Topic: The most important thread YOU can contribute to .. this YEAR....no Kidding. (Read 1295 times)

Thank you for being one of the only persons here that seem to be able to process facts as being facts and not some opinion.
The systems as they are now are simply operating as I have described.
I fully agree with what you said too.

Regarding your very last part. I don't think the "owners" of this forum care about money any more I mean I expect they are beyond wealthy. The owners I think are fair and just want to encourage as many people as possible to join in and be part of this movement.

I can not speculate on the owners intentions for leaving sigs. However I can guess only that it is for a good reason in that they may think that to encourage the network effect of this decentralised trustless movement it will help if new people can earn a little bit along the way with no investment other than their time since they may not have much money to invest. I totally sympathise with this view and agree with it and would prefer we developed a fair, objective and transparent system that can provide everyone equal opportunity of contributing,. In other words a true meritocracy. If we try all things and still we see gaming/abuse from both the top and the bottom then removing sigs will be the best way to go.

The problem is here in meta it consists of people mainly at the top end  and those already controlling the paid2post system. So why would they want any change?

This you will notice is why although there is no real argument the current systems are as I describe them there is little motivation here to change them to a fairer system and indeed a far more valuable system for the entire movement.

I have no doubt that these systems were introduced with very good intentions and they have done some good. However it is very difficult to code out systems that can not be gamed or abused. Honestly creating a system here that works like a perfect meritocracy is likely impossible but I do not doubt given enought time and the willing we can together create something much more akin to the projects we are interested in here.  

Thanks very much for joining this thread and commenting and great to know some people even legends are open to change and improvements.

thank you for posting this conclusion. i think you are right.


You have my support. But nobody will care. Because I am not one of the "system controllers".



only if they care about their rank.
and i can understand that people care about their rank. and not just because they want to be able to be in a "Paid2Post Campaign".
but because the have something important to say and they are most of the time just ignored because of their rank.



I think this would be an option.

and I don't know why this have been done already.

thats why i have to ask this questions:
more sig-spamming => more traffic?
more traffic => more money for the "owners" of this forum?
is this the reason that paid sigs are here?


edit: corrected some typos

Make sure to read and fully understand that regarding my description of the systems of control there is no argument. That part is simply a description of how they work? There is clear motivation for abuse and they are clearly wide open to abuse. That is the factual and central point to tackle first and most importantly.

There is no point drilling down to an individual level (although i have done so already if you examine the thread but this is now i see a mistake because it clouds the bigger issue by introducing subjectivity.). You need to look at the system as a whole or you risk giving anecdotal individual experiences more weight than they should have.

However these drilled down claims can again be written off as anecdotal or an isolated case that has no real weight on the system value as a whole. This is obviously subjective although I believe corroborated by events clearly. I am shifting my focus from this to an objective clearly observable and undeniable presentation of pure fact based description of how the entire system works.

There is no real point in me criticising mikey for his anecdotal post if I rely only on anecdotal accounts myself. I am clearly demonstrating the system as a whole is as I say it is.

I mean there is no need for an opinion really . I am stating an observable account of how the systems currently operate and the facts they are wide open to abuse (well it is hard actually to abuse a subjective system if you want to put it like that so that makes it worse)  the facts there are clear motives to abuse and the fact of the small issue of subjective nature on what is deserving of merit . That's without the facts that posts that make clearly incorrect points may be assumed correct by system controllers anyway.

So you therefore have a system that at the very same time creates scores of very low or misleading value you also introduce a system of control of the many by the few that have the motive for selfish gain in terms of financial reward and also in terms of pushing their own person views.

If the only comeback to these facts is - - people may not choose to act selfishly at any point when there are clear financial rewards and clearly other rewards then you need to go back and have another look and think about it.

To help keep merit  ( that does help in some ways and i think could help a lot with a few improvements)

maybe these could help and maybe they will not

1. Put a filter on the merit scores like the removal of the top200-300 on the top 200 - 300 but perhaps leave 10%

2. No merit source can be a  trust source

3. If you are demonstrated to have given merit to an incorrect post or misleading post 3x you are removed from merit source for 6months and lose 100 merits. Learn to give merit to posts that are net positive only. Flying in early to a thread and pumping a ton of merit to a post you assume is correct then only at the end is that side of the debate debunked and shown to be incorrect means you simply added support to a flawed argument and proves you did not understand the topic - - therefore why should you be a merit source??

Not retrospective though -- from now on forward.

4. Make all legends merit sources.

5. Criteria that must be met for giving merit (fail 3x banned from merit source for 6 months)

6. Obvious and blatant merit abusers = 6 month ban and all merits gone.

7. Decouple merit from rank after snr unless all the above 6 can be introduced to avoid restriction of free speech after that rank.



Really I mean anyone not wishing to tighten up the merit system and prefer to leave if totally subjective are demanding it remains a low value metric and even a misleading one and wants the systems left open to abuse and the control over free speech being an obvious and factual possibility.

There is no room for opinion on HOW the systems operate. They operate as they operate.

The argument that some people may not act selfishly even if there are not rules to stop them doing so when there is financial rewards plus other rewards is as ludicrous as many other things I have heard since visiting meta.

It stands to reason before you start using merit scores as a tool to fix the board (more than just holding off everyone who does not get 1 merit from financial rewards in one way - which it does do and has helped plus account farmers) then you need to make the merit scores have some moderate value and not be misleading.  I think again that seems quite obvious and beyond argument too.


Ask yourselves whom would fight to stop things becoming "less open" to abuse?  at the same time as pushing for more systems to be grounded on these scores. Simple answer...

From now on please only post replies if you want to refute the core point regarding how the entire systems currently operate and improvements that can be made. I am not going to focus on gangs and bring in personal experiences going forward. These will cloud the main issue and I believe with the correct improvements it will solve any gang abuse or actually any individual abuse so win win.

I like merit but we need to just give it a few tweaks before more people are scared to say what they want even if it may be true.

Perhaps first even going back to basics and the real core.... what is a net positive post... what is a net negative post...

I think you should start naming some names and providing more evidence on how both "systems" are being controlled by a particular group of members. If you think they are shutting down people by not giving the merits they are deserving as well as them giving neg trust to people they don't like this is clearly an abuse of the system as the way I see it is you are describing how this group is removing their competition for this limited "Paid2Post Campaigns". I won't be siding with anyone but your accusations are really big and without any proof being shown in your post it just makes you look like you are hating some of these people part of these sig campaigns.

Interesting no successful rebuttal of the central point (that I can see) so far and yet the continued wittering on of how to leverage and use the subjective merit system (in its current form) to define low quality posters and high quality posters.

This thread serves as a prime example of why that will not be possible right now.

I swear I tried. Going to pray first to one of my many Gods. I am thinking something the equivalent of:

"Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me"
https://biblehub.com/psalms/23-4.htm

I am honestly ready to forget this gang now because I realise they exist but I have no need to speak to them if they keep away from me.
In every thread  I entered (that they did not create about me) they have previously followed me and then bugged me with their ganging up ways. When I would not adopt their views or rather drop my own views they start to get a bit angry and also I don't much care for some of their talking down tone to people. This kind of intensified (my fault too but I can only take so much rough tone) and then when I got red trust and then attempts to get me banned I decided no more being civil with them. They are nothing I never even heard of them before except TP and he was just a minor person who did nothing so I barely remember him.

Anyway as i say I am not wanting some war to continue although of course since I only present observable facts I can not lose ever any war against me that wishes to deny these events . I actually told them many times that I wished to end the merit cycling discussion and they kept opening new threads and asking me more things. Then saying I am going on about it.

Now I realise although merit works to control newbie spam it must not relate to rank after snr member so that merit control only has power over the speech of the very new. If we must keep it.

I still do not see a rebuttal to my points even after actmyname put up a very impressive reply that made me think deeper but still I see the main crux of him saying just because it can happen does not mean it does happen ... is not sufficient.  This is not what trustless decentralised systems are all about. This board needs systems that does not need layers of central control that can easily be abused. Even if I considered them to be free of the optional abuse (which i do not) then the very fact they can be abused to control speech is not good at all and we should work to improve the system and reduce and central control of ideologies and ideas.

Of course maybe theymos might read this thread but I think theymos is very fair and also probably is quite busy in some very important jobs so maybe we can thrash out a great solution together then ask him how we can implement it once we have devised an improved solution. One man however great they are can not be expected to solve every single issue and as a community we must face up to how things are and deal with them not try to brush things under the rug.

I say again I never in 5 years had any problems with mods or theymos this board has been excellent but now I get told by those that asked for me to help some people are getting bullied and I did try to help  the first guy get his red trust removed (more trust abuse by that fool the pharmacist whom made false claims and tried to bully this poor newbie).  https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/negative-rating-from-the-pharmacist-5063753

I see more people getting bullied and scared to speak out and now they even dare try to bully me too. I see there is a problem and still it is not the mods and theymos bullying us it is some sub layer and they seemingly have power but no mandate and no criteria to keep them in check and this layer are just normal users who compete with other posters but have the power to tip things to their favour . The entire thing is quite insane to leave on this path.

Anyway I do not accuse all of these system controllers of abuse (some are very fair ) but some are (even if we believe a tiny amount I am not sure about that) but the fact it is open to abuse is not at all good.

I never said a solution is easy, I don't have a comprehensive one. However I have made some suggestions for improvements and I see no person explaining  why they can not help and why should not do it. Merit has had a nasty side effect of power over posters we need to reduce the set of users to which it can exert power to a tiny newbie subset and do all we can to stop collusion, force fair review and punish abusers. Seem common sense to me anyway.  

I am here to help this board not cause damage. I love this place. Can't let it all go down the drain. Free speech supported by reasonable argument must never be silenced. This is not in the spirit of decentralised trustless projects. Anyone who believes we should leave even a possibility of a small group having control and influence over peoples free expression is not part of the real community here.

@cryptohunter

Let me put forward another theory that I believe.

Forum is a private forum that is administered by theymos. Might we think that theymos is not aware what is going in this forum but from my personal experience I observed that theymos reads everything here and seldom comments. He is fully aware what is going on this forum.
He has full power to start a very new system and scrap any of the existing system.

If a gang exists than it is not possible that he is not knowing. If he even not taking actions after knowing it then better to leave as it is (because all DT powers and Merit source powers coming from the system designed by theymos.)

I am not agreeing/disagreeing  with your gang theory but I am just saying you have created enough posts/thread about your views and I am sure your views already reached to forum administrator.  

What the problem you think will be rectified by him if he agrees.

So I will say, just take rest and enjoy and you have made enough effort in posting the issues you think.

hello @actmyname

thanks for a great reply here at last.... and thank you for taking time to read my post and also making great answers like this.

Okay I am now looking over it and will gradually work through on here with replies.

Just one thing though for our future debate... can you try to speak to me in perhaps more simple english? Somethings you say I am not sure what exactly they mean. I am improving my English now for some time, but still I am not exactly an expert. I wish I could write as you do but perhaps in another 10 years of brushing up..

This I am looking forward to since I know that you are a fair person too.

I will be adding to this post as I go... so anyway I am not too good with how to do quoting so you will be italics i will be standard. Save me using quotation and not get my account banned.


