Topic: PSA: Covert agents manipulate, deceive, and DESTROY REPUTATIONS (Read 952 times)

What a day to land on this thread!
Believe it or not, I don't give a fuck.

Still reading it, but:


How am I supposed to hide my love for you?

Pretty much goes for anything currently happening in the world, including BTC.
I hate it, but I will say it: Old people don't make much money now, do they?

Oh Marcus, here boy.

I say a dicktree is cheaper and more convenient but yall do whatever yall want.

I'm all for working towards paying off my debts before BTC goes to a million dollars a pop. Will gladly draw penises, stick fire in my ass and code things in order to make income to pay off investors as well as pay bills.
An mBTC is 0.001 BTC. That is my sort of floor for an art commission, generally more complex art pieces require more time and thus I ask a little higher payment in return. Last art I did for a user here was 0.002 BTC and featured 3 entities/elements.

lol, Love the human centipede idea, that would be hilarious. Given the complexity of drawing a human centipede and doing an infinitychan(?) logo my ask price for that commission would be around 0.003BTC to 0.005 BTC depending on how long it takes.
If you'd like to commission a legendary art piece, please don't hesitate to PM me on here. If you've got a positive rep on the forums I'm even willing to draw it first before receiving payment for the commission. I can code also, so if you need an app or site done.. Willing to work.

I think the claims of the OP are a better wake up than any name.
On klye's side I know he been repaing very slowly thru this time, I also know some people even ignored him when he tried to repay which doesn't make this easy.

Yeah, I kinda changed my mind..

I was very interested in the OP, but he never got down to the meat and potatoes of the subject (naming names of suspected agents), and meanwhile this alt attacked me elsewhere with some hebrew lectures, and then we correctly deduced that it was Nullius, then I noticed the rare appearance of MRKYLE, who I enjoyed reading for the comedy years ago, and decided I might as well tromp his thread with some OT, which amazingly hasn't even been deleted yet..

So fork Nullius (pun intended[get it? .. alt]), and let's chat about how MRKYKE is going to pay back his debts by selling penis drawings, and possibly doing some more stunts??

Right now I would love a great drawing, with said classic penises, of a human centipede, in the shape of an infinitychan logo, including, nully, owly, tman, and lauda.. But I am too much of a jew to cough up whatever an "mBTC" is to have it done..
If he would like to include BAC I suggest him as the creator in the trenchcoat, with a raging boner ofcourse..

Maybe he will do it for me for free as a vouch since I have shilled him so well here thus far..

If he does it physically on paper, it may even auction well...

Did anyone else notice this, or was it just me?  


37 minutes later...


 

Hail all.

Oh god. Uh, thanks for the shameless plug bb. (And by shameless I mean extremely shameful)

Thanks hacker1001101001 and eddie13 for the encouragement, I think?


If anyone wants some MS-paint art done, let me know. For as low as 1 mBTC I can draw something magical for you of your choosing.
(For more advanced or complex art work I may request a higher commission on it, due to time and skill required for such a feat)
(50% of all money earned will be put towards reconciliation payments and debts, get yourself immortalized in MS-paint today!)


Anyways, thanks for letting me know that someone remembers me around here. Cheers folks!

That's really crazy of you, and more crazy of MRKLYE !! Respect sir.

None at all.  It was fun doing it and it's fun to talk about even still.  

I've spent far more Bitcoins on things that weren't fun and I don't want to talk about! haha

LMFAO.. Yeah..

You actually paid him 1.0 BTC to light a gang of sparklers that were shoved up his ass?
EPIC!
Any regrets on that spend?

MRKLYE you should post more..
I feel honored by your merit sir..

Be warned:



If you choose to enter:  https://imgur.com/a/sFhLx

Most of these are commissioned pieces, but sometime KYLE drew people just because he felt inspired or something gay (idk... lol he was obsessed with drawing me... agent bb!?)

Begging wasn't allowed in the Just-Dice chat box, so you had to offer a service or be prepared to degrade yourself pretty bad minting a buttcoin.  bb offered his MS paint skills.

Here are just a few:









bb minting a sparkle coin:  https://steemit.com/crypto/@klye/how-i-burnt-my-ass-for-bitcoin-seriously

"Merited by TECSHARE (1), BayAreaCoins (1), MRKLYE (1)"

MRKLYE is around?
Weren't you the guy that made all those crazy penis drawings I saw a long time ago? That shit was crazy.. Link?

Ok cool... Now we can get back on topic of the OP..

What about these "Agents" on btct and who are the speculated agents?

I'd be REALLY cranky if my tax dollars were being wasted on copper memberships. 

Surely they have more of a life than that.

[uses analogy about A.I.D.S.]

Nullius: hE iS sPrEaDiNg DaNgErOuSlY mIsLeAdInG mEdIcAl InFoRmAtIoN!!1


[uses analogy about a murder suspect]

Nullius: hE cAlLeD mE a MuRdErEr!!1

The minor point is that, yes:  It would be oh so cunning to intentionally plant speling errers, so as to throw people off the trail of a secret identity to which I casually confessed (on grounds that OP requested that, so as to focus the thread on important issues rather than on irrelevant speculation about his identity).  I suppose that it was even more cunning to deceive people by constructing a nullius-style PGP key, which I myself openly averred is “a work of art”.

Ploni has a hell of a sense of humour.  —Oh, no!  So do I!

Now, the major point will require a full contextual quote:

Quote from: TECSHARE on March 12, 2020, 10:57:12 PM

Quote from: bonesjonesreturns on March 12, 2020, 08:28:19 PM

Quote from: nullius on March 12, 2020, 06:21:23 PM

Quote from: Ploni Almoni on March 11, 2020, 01:15:22 AM

"I am Sparticus!"

Sure, whatever:  I am he; he is I!

(But he misspelt “Spartacus”.  Would I do that?  —Quickly, someone must run and check whether “Sparticus” has ever been used by Quickseller and/or PrimeNumber7.  —And would I quote ahistorical movie movie magic made for the purpose of American Communist agitprop?  No offence to OP, but—alas, my reputation must be suffering.)

Stop pretending you didn't inject a spelling error so you could use it as some faux defense the waffle wall was not of your own boring construction.

Exactly. He is like the murder suspect who gets asked a simple question about where he was on the night of the incident, then blurts out something about how the bloodstains on his shoes are from cutting himself on a broken bottle last night when no one asked. He thinks he is a fucking mastermind. He is a tool.

Holy cow:  Being Ploni Almoni is “like” committing a murder!  Replete with bloodstains.

Regardless of whether or not I am actually Ploni (or even Jewish), I do believe that TEChSHARE just committed a “blood libel” against me.

Certainly, in substance, TEChSHARE thinks that being OP here is sufficiently comparable to murder to support his absurdly melodramatic analogy.

---

Artless Techy, I have a question for you based on a post of which you were so proud, you self-quoted this as the basis for ridiculous accusations against me and against Lauda (to which I will reply presently):

Merited by eddie13 (1)

Quote from: TECSHARE on March 10, 2020, 02:07:03 PM

Quote from: eddie13 on March 10, 2020, 01:28:01 PM

~

Maybe Lauda is just taking it back? This is just another good example of Lauda trying to hide the fact that they are a normie wearing 4chan culture like a suit to camouflage themselves like Steve Buscemi and his skateboard desperately trying to convince his fellow kids he is one of them. The idea of chastising some one for being racist while simultaneously lauding shitposting culture is self contradictory and yet another demonstration of the fact that Lauda exists more as a fabrication than a real personality.

Given your valiant defence of “4chan culture” against infiltration by the “normie” Lauda, should I now expect for you to start referring to me as (((nullius))), just to make people aware that I am purportedly the bloodstained (((Ploni Almoni)))?

If so, I should warn you that I have also been otherwise accused of being literally Hitler.  (I have neither confirmed nor denied this charge.)  If I am also Ploni, your history lessons should become less boring quite entertaining, with references to (((Adolf Hitler))).

Well, all of that would be consistent with your usual standard of honesty and credibility.

Quote from: TECSHARE on January 28, 2020, 01:46:43 PM

nullius
As I stated before I highly suspect this user is an alt of one of the usual members

Quote from: actmyname on March 13, 2020, 03:07:04 PM

Newbie: posts something
...
It's not a matter of if there's an alt accusation, but when.

---

You know how easy it would be to construct a couple posts that "fit" to the character/personality/prose of a user here, in order to fool others?

actmyname, you have not denied that you set all this up to say what you really wanted to!  See OP:

Quote from: Ploni Almoni on March 11, 2020, 01:13:06 AM

Then, I saw two of the most astute users on the forum, o_e_l_e_o and actmyname, [...]

Note that neither o_e_l_e_o nor actmyname said what I am saying here!

To my knowledge, you also still have not denied my 2018-vintage accusation that “you = theymos = the CIA”.  You even threatened me for erasing your doxing of theymos as truly “thermos”.  I should tag you for that!

Quote from: nullius on February 02, 2018, 12:03:42 AM

—Eureka!  I have another theory!  YOU ARE PAID BY THE LUMBER CARTEL!

Quote from: nullius on February 01, 2018, 06:12:50 PM

THE TRUTH is that this forum has exactly one user, [...] me.

Quote from: nullius on February 05, 2018, 12:54:42 AM

Quote from: Lauda on February 04, 2018, 04:22:26 AM

Quote from: nullius on February 04, 2018, 04:13:55 AM

He pwned you there, revealing THE TRUTH that you are not theymos.

Sorry, the truth can be painful sometimes.

I’m sorry I hurt your feelings, Lauda.  My heart bleeds negative-trust red.

---

Quote from: Quickseller on March 13, 2020, 01:49:17 PM

I would respond to this theory with the question of why would a 3-letter agency want to do something like this?

Well, that is a reasonable form of debate that looks to the substance of the issue.  For my part, my reply rapidly grew far too long to be tacked onto the post I already had in my pipeline; and I now have no time to finish it, anyway.  I will follow up here.

Who said newbies, and since when newbies  are able to destroy reputations.

Absolutely true. However when their motives and intent also align... that is a pretty good indicator. This was a pretty hamfisted sloppy attempt at remaining anonymous.

Newbie: posts something
...
It's not a matter of if there's an alt accusation, but when.

---

You know how easy it would be to construct a couple posts that "fit" to the character/personality/prose of a user here, in order to fool others?

Probably really... fuckin'... easy.

Just remember, bozos:

I think it is very unlikely that intelligence agencies are using newbie accounts to smear the reputations of forum members within bitcointalk.

I would respond to this theory with the question of why would a 3-letter agency want to do something like this?

Most of the forum community is made up of people wearing paid sig ads who talk about bitcoin to earn money from their sig ads. My guess is the worst most of these people have done is not report income on their sig ad payments, but that the majority of them will report this income (perhaps using the incorrect forms, etc, but still paying the correct amount). If this was the case, the amounts involved would be a few hundred dollars in unpaid taxes per person, at most -- not really amounts that intelligence agencies would be interested in getting involved in.

Another large part of the community is those who use bitcoin to gamble. My guess is these people are harmless, and again intelligence agencies are probably not interested in these people.

A third large community on bitcointalk is the altcoin community, however bitcointalk is really not a major platform to launch altcoins, and there are other platforms that altcoins are frequently launched on, and promoted. Certain bitcointalk-specific policies have prevented bitcointalk from being a major altcoin related platform.

The development of bitcoin is largely done off bitcointalk, and most bitcoin devs are not even forum members.

Forum polices prevent really bad types of business from being conducted, such as disallowing illegal transactions that are not legal in the country of the buyer or seller.

---

I do find it interesting that a newbie account would post something that essentially says to not trust newbie accounts because they might be intelligence agencies.

Exactly. He is like the murder suspect who gets asked a simple question about where he was on the night of the incident, then blurts out something about how the bloodstains on his shoes are from cutting himself on a broken bottle last night when no one asked. He thinks he is a fucking mastermind. He is a tool.

Surprised that many thought this alt would be nullius, that's not what came to mind for me. Pretty sure nullius would post it themself, under their own account, if this is the message they were trying to get across. Sub-par grammer isn't nullius' style either, nor is aggressive & ugly looking formatting.

Another user did come to mind though, someone who used to be DT but is now highly excluded and arguably had their reputation destroyed.

A few clues to join in this game:

- A lot of bold and red (in a somewhat "erratic" manner) being used
- Selective cutting of quotes to fit agenda or message being conveyed
- Grammer would of needed some tidying up with some help though

But ultimately, if the topics relevant it should be discussed, rather than speculating on who's alt it is (which is a lot more interesting it seems).
Also: TL:DR it all, my bad. Just skimmed over the formatting personally and got the drift... kinda.




-

The substance was not ignored. There was no substance.

Stop pretending you didn't inject a spelling error so you could use it as some faux defense the waffle wall was not of your own boring construction.

Looks like nullius turned up and avoided any detailed exploration of the bogus and misleading crap his alt spewed out at the start of the thread.

Meet the challenge or just weasel off back under laudas skirt and continue devouring its anal secretions.

Nulluis posts are simply one big look at how smart I'm desperately trying to sound while avoiding the central and core points.
Obviously the discerning reader who isn't going conflate using Latin and flowery waffle to present feeble and weak arguments with a convincing and credible case will just be laughing at him.

Those motivated by sigs and greed will clearly be supportive of his scammer supporting double standards bogus reasoning .

So get down to specific examples in the OP, who they relate to with evidence to support your views that will stand up to scrutiny.

Stop trying so hard to "sound" smart. Debunk clearly some central points that you are trying to discredit or
create your own robust points or head off to the i speak latin and self taught my self the classics forum with all the other fat ugly bitter girls that never get fucked. 

I don't care if you can spell correctly and have memorized a bunch of stuff you think you can inject everywhere to make yourself sound smart to morons.

You say the post has substance.  Bring your evidence. How does the stuff he copied and claims applies here to trolls and those poor defamed DT members "really apply" or is it a pile of crap? And another bunch of desperate excuses from scammers and their scammer supporters like nullius the moronic double standards cowardly turd?

Quote from: eddie13 on March 11, 2020, 04:27:13 PM

Interesting thing I just realized..

Nullius is Latin for nobody/anonymous..

Ploni Almoni is hebrew for "john doe"/anonymous..

Thanks.  You just increased my anonymity set to everybody who has ever used any variation of “Anonymous”, “Nobody”, “John Doe”, or any conceptually related placeholder name in any language.  Helpful. :-)

Quote from: eddie13 on March 11, 2020, 12:57:15 PM

Oh shit it’s working.. Now I’m paranoid..

---

Quote from: Ploni Almoni on March 11, 2020, 01:15:22 AM

"I am Sparticus!"

Sure, whatever:  I am he; he is I!

(But he misspelt “Spartacus”.  Would I do that?  —Quickly, someone must run and check whether “Sparticus” has ever been used by Quickseller and/or PrimeNumber7.  —And would I quote ahistorical movie movie magic made for the purpose of American Communist agitprop?  No offence to OP, but—alas, my reputation must be suffering.)

Anyway, yes, let’s ignore the substance.  It is more important to play guessing games about OP’s identity!

Quote from: Ploni Almoni on March 11, 2020, 01:13:06 AM

Quote from: Glenn Greenwald, The Intercept (2014-02-24)

[— important facts that most people want to ignore —]

Merited by nobody (and I am out of sMerit for now)

Quote from: Lauda on March 11, 2020, 05:54:41 AM

I would strongly urge you to read literature on this topic if you think that this is not happening in most online communities that present a threat to the system. It is very very improbable that this has not been going on for many years here already.

Quote from: Lauda on March 11, 2020, 10:26:45 AM

It is very probable that some trolls are agents, but the supermajority of them are not and thinking otherwise is paranoid.

QFT.

---

Oh, whoops, almost missed this due to my habit of skimming past sock trolls:

Quote from: bonesjonesreturns on March 11, 2020, 04:22:57 PM

Lol. Notice how this thread appears thread appears the day after the lauda nullius duo get their own dedicated scammer proof thread?

Say what!?  I didn’t even know that there was such a thread, let alone “proof” of nonexistent scams by the “lauda nullius duo”.

Most crypto related sites are under heavy surveillance, more than once I stumbled upon different state agents, sometimes even just being crypto followers. If we look back at the silkroad 1 out of 3 main owners was infiltrated.
This can get really worrying if we think about different accounts and having a whole section perhaps working on engineering specific entities, not only trying to make them talk but to behave and do things wrong so they can later pay up.
Creating specific situations to mold things for their perspective to be right since they teamwork.
One must be extra careful till crypto traffic is so big it cannot be under control which might take a bit with all the FUD going on.

It is known cunts recieve orders from above and as any good dog will listen. They quite a few i know for sure, also note that sometimes just surveillance is around when a identity cannot infiltrate.

There are some other really obvious tells, but I am not going to give them more hints so they can use it to be a better con next time.

Whats wrong Nullius? Tuckered out already? Maybe you and Lauda can get together and leave me some more negative ratings because I said you are hunting through my turds for peanuts because you never literally hunted through my turds for peanuts (I mean hopefully you haven't, but who knows), and accusing me of being a liar because of this. I predict yet another sock filtering out of the woodwork to attack me now that you have quite thoroughly burned both of your reputations with this ham-fisted spy game LAARP.

Interesting thing I just realized..

Nullius is Latin for nobody/anonymous..

Ploni Almoni is hebrew for "john doe"/anonymous..

While English uses phrases like John Doe or A N Other to refer to an unnamed or unspecified person, in Hebrew we say ploni almoni or just ploni. In discussing hypothetical scenarios, the Talmud uses ploni to refer to a witness, a bridegroom, or whatever the case maybe.
https://www.thejc.com/judaism/jewish-words/ploni-almoni-1.15782

latin lessons..
hebrew lessons..

hmmm

Lol. Notice how this thread appears thread appears the day after the lauda nullius duo get their own dedicated scammer proof thread?

Lauda here defending this nullius composed garbage.
Of course it is possible but the proof that is full of shit is

1_ no specfic examples

2_ i guarantee there will be no analysis or examination of any examples

Just another day of fun crushing scammers and their toadies.

Always the same

1_they pump out lies and bullshit, then they run away when you offer to examine their "theories" with them in public.

Or

2_ they claim you are lying and trolling, then they run away when you offer to examine the evidence in detail with them.


Prove me wrong.  It is small wonder so many "agents" are unable to resist joining in and punishing scamming scumbags and their friends in their spare time.


Nullius please hurry up and bring the specific examples you want to work through in public.
These agents must be identified and these innocent upstanding members " reputations" must be restored where required.

What is taking so long? 

Definitely looking like nullius. The waffle wall is looking as delicious as ever.

Licking my chop.

A WOT duel between cryptohunter and nullius. I wanted to say "this should be fun" but it's probably going to be extremely boring. Good for CH - not a lot of people still talk to him.

I think this guy is on to something.

Please provide examples.

1. Which member has their reputation been destroyed?

Let's use this thread to examine this web of lies and deceit they have tried to cast over our eyes.

Or do you mean whistle blowing on confirmed scammers and their double standards hypocritical mates?

2. I want to avoid these agents. Can you point some out?

I want to grill them publicly and see if they crack or run away now? These evil agents that hate chipmixer?

Or may be these people are sick of dark star sponsoring a bunch of greedy, self interested scammer supporters?
They may think darkstar should stop the nepotism to his mates and rotate the chip mixer spots to all good posters that have no scammer supporting or trust abusing in the histories ?


The best way to tell if this is nullius. 

1. Long flowery pretentious screed that is desperate for you to notice how smart and knowledgeable they are.

2. Their entire wall of waffle falls to pieces one you apply even mild scrutiny or pressure.


Let's see if it is nully or not.

That is just your spidey sense.

Well, he just attempted to give me a lecture on hebrew.. Does that count?

Also tried baiting me into a debate about Jews in a topic about censorship, so maybe he is the agent and this op is to sow exactly the paranoia it describes...

Spidey sense has a slight tingle of projection..
Oh shit it’s working.. Now I’m paranoid..

Nullius being targeted? Now I know it is you

-Long winded: CHECK
-Pedantic: CHECK
-Fondness for excessive formatting: CHECK
-Fondness for self aggrandizing historical references: CHECK
-Casting Nullius as a target: CHECK
-Not so subtle digs about objective standards: CHECK
-Familiar with techniques to manufacture consensus: CHECK
-Presenting the role of being righteous while demonstrating motives of a perp: CHECK

All that is missing is a Latin lecture.

Are you accusing Edward Snowden and Glen Greenwald of having made an April Fool's joke?

There is a reason why I opened with documented facts. Not speculation or Internet navel-gazing.


You omitted this:

---

Why yes, because the best way to present important information is to avoid attention. Attention is the last thing I want for the message.

And I am obviously not trying to get pay attention to me. I am good enough at that otherwise, thank you very much. For the privilege of covering up my name so as to focus on the message, I paid >0.002 BTC to set up a throwaway account where I can post images... then deliberately mangled what I said with the style of at least 3 well-known users. I think this message is very important.


Try striking a balance. See OP for suggestions how.


Intelligence (and counterintelligence) work, and also ordinary police-detective work, operate on the balance of probabilities in the face of intentional deception and concealment of evidence. I am very sorry that I could not deliver an extended lesson on that in a "TL;DR" megapost that nobody would read. I want to raise awareness, make people think. Foolish of me, perhaps; but I've got to try.

---

Yes, that happens; and the Snowden dump of the information in OP's quoted article also happened. But the evidence is rarely so clear-cut. Rather than tilting at windmills and searching for THE TRUTH, I suggest the practical, intentionally quite general advice in OP.

---

Kicking around on the Internets, I have been accused of being a CIA pro troll, an NSA hacker, an FBI agent, a Mossad agent, an FSB agent, and a few dozen others. Well, being accused of being Nullius and/or following him? Most evil of all, LOL! (Cue accusations of being other users whom I believe are being targeted...)

Stop looking for names, and take the advice in OP about words and actions, what people reveal about their goals, etc.

Very interesting subject..
I have been interested in the subject of shills, fudders, sliders, glowbaiters, etc. for quite a while and I could see motive to sow discord around here and possibly also infiltrate positions of influence..

I'll read the rest of the linked article in the OP later and maybe add some interesting information I have come across on these tactics of such shill groups as shareblue and "russian bots"..

Their was a recent case of an agent being outed posting bait on 4chan, as nutildah mentioned, by releasing a report with screenshots of "you" in the ID of posts iirc..
It does happen and they do slip occasionally..

What's with all the pompous, arrogant, self-righteous hypocrites popping up around here all of the sudden?  Is it just me or has anyone else noticed this trend?  Maybe nullius has inspired them to come out of the closet and show us "who they really are."

What is wrong with the way it was presented? I can speculate who is behind it and reasonably guess, but the content is more important to me.

It is very probable that some trolls are agents, but the supermajority of them are not and thinking otherwise is paranoid.

Good example. What kind of threat do people on 4chan present to the government and what kind of threat do people on this forum present? The invested resources against Bitcoin are considerably higher.

Sorry but the entire OP reeks of a bloated sense of self-importance and I'm 95% certain I know who is behind it. There's ways to go about presenting information in a way that doesn't demand attention, and this isn't one of them.

On one hand he's accusing trolls of being government agents, and on the other hand he's saying "don't be paranoid." Kind of a mixed message if you ask me.

I mean, the one CIA guy who was caught infiltrating 4chan (or was it 8chan, one of the chans...) was pretty dumb. So I suppose it could happen, and it could be found out, but cryptohunter isn't in on it. Neither are bad englished sockpuppets with an axe to grind with the Chipmixer campaign. Even if they were, I don't see what this thread is going to do to stop them. Telling people to be vigilant about a "threat" that cannot be quantifiably ascertained isn't very helpful.


As likely as any other scenario.

Ploni Almoni is working for CIA.

I can't really agree with the claim that cleavages pull people apart. Depending on circumstances it might exhibit some positive pull.

I guess, I can point out some of the possibly manipulative agents here, looks some what happening around.

shy, but I lube up quite well

Stop getting offended by stuff and the problem partially resolves itself. It is very easy to create a sexism, racism, etc. dispute and you all play along like true sheep.

I would strongly urge you to read literature on this topic if you think that this is not happening in most online communities that present a threat to the system. It is very very improbable that this has not been going on for many years here already.

Good, finally a possibly honest alt account.

Is this a precursor to an April Fools joke?


Sounds like you are in desperate need of your own advice:


Or do you want us all to believe that cryptohunter and some disaffected ex-sig campaigners actually work for the CIA? 

Because you are not making any allegations with clarity and purposefully overcomplicating things, your pure motivation for posting is to create a dramatic effect and get people to pay attention to you, thus narrowing you down to a handful of users. Pretty boring, really.

reserved

reserved

reserved

• (To be added.)

---

This is a thread made to fight back against a growing mess that I believe is probably professionally manipulated. Of course, I expect interference. I will be accordingly ruthless in moderating this thread. No apologies.

---

None of your business. I am anonymous.

If you support me, I encourage you to NOT merit my posts, green-trust me, or even talk to me too much. (If you have evidence or something important to say, please feel free to post it; but talk to the public and not to me, to the extent that can be done without looking awkward.) Obviously, people will be suspicious that this is an alt account. If you make it look like you're trying avoid violating merit/trust community standards, and even feel self-conscious about sockpuppet discussions ("talking to yourself"), then you can be part of my anonymity set!

If you support me, also feel free to "admit" to any accusations that I'm your alt. Not as a serious claim, but in an "I am Sparticus!" way. My identity is secured by a PGP key; and unless a digitally signed statement (or the revelation of a hash-committed preimage, etc.) says otherwise, only this account can speak for me. But I don't mind if people give a "sure, it's my account... so what?" sarcastic answer to this sort of question. If you don't want to say that, then just say that you neither confirm nor deny.

Sorry but not, I will not do PMs. Anybody who has evidence or tips is encouraged to send me an encrypted PM with that. But it's way too easy to leak personal info when drawn into a personal discussion. If you send me something good, presume my thanks. In almost no conceivable circumstance will I ever reply to a PM with this account... I prefer to keep discussions public. Thanks.

Real apologies if things are a bit messy. In some points, I try to copy styles of well known users; in others, I dumb myself down a bit. Then I change it around. Got to keep things interesting.

---

This is a metadata post. It will be edited.

Topic title says it. Out of many articles that have been written about this subject in the years before and since, this is still one of the best:


I encourage you to read the whole thing, then do more research on this important practical subject!

