merit and the quality will be far higher on the entire board because bot spammers and puppet accounts will have less and less reason to exist.

Really? And you actually just got what? 17 merits despite being a "legendary?"
Don't get me wrong, I just wanna say my point related to the merit airdrop.

This would hurt a lot of legitimate users here. This has been discussed to hell and back in the past and it has been turned down every single time. theymos values freedom of speech way too much.

A year ago the board was less spammy but it wasn't as worthwhile as you think it was. Go and read the topics back in 2012-13 or even 2014 , you'll know.

This has been going on for years. Ever visited the Off-topic board? Things are much worse there.

The real members left in 2014 itself. Mods can't do anything if people don't report stuff. And very few people use the "Report to Moderator" button. Because every time they do, they ask themselves, what is in for them,they realize it is nothing and don't even bother to use that button anymore(this is for most people who DO NOT care about this forum).

About the altcoin board, do you seriously expect one moderator to handle the worse board on bitcointalk? Come on, man. People literally have given up reporting anything on that board. It is that bad.

Did you consider to start doing something yourself and help with moderation by eg reporting the threads/posts you see as problematic to moderators?

The board is a mess. The average thread content a year ago was worthwhile.

Now both the main boards are beyond any reasonable moderation. There is too much low quality volume. It is a mass of which ico is best and copy and paste bots reposting threads over and over.

The real members that did post quality content are leaving.

The board needs to be slowed down and 90% of the trash cut away.

You can't even start to moderate this much volume with most new members not even bothering to pretend to keep to the boards guidelines.

100 merit or cant start a thread on the main boards.
mods will stand of chance of moderating to some degree after that

sure some will find workarounds but mods need to get on top of what can not be automated.

Junior boards or noob jails are essential - the merit system is good but does nothing to prevent people spamming their project and building a ton of bots and puppet accounts to spam with them. I see entire threads pages long all pump the same shit and not 1 account has any merit in pages and pages of accounts.

It used to be great to drop in here and read some really interesting and great discussions by the more knowledgeable members and get to ask them some questions..but now just pages and pages of nothing but ico pumpers and spammers and noobs asking the same questions over and over again.

Honestly I don't think the main alt board is really even moderated now, and I don't blame them, it moves to fast and nobody there even tried to adhere to the rules.