I don't see the point of forcing a conflicting discussion to have only one side given merit. Merit is not a zero-sum game: the purpose is to reward sensible and on-topic posts. The posts that do not deserve merit are those that are irrelevant to the discussion or clearly very loosely thought-out. (i.e. reading topic title and responding). Moreover, your whole "battle" is more of you saying, "I haven't given this much thought, therefore I will read your post later," since the conditions are based on the soundness of their post in regards to yours. This is something that can be declared immediately after reading, or shortly thereafter.

-Hypothetical example.

Are you saying - In an example where Alice says something that is provably correct and produces evidence for this. Then Bob can come along and refute Alice giving no suitable explanation of why Alice is wrong and still Bob will still deserve to have more merit than Alice or any merit at all?  I do not at this point accept this if that is what you are saying.

1. Bob even contradicting Alice without presenting evidence to disprove Alice or show her evidence to be false is trying to stop the truth being known even if BOB thinks his opinion is the truth.

2. Over time if this kept happening Alice would have less merit than BoB. Bobs merit would continue to grow and Alice would have way less than bob even though her information is correct and true. That does not sound correct to me.

3. Bobs post does not add any value because it is wrong  and certainly does not add more than Alices post. If Bob gets more support via merit and via other incorrect posts backing bob then the entire message Alice brought which is entirely  true is devalued because readers without the capacity to understand will assume that the higher merit = the more correct assumption or explanation. Also if more people tend to support Bobs wrong explanation or opinion that adds even more weight to bobs incorrect opinion.

I believe the principle issue with your posts are their length and structure. You need to better articulate your points as to convey understanding not to yourself, but to others.
"A wrong statement can be fixed but an incomprehensible statement will always be wrong."

This I can accept. Which part of what I wrote was incomprehensible - I will rewrite it to better explain my point.


I just read your post and before I make any comments, I'll say this: any proposition that makes an extraordinary declaration should have sufficient evidence to disprove the null hypothesis. Anything short of that will be considered false and potentially reliant on biases prevalent in the data.

You have an argument that DT can give red trust at will. That is untrue partly due to:
1) public backlash
2) dilution of red trust value (i.e. if red = scammers = poor english then there is a false equivalence)


I do not accept this to be true at this stage or I do not get what you mean.

1. Public backlash does not mean they can not leave it in the first place
I was told by a DT member that you can have red trust for saying you do not like lemons.
Also I have seen Red trust give on the basis of false assumption by DT member and not retracted even when proven wrong.
Perhaps "at will" does not mean the same to me and you.
I mean a DT can give you RED and not remove it even when proven wrong.
So if they can give it to you for not liking lemons and even if they are demonstrated to have given red trust on their false assumption then... they are able to give red trust for what they like when they like.

2. Dilution of red trust value is happening but med term still has power. People fear red trust because
a/ traders think it will put others off
b/ sig campaign managers do not allow red trust participants.
c/ people can assume because you have red trust you are a scammer (even if it is not true)

You also have an argument that 0.13% of users have the highest merit. Well, yeah. That's kind of how it works, though. Merit is not based on a communist approach. You might say that 80% of their merit is reduced if the top 200 merit holders' transactions were gone but that should be true of almost every other person on the forum.

But it is not true. Because if you look at the stats it demonstrates the lower you go down the list then less difference extracting the 0.13% makes.

Communist approach - what does that mean? every post gets fair consideration and measured by the same criteria?

My entire point about merit (before I realised it is a seriously damaging control tool)

Merit does not represent anything? there is no criteria and there is no way to give every post fair consideration. Entire boards are on ignore by merit sources? As I have said before a great poster who's posts have huge value and accuracy may have only 50 merit in alt discussion compared to someone who's logic is corrupt and without knowing it voicing opinions that are incorrect. They may have negative net value but 666 merit score.

We therefore can not treat merit as an objective score and make any concrete assumptions based upon it.
I have witnessed many times peoples posts achieving high merit when they are observably incorrect.

Do you know what the problem with your argument is? It kind of hinges on "everyone is here to make money" and the issue is that people want to prevent spam from overtaking the forum (it already has). Anyone who is here to learn about bitcoin will leave. Not because of rank lockup (for most) but because the forum is a cesspool. Anyone who is really here to learn about or to discuss bitcoin will stay.

I am assuming the vast majority here want to earn money I don't think that is unreasonable at all perhaps not all. I don't see that invalidates anything that I have said though. I would not like to see even 1% of people wanting to post their view on something but being afraid not because they think they are wrong but because they are scared to do so.


Your 'signature removal' solution has been echoed by a lot of members who you claim are abusing the systems, by the way.

I can not believe any of the persons that I have accused of abusing the system want sigs removed. I am not accusing all persons part of the control systems (merit)(trust) are abusers only that the entire sytems are open to abuse anyway.


You are describing their post. You are creating a tautology. "If your post is your post, then that adds serious weight to my argument..." is an equivalent statement.

I can't find where I wrote that part?

What I am saying is. If that Bobs post is contradicting Alices post but Alices post is beyond contradiction in several areas (except gangs which I think there is a lot of corroborating events that demonstrate reasonable assumption)

To me BOB here is producing "true" anecdotal statements that do not refute at all Alices statements but Bob seems to believe that they do. Others reading Bobs true statements believing that they rebut Alices are incorrect. Bob by believing his statement is a rebuttal is incorrect even if his statements are true.

Bob in this case is a fair person making fair comments and they are true to him. However Alices post has still not received a rebuttal. The core claims that her post makes are provably correct. There are still no holes in them. I accept Bob may have told the truth.. that his experience here is yet unfettered (to his knowledge) by these control systems. That does not mean they have not been (without him knowing) or that they will be later, or that others have not been, or that the control that Alice mentions is clearly there is not there. This seems sensible and clear to me.

So yes I agree Bob's post was largely true in his case. It does nothing to demonstrate Alice discovery that M&T are control systems that can be used to control posting behaviour to the point of stopping people voicing their own views without considering the implications that could arise from upsetting "system controllers"

Quote from: cryptohunter on 24-12-2018, 12:48:15
Each person should remove your merits for that post if you can not prove what you have said is correct relating to my post.


I don't see any false statements in mikey's posts, a lot of which are subjective statements which are true by principle.

This does not matter regarding my post.

Bob (mikey) is implying what he said contradicts what Alice (cryptohuter) has cleary demonstrated is fact based on observable public evidence/events. This is not the case at all. Bob spoke the truth but was trying to using these true experiences to try to rebut Alice but they do not.

Imagine this

Big swimming pool lots of people in it lets say 1000 people

Alice notices some sharks in there

Alice then notices some sharks attacking and starting to eat some one

Alice then notices some sharks attacking and eating another guy

Alice  shouts out there are some sharks that can eat people in here and are doing so

BOB shouts out I'm riding a shark and he likes me I can tell,.. I think Alice is making and fuss and I am doubtful of what she says

People cheer and say Bob you are who we think is cool because we don't want to get out of the pool

Alice says no BOB perhaps only your shark may be nice but I say these sharks can eat people if they want to and are dangerous

Alice says look everyone just because Bob says his shark is fun that does not mean all sharks will be fun ...therefore Bob suggesting I am wrong is incorrect although he was speaking the truth.

Claire comes along and says Bob is not lying at all his shark is really fun and not attacking him stop saying Bob is incorrect when he is telling the truth

Alice says I am not saying Bob is not telling the truth to say his shark is fun. Bob is incorrect to assume  (I) Alice is incorrect just because his shark did not attack him yet.

The fact Bob is even saying anything is actually negative to reaching optimal action in this situation. Ie he is preventing people leaving the pool or the removal of the sharks.

His comments are net negative. However got over 20x more merit. This is why merit is broken.

I think this is what I am trying to say. If that analogy is incorrect then tell me how and I will fix it.

Merit isn't censorship and merit is subjective.

Merit being subjective makes it censorship.

Because merit is subjective but given a value . It's value (rank - rank=paid2post) is used as reward or held back as punishment. That equals censorship through ...well reward and punishment. It is control and undeniable.

The implementation of merit was to reduce the amount of spammers on the forum. This has succeeded.

this is exactly what I have stated previously was the purpose but was told I was incorrect.
It has succeeded to a large degree but it has now become a control system and is used to censor peoples posts.

So anyway let me break your post down so I we together can examine it..

1. Explain my conspiracy theory in detail so that I can see where I am going wrong and why it is a conspiracy theory not something clearly observable. Which part of my theory is conspiratorial exactly?
Your whole PAID2POST debacle with merit/trust gangs.

Impossible to claim that is is not the case. I have detailed how it works.

Quote from: cryptohunter on 24-12-2018, 12:48:15
2. Do you think giving the people that control rank (merit) and trust (dt trust) therefore total control over PAID2POST and trading - without giving them clear criteria they have to stick to and no come back for not sticking to it is a good idea.
Guidelines exist to prevent abuse. PAID2POST is a non-argument.

Incorrect in my opinion. We must explore this one much further.

Free speech is upheld because you can still write what you choose. The only reason you might decide to pander to others is to try and earn morsels of merit.

There is strong motive to not upset "system controllers"

This is not free speech. guy with big gun tells me  stop shouting to alert others hes stealing their car. I may pander to his request because I want to earn morsels of extra living time. I have free speech but it will have consequences meaning to me my speech is not free at all or it is very controlled. This is not what I call free speech.

3. Do you think that in light of the fact that the people controlling the ability of others to participate in PAID2POST and (trading) are obviously then able to control the competition to the "exclusive" and highly paid spots that they say NO WAY IN HELL WILL THEY STOP GETTING PAID2POST WITH is ... the fact they can control their own competition with no clear mandate is not a problem you say?
It's unclear why anybody would send merit to non-Legendary members if they were scared of their spots being compromised

1. to obfuscate total and utter blatant selfish rewarding
2. ensure the system of control could go on longer
3. as yet competition is not at critical point

Do you think a situation where people are telling me they support my view but are scared to comment is a situation on a board that should be allowed to exist? and that means nothing because you could power up your scores here?

The fact of the matter is that some are senselessly scared of red trust abuse on conflicting opinions, which is a non-issue if they use anonymous accounts. If they want their opinions to have weight, then they should use their real accounts. DT is not meant for suppressing dissenting opinions and if anyone uses it for that then they are using the feedback system improperly: why I sent you a counter-rating.

I thank you for that but of course the system is open to that abuse and it takes place. Hence if you had not countered it and i was a trader or wanted to be in a sig campaign i would have reason to fear it. I do not think we have a system where these system controllers can make it essential to create puppet accounts to voice our free speech to avoid reprisals and punishments permitted to take place by the subjective and abused natures of these systems.

The gang knows exactly who I am referring to. This though is not the point the fact that there are no criteria and there is no real comeback for abuse in these systems (not all need to abuse) that control peoples ability to PAID2POST  their rates get they are paid and also trading to a degree of course allows them to control posting behaviour with financial carrot and stick can you demonstrate how that is not true.
The fact that this might be happening doesn't mean it is happening.




You can not employ a system that just trusts people to do the correct and non selfish thing when finances are involved.

Plus I have already said people have told me they are scared to post and I too have endured some carrot and stick (mostly stick cos i hate carrots) to control my posts. That's a bit like a bank leaving everyones balance on the counter and saying just do what you like when you come inside and trusting people to only take their own money.Trusting people to act in a non selfish way when there is financial gain to be had by doing so is crazy and ludicrous.

YOU CAN NOT POSSIBLY ARGUE AGAINST THIS OR CALL IT A CONSPIRACY.  Do you not understand this is clearly observable?
If your argument is that the systems are prone to corruption without third-party action then I would vehemently agree. However, in its current state, it's more-or-less stable.

What do you mean by more - or- less- stable.

Do you not see that having a system where a tiny group get to decide who can be PAID2POST and trade whilst also wanting to be PAID2POST  at the highest rates is not an optimal system ?
#BanSignatures

Oh, and the whole merit source mutually exclusive to DT list thing won't really change anything. In both cases, members of low rank can be applicable for both positions (though unlikely) and the matter is curved if the person (not user) uses alts.

How can separating them and them being chosen not by themselves but by admin not help? So a person chosen by admin to be in "merit control" can not be in " trust control" this makes collusion harder does it not? I understand with alts you can game it slightly but it must be an improvement anyway. I am not an expert in game theory but I can not see how this is not an improvement.

7. Can you tell me how this war started and how you conclude I started it and detail it here for me to understand. Do you mean raising factual important points is starting a war over nothing?
The war is really composed of all your battles (threads) spanning multiple territories (Meta and Reputation) aimed at different targets (various DT members)

I asked about the starting of the wars not where the wars took place. Do you say that I started these wars and if so please show me the origins.

Quote from: cryptohunter on 24-12-2018, 12:48:15
8. I will then if anyone wants drill it down post by post and detail what I say each person has done I was trying to not make it become about individuals and keep it at an overall system level discussion where the biggest changes could be discussed and the biggest improvements made.
It is about individuals, though. This is not a massive macro-scale system composed of hundreds of users. It's the individuals that matter: those who you state are abusing the system should be suppressed and those who are not will seek to dissolve the unfavorable individuals.


Okay then for drilling down please just select the same characters that you notice on every one of my war threads. That's just if we want to drill it down right now. However to me the individuals involved this time just highlight the problem with the system. So the system should be the focus. The source not this particular gang which is just a visible symptom.

9. Are you in agreement that these statements are true.

a. - most pre merit legends are spammers?
b. - that I am an idiot and incorrect to believe that some of the 99.93% of current posters (not top200 merit hoarders) are able to make posts as good if not better than some of the 0.13% of the board (top 200 merit hoarders)
A is true since over 90% of any rank are spammers.
As for B... of course some members can make posts better than some members. That's a non-argument. This doesn't illustrate anything.

90% of legends are spammers?  where did you get this data? I can not accept "most" or that 90% of legends are spammers without seeing where this data comes from.

B - I'm not sure  if you read it correctly the first time.

If I said some midgets are taller than some giants then you would have to disagree. There are 2 different groups.

Both statements to me remain ludicrous.

Quote from: cryptohunter on 24-12-2018, 12:48:15
10 - Do you think we should be critical of people coming here to milk this board like a cash cow and monetise their posts whilst we are making the most money via PAID2POST?

There are those with paid signatures and there are those that don't read more than 1 post in a thread that they're replying to. Peek the Economics and Bitcoin Discussion sections, and go to the recent posts.

this answer I don't quite understand what it means?

Quote from: cryptohunter on 24-12-2018, 12:48:15
11. Can you tell me the what % of your merits came from bitcoin discussion or alt coin discussion and which communities here you belong to which enable you to give a comprehensive view of how merits are being deployed over a wide and varied group of members here to compare to your own experience. Do you believe if your specific example somehow refutes any of the claims that i have made and if so please present this case in detail.
Certain boards are typically avoided due to the fact that they are mostly-consumed by spam. I have an analogue for this:

Would you rather take blood from a straight man or a gay man? One has a high risk of aids, which is why they are barred from giving blood. Similarly, those boards have a high percentage of spam. I'm willing to say that less than 0.1% of the posts are real discussions.


I agree with this and have said the same. This does not refute my claim that any good posts in those sections are not going to be given the same chance of getting merit. This was never an accusation levelled at the "merit controllers" because I recognise that they can not be expected to sift through all of that. It does not matter why they are not getting the same attention for review though it only matters that it does happen. To me unless every post was run though an AI that marked each post against some comprehensive criteria that treated everyone to the same chance of review and by that same criteria then merit is not useful as an objective score. That is without taking into account deliberate abuse and not just honest subjectivity which I think will make it even less valuable.


Quote from: cryptohunter on 24-12-2018, 12:48:15
12. My motive is simple I want fairness for all and equal opportunity for all hence why I love all projects that further an end to end decentralised and trustless arena where this is an unavoidable consequence.
The simple solution? Ban signatures.

agreed

Quote from: cryptohunter on 24-12-2018, 12:48:15
I mean surely for my post to be of "lower value 0 merit" than your own your post (multiple merit) that seems to present rebuttal to my own must be able to prove that my points are incorrect and that yours are correct and that your post is pushing toward a more optimal solution than my own.
This is your thought process. You're projecting, here. Again, merit is subjective.

I was saying though if merit an accurate measure of value ... I agree that it means nothing in its current form. Merit can mean anything to anyone so applying any objective value to it is impossible..

Quote from: cryptohunter on 24-12-2018, 12:48:15
Let us in public now explore all of this and find the truth or which post of the 2 is more valuable.
What deserves merit is not a group philosophy, it is an opinion: that of the individual.


I agree that the opinion of the individual needs be heard in its free form not controlled and manipulated or stunted . My main point.

I start to see how you view merit and it is different to what I thought merit was meant to stand for.

I say the truth is what warrants merit not the individuals view of what the truth is.

I say anyone contradicting what is provably correct  should not have merit even though they may think they are correct.

I can not see how we can place value on posts that are provably incorrect even though they may put effort in because it is net negative to reaching the optimal decisions and actions? does it not?

Thanks for posting I hope you will come back and drill down some of these points further.

Hello, essay-writer.

---

Sit down, grab a cup of tea, and start reading.

---

I don't see the point of forcing a conflicting discussion to have only one side given merit. Merit is not a zero-sum game: the purpose is to reward sensible and on-topic posts. The posts that do not deserve merit are those that are irrelevant to the discussion or clearly very loosely thought-out. (i.e. reading topic title and responding). Moreover, your whole "battle" is more of you saying, "I haven't given this much thought, therefore I will read your post later," since the conditions are based on the soundness of their post in regards to yours. This is something that can be declared immediately after reading, or shortly thereafter.

I believe the principle issue with your posts are their length and structure. You need to better articulate your points as to convey understanding not to yourself, but to others.
"A wrong statement can be fixed but an incomprehensible statement will always be wrong."

This is an example of how your lack of brevity inflates your posts, to the point where few will even decide to read it. It's an intimidating mass of words. You could phrase this paragraph as such:


Before I tackle this sentence, might I suggest breaking it apart instead of having a run-on sentence of literally 95 words?

I just read your post and before I make any comments, I'll say this: any proposition that makes an extraordinary declaration should have sufficient evidence to disprove the null hypothesis. Anything short of that will be considered false and potentially reliant on biases prevalent in the data.

You have an argument that DT can give red trust at will. That is untrue partly due to:
1) public backlash
2) dilution of red trust value (i.e. if red = scammers = poor english then there is a false equivalence)

You are describing their post. You are creating a tautology. "If your post is your post, then that adds serious weight to my argument..." is an equivalent statement.

I don't see any false statements in mikey's posts, a lot of which are subjective statements which are true by principle.

Merit isn't censorship and merit is subjective.

The implementation of merit was to reduce the amount of spammers on the forum. This has succeeded.

Your whole PAID2POST debacle with merit/trust gangs.

Guidelines exist to prevent abuse. PAID2POST is a non-argument.

Free speech is upheld because you can still write what you choose. The only reason you might decide to pander to others is to try and earn morsels of merit.

It's unclear why anybody would send merit to non-Legendary members if they were scared of their spots being compromised.

The fact of the matter is that some are senselessly scared of red trust abuse on conflicting opinions, which is a non-issue if they use anonymous accounts. If they want their opinions to have weight, then they should use their real accounts. DT is not meant for suppressing dissenting opinions and if anyone uses it for that then they are using the feedback system improperly: why I sent you a counter-rating.

The fact that this might be happening doesn't mean it is happening.

If your argument is that the systems are prone to corruption without third-party action then I would vehemently agree. However, in its current state, it's more-or-less stable.

#BanSignatures

Oh, and the whole merit source mutually exclusive to DT list thing won't really change anything. In both cases, members of low rank can be applicable for both positions (though unlikely) and the matter is curved if the person (not user) uses alts.

(throughout post)

The war is really composed of all your battles (threads) spanning multiple territories (Meta and Reputation) aimed at different targets (various DT members)

It is about individuals, though. This is not a massive macro-scale system composed of hundreds of users. It's the individuals that matter: those who you state are abusing the system should be suppressed and those who are not will seek to dissolve the unfavorable individuals.

A is true since over 90% of any rank are spammers.
As for B... of course some members can make posts better than some members. That's a non-argument. This doesn't illustrate anything.

There are those with paid signatures and there are those that don't read more than 1 post in a thread that they're replying to. Peek the Economics and Bitcoin Discussion sections, and go to the recent posts.

Certain boards are typically avoided due to the fact that they are mostly-consumed by spam. I have an analogue for this:

Would you rather take blood from a straight man or a gay man? One has a high risk of aids, which is why they are barred from giving blood. Similarly, those boards have a high percentage of spam. I'm willing to say that less than 0.1% of the posts are real discussions.

The simple solution? Ban signatures.

This is your thought process. You're projecting, here. Again, merit is subjective.

What deserves merit is not a group philosophy, it is an opinion: that of the individual.

---

I'll stop the post here. Part 2 coming soon.

---

Addendum

I believe it would be best to revise your future posts to avoid any digressions (i.e. stick to the argument!) or to section it off into different components if they're going to be as long as the one I was focusing on.

And on the case of my paid signature: no, I won't remove it. But I'm also not on this forum exclusively for money, either. Otherwise, I would be racking up 50 posts every week which I certainly wouldn't have the time for (lest I compromise quality).

I enjoy my occasional free lunches, wouldn't you?

Yes you do post what would seem to be a very good point...I would expect exactly the same as you.

The problem is some people do not stick up for themselves. Some people just accept authority even if their decisions are not fair.

However most people do not get any attention for a red trust because they are confined to reputation forum for their threads.
If you visit the reputation forum you will notice a lot of people have been upset at getting red trust
Even in my thread if you read through it you will see some legends complaining at other legends for red trust although some now have managed to get their trust back to 0 via other means.

Red trust should need criteria to be placed and it must be strict and enforced else the DT member is removed.
Merit is a a more widespread threat to me than trust though.

The fact even Legends are scared to speak out when they want to then that tells me there is a big problem because their fear did not come from admin level actions. Mods act on clear mandates and by criteria that can be appealed against. Red trust you can get for saying you did not like LEMONS?? I mean that comes from a DT member that is actually a nice enough person and not a gang member.

I think you honestly seek the truth so I would say please read everything I have written on this thread over and over and then please answer those points that I numbered. Those points if tackled 1 by 1 will honestly allow you to see the damage merit (i think is worse than trust sytem to point) and DT lists (without criteria or comeback for abuse of that criteria ) does. It really is not something that can be denied. I would honestly rather have total anarchy than i would a system of control that silences free speech that can be proven to be true or highly probable if you are talking long term.

Also check out my suggested improvements and tell me what you think about those.

I don't actually  understand the resistance by many to improve things and removing/improving systems that are already stopping free speech here.

On the trust page it says:


I think the fact that it doesn't show e.g. on local altcoin boards is a bug, not a feature. Some ICO scams like Arbitao have been essentially booted out of the English ANN board but prosper on local boards. But that's a whole different story. Neutral doesn't affect any of that so I'm gonna keep using it for "comments".

sorry i can't reply to everything, but i do not understand what do you mean by other people being afraid to speak up? afraid of what? being tagged by DT members? i assume that non of the DT members is stupid to enough to abuse that system in such an obvious way that everyone and their grandmother can see, if 10 people commented on your topic now and said the same things you are saying about the "gang" who will have the balls to abuse the system to that extent by tagging everyone who says anything about them?  

one negative trust and you started a whole topic and the DT member had no choice but to take it away, imagine he gives 10 negatives and the whole Meta board turns to a serial of topics against him. i bet the horse he will be in deep in shit.

now the only thing anyone can do including the "gang" is to try and fight you back without using the "power" at their disposal. by maybe finding a plagiarism or a scam  accusation against you, and that is their legal right to defend themselves and all the tools at their disposal are nothing special, you will get the same sort of a fight-back from anyone or any "gang" regardless of their rank or merit for that matter.  unless they start giving you negatives, or accusing you for being a scam or something, then i see nothing wrong with anyone trying to defend themselves. and to be honest I think they are not that much into each other, but by fighting them all together at the same time , they might turn into a real "gang" this time for real  .




we can debate all night on this topic, but really neutral does not mean tagging someone thet you don't like. an example of trust feedback is:

1- positive > you had a successful trade/trades with this guy, you send them money first, they kept their end of the deal and sent the goods > trustful.
2- negative >  this person scammed you , by either not sending you the money/goods he promised to, or they arrived in bad shape > can't be trusted
3- neutral > they sent you the money first , you sent them the goods > ( they had no chance to scam you ) but this does not mean they are "trustful" thus a neutral represent that the person has done a successful trade without being in a position of gaining trust hence " ability to scam".

I am sure Theymos can confirm that this is the initial propose of the trust system. you see people with negative trust  " Warning: Trade with extreme caution! ". it does not say  "Warning: Interact with extreme caution!

if the trust system was meant to be the way the you think, then why theymos doesn't have it show across all parts of the forum? it is a pretty plain simple answer.

however,since people started to use the trust system as another way of measuring other members it started to sound normal for something tagging someone else for their ugly avatar.

as long as  there are no clear rules on how MUST the trust system be used for, then everybody will have their own "way" of using it.

Let's just stick to the thread.  If you do not want to read it, understand it and contribute then that is fine. The very notion of what I am saying being jibber jabber is quite strange.

Can you direct me to a more important post than evidence the systems under admin are silencing free speech here.

I will await your more important thread and change my title when provided.

I say again to any poster thinking to post on this thread please do not post unless you can bring supporting/corroborating evidence to support your opinions or claims.

I am still waiting for anyone to demonstrate anything that I have posted is incorrect...so i am assuming therefore that there is a lot of weight behind those assumptions and that should be very worrying for anyone that can actually understand the problem.

Idk why you think so, but this certainly ain't the most important post of the month. This is just a wall text consisting of jibber-jabber.

Idk what's up with you and your recent behavior, but honestly,enough with the big text walls. It hurts the human eye.

Honestly,go and have a Bloody Mary, its Christmas ffs.

Your message is not clear. I want examples of what you posted for the neutral trust even.  Your link leads to nothing of denying facts. Bring the evidence here. I am glad it has come up although I don't want to derail this thread into a specific case I would rather keep it at a system level discussion. However since you want to explain your neutral trust here I will listen to it. Bring it with the full example.

I don't want too much focus on one case this is much bigger thing that a gang of non achieving scum bags getting to enforce their ideologies and ideas here.

I want to get back to the bigger picture after he produces his reasoning for the neutral trust.

As soon as theymos implements a button for that... which is probably never. It's your own fault for posting sensible things


Neutral is neutral. I use it as a post-it note to mark exceptional users such as merit-beggars and others who don't deserve a "+" or a "-" but I need to remember whom I dealing with when I encounter them later on. If anybody else finds it useful - great, but that's not the main purpose.

It's not about trust or distrust (otherwise it would be "+" or "-"), does not affect the trust score, so as long as the message itself clearly indicates what it's for I don't see how it could be a problem.

First I hope that you did see this part that I wrote...

"I have nothing against you  and you sound like a very nice and reasonable individual"  - those are not scare quotes either. So this means someone really wrote it and it was myself.

So do not get the impression I am going to pull a full psychotic episode on you and started going full I AM LEGEND CRYPTOHUNTER NOW LEAVING IN MY VERY EXPENSIVE AUTOMOBILE on you  (if you don't get why I say this fair enough just ignore that part). This will remain civil as long as others will remain civil to me that is how I always operate unless I am dealing with scammers or people that have tried to do sneaky things to me or have been uncivil with me or tried to damage me in some way. That is how I operate in life. Think of me as a mirror if you like.

I simply want to explore this very very very important topic right now before we make more and more mistake building upon a very flawed system of subjective merit.

I am not trying to deride you for trying to make a post you thought when your wrote it (and may still do ) that it was correct or perhaps it is correct we will see. I simply saying that ANY post that gets merit that is provably NOT correct or is in objection/opposition to a post that provides proven observable fact.. or if a post can not provide any thing of substance to counter the claims made in the post it is replying to can not possibly be given merit.

It is misleading and completely mad to merit a post that is wrong, or has no grounding and is demonstrated to be false over highly likely to be false. I mean how can we merit things someone can demonstrate using reason and logic are in correct or highly highly improbable and even based upon false assumption most of the time.

This part

"I am not obligated to prove the non-existence of something that you have within your thoughts, it is you who has to prove the opposite."

which part of my post is that referring to? If it is the actual gang existence of collusion and corruption then we will shall leave that part until last because although It is a sickening example of what CAN happen I am not as bothered by single instances of something that creating a system where it is IMPOSSIBLE or very difficult for it to happen.

I would like you to read the numbered points that I have made and leave out any of the number you think are not proven or just simple fact that I have already mentioned in my first post. These you will find need to be answered because these are not things I have dreamed up they are an accurate appraisal of how the system functions right now. So answer the ones that are which you consider related to facts only and then we will leave the other ones.

Let me just answer some of you points though because you make some valid ones.


1. MY sig is used to promote Bruno - who I nominated for most cool person on this board. Who won best person on this board.  I actually do not even know if his project is going ahead or if I am getting anything at all from leaving it on there or if it was over months ago or if it has started yet. I usually use my sig to push projects that I believe in . I am suggesting ALL persons have their sig removed that would include myself. I do not feel financially motivated to post and never have. I appreciate this board has made me very rich and I do not think we should deride people for wanting to make money but we can not be hypocrites or unfairly suppress other people ...we must give everyone a fair chance to work in a real meritocracy.


2. The merit system can never work unless every post is run through a system which marks it against the same criteria...else there can never be true value attributed to it. I agree airdropped merit is no more representative of real value. I am happy for them all to vanish and have the entire merit system deleted. Merit was and is good for preventing newbie sock puppet spam but I think it has far too many side effects to be net positive right now I 100% think it is net negative and dangerous. One quick fix could be for merit to only count towards rank up until full member that would give full members and above no chance of having their speech controlled by those that control merit. Trust is another thing though that needs tightening up in a big way. Neg trust should be based either on something related to scamming in a financial way or there must be a cast iron case and super strong case for suggesting a warning of trading with them is dangerous to their finances. Otherwise instant removal from DT list. Trust scores need to mean something for trading with them. Nobody wants to read 1000 pages of negative trust because they don't wish to eat LEMONS.

3. Free speech has been EXCELLENT  and a real credit to this board and the mods. I am fighting although you may not yet realise it for exactly that. The mods and theymos may stay the same but you can not allow a new layer of control slide in between the users and the admin. That is exactly what I am telling you has happened here already. The influence is impossible to deny

1. motivation to align and agree with or not speak up to those with merit givers to earn merit - merit controls rank controls your ability to earn
2.  motivation to align and agree with or not speak up to those DT members to NOT get red trust. - trading and again sig campaigns

these are not really debatable to be fair they are undeniable ....

I use the word motivation to be nice and no sound dramatic but actually these control systems put fear into people and crush their free speech.

It was not until I was told by some members they would like to support me but "dare not" worry about reprisals that will stop them trading or stop them getting on sig campaigns that I realised that even a legend can be worried by these "system controllers".

I had presumed (because I never examined the board and how it works ) LEGENDS  could go no higher and therefore only answered to admin. I had not studied this until I heard about LEGENDS being scared to speak out.  When I realised that sig campaigns will not allow RED TRUST even from a LEGEND and also I had not considered the trading side of it either that having red trust will be bad if you trade here.

I hope you can see this is not called a conspiracy this is called pure observable fact. To try to deny this is either a lack of understanding or you have some other piece of information that you can reveal that undoes what I say. I will welcome this.

Please understand that I am not saying I want the merit removed from your post because I don't want you to have merit. Honestly if Theymos can give you my merit (all of it) but I retain my rank I request it happens now. I have no care for merit.

Why I said it should be removed is the same reason merit should never be allowed to remain on a post that is incorrect or in opposition to a post that is provably correct (same thing i guess)

Nothing personal against you and you seem like a normal nice person who talks to people with respect and you will always get the very same thing back from me.

My crazy pisstaking and ranting only happens to people that do unfair or cowardly backstabbing to me or speak to me poorly and call me an idiot when I am clearly speaking the truth.

I have no desire at all to abuse or deride or talk down or put down or point out their bad points to  innocent and nice people. I am constantly helping people on here and in life all the time that are nothing to do with me. I do it because.... well why not if you can.

As I said I want a civil debate with respect to anyone who respects me. ( I don't include anyone who has tried to fuck me before in that category once you try to fuck someone over and collude to shut them down for nothing other than revealing the truth )

 i took the time and effort to try and help you out by giving you a free advice and now you are worried about the merit i got for that post ( for everyone who gave me the merit please remove them now ).

I am not obligated to prove the non-existence of something that you have within your thoughts, it is you who has to prove the opposite.

i did not read the long reply of yours, but I skimmed through some of the points and i see a lot of contradictions.

1- you talk about PAID2