---

---

Why am I bringing this up? Obviously, the Reputation forum (and Meta) are mass-chaos lately. It's that... and more:

• I noticed that certain users have been recently targeted with increased intensity by trolls who seek to destroy their reputations. They are exactly the types of users one would expect to be targeted by intelligence agencies and other mass-manipulators: High-visibility, principled, doing a lot of work to contribute to the community (some of them doing it for free, with no paid signature), sterling reputations for honesty and integrity.
• I noticed an ongoing persistent smear campaign against ChipMixer: A privacy site, which is certainly not beloved by the types of entities discussed in the above article.

I had been growing suspicious that there was more to this recent trollfest than meets the eye. Then, I saw two of the most astute users on the forum, o_e_l_e_o and actmyname, point out to others that widespread assumptions about the identities of various sockpuppet accounts are probably incorrect. Note that neither o_e_l_e_o nor actmyname said what I am saying here! What they said was purely negative. It just tended to mesh with suspicions that I already had, and made me take a closer look...

I may discuss all this in more detail on this thread. Maybe. But let's start with that, and then some general practical advice.

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DON'T	be paranoid. Paranoia paralyzes. Paranoia is a mind-killer. Mass-manipulators deliberately sow paranoia amongst those they wish to neutralize, and in particular, among political activists. There is a world of difference between prudence and paranoia. But on the other hand, "just because you're paranoid, it doesn't mean they're not out to get you..."
DON'T	make incautious accusations that your personal enemies are alphabet-soup agents. It makes your adversaries too powerful when you accidentally label some basement-dwelling idiot as an intelligence agency operative. It also makes you look like a fool.
DON'T	be stupid. Sorry, it's as simple as that... not simple at all. I could write a very long post with lots of advice, which few would read. If you care about your bitcoins, your reputation, and your sanity, you should probably read some guides (especially, activism guides) to how to avoid tricks and traps on the Internet.
DO	be aware that on any Internet forum dealing with hot issues, you will encounter parties with ulterior motives. Most of all the Bitcoin Forum, where money, power, and politics all intersect. I would assume the presence of everything and anything from intelligence agency plants, to garden-variety police informers, to paid shills for various large or small commercial interests... even for "nonprofits", maybe. Anybody with an agenda! Although this isn't the highest-traffic site (nothing compared to the major social media sites), its topic is Bitcoin; and it attracts a high concentration of intelligent people who have strong political opinions. Do the math.
DO	be objective. I mean, truly objective (not as that word is being abused around here lately). This is not a matter of "fairness," but self-protection. Evaluate and re-evaluate your own trust decisions based on an objective (re-)appraisal of those you trust, and those you distrust, without being blinded by personal feelings. This is not to be hardhearted, much less to show your virtue. It is to protect yourself from being emotionally manipulated and deceived.
DO	look to actions and results, not mere words. Many people talk about "freedom," "honesty," "community," etc. Do a person's actions consistently tend toward results that produce the stated goals? Or is that person a hypocrite who is playing you? Be wise also that this cuts both ways. Some people have personalities that make them unpopular for some reason or another, but they care about helping people and doing the right thing... they're just not people-pleasers flashing around flattering smiles. Any which way, look for concrete indicia of what a person's real goals are.
DON'T	get demoralized. There are good people out there. There are good people on this forum. You want to connect with them, while avoiding the ones who aren't good at all. If you forget the good people and get depressed by all the jerks, then who wins?
DO	remember that things are not what they seem. It's an old truism that on the Internet, anybody could be a dog. You have no idea who (or what) is behind a screen name. Don't get hung up on this... but do take things for what they're worth.
DON'T	be a dupe. I surmise that the professional manipulators get great mileage out of obsessive trolls, greedy bounty-chasers, and random idiots. It makes their job easier. If they want to make a wreck of the forum, they really don't need to do too much themselves... they just need to play to the weaknesses of people who have bad intentions anyway.
DO	keep doing Bitcoin!