Topic: Signature Advertising is Getting Out Of Hand - page 3. (Read 3901 times)

"Ripple Explained, for Bitcoiners!" is less of an ad than "⚠ Ripple is a scam"

Typically, what Ponzi schemes, pump and dumps, and MLM all have in common is that they urge the listener to invest or buy something. I have never suggested that anyone buy anything, least of all gamble on XRP which I am very careful to point is extremely risky as an investment and for all the reasons that others have mentioned (not open source yet, OpenCoin has almost all of it). Therefore, I'm having difficulty understanding how you can equate anything that I wrote with a dishonest scheme.

It's been stated numerous times that the Ripple system is not just the built in currency but that is a fact that gets overlooked. I've also been accused of being a paid shill, etc... although one has to wonder when people are receiving the chance of winning money in exchange for putting ads in their signature, who is really the shill?


So anyone with a desire to provide knowledge and clarity on anything which is not Bitcoin should be viewed with suspicion? I'm not seeing the logic there.



You don't see me or anyone else going into the Newbies forum and telling them to put their money in Ripple, or telling them they are going to get free Bitcoins, etc... Well actually wait a second there is someone who is doing that, and their name is TradeFortress!

I do not think he is trolling.   If ripple is a pump and dump (not saying it is) your "educational" posts would be considered advertising.   That is the model of how most ponzis and pump and dumps work as I am sure you are aware.   It is the same with pyramid schemes and multi level marketing.   Many people who get in early, tell others of the great new thing they have found (just for information sake).   So, anyone that is skeptical about the intent of ripple would view yourself with suspicion.
I have told you before, what makes me the MOST suspicious about ripple are the "altruistic" posters "that have no stake in it".

I don't see any Ripple ad? I see a link to a post I wrote explaining the Ripple system. No one paid me for that, nor am I encouraging others to copy it into their signature. Are you trolling?

It's ironic you complaining about TradeFortress first when you have a ripple ad in your signature

As if the TradeFortress "Ripple is a Scam" signature ads were bad enough, now everyone is copying his "business model" of offering newbies a raffle ticket for a bitcoin if they put this junk in their signature. PrimeDice being an example. It's not limited to just TradeFortress.

This is diluting the value of the advertising for the board. Note that TradeFortress no longer bids on the ads, since he found a cheaper way to advertise (1 BTC for hundreds of signatures that last forever). Furthermore, newbies are being encouraged to make a lot of useless posts, they get paid based on their post count and how long they keep the ad in their sig (PrimeDice is doing this).

While I believe that people should be allowed to express themselves however they want, now we are getting large fonts and garish signatures with a lot of different colors in the background. Pretty soon half of the page on every post will consist only of advertisements in signatures.

I'm not sure how to fix this. Maybe make all signatures small font with no color backgrounds? The signal to noise ratio of the board is steadily increasing thanks to this nonsense.

Here are some of the sources of the advertising signatures:

Buying Your Signature! Up to 0.15/month

Free bitcoins (up to 0.25BTC/mo): Advertise these links in your sig!

I also noticed that they are sometimes getting placed in the Newbies forum. If everyone did this, newbies would be deluged with worthless posts and promises of "free bitcoins." The forum as a whole would suffer. Off-topic posts are regularly moved into the appropriate forums. But link-advertising is a loophole, a way around the system of moderation. They are the ultimate form of off-topic posts since they follow the user around no matter which forum they post in. The offer of paid signature advertisements is not sustainable behavior, left unchecked it will grow without bounds.

Here's an example of newbies being targeted. In my opinion this is a detriment to the board:

Newbies: 1 BTC FREE RAFFLE - Just add this link to your sig!

This is what the signatures look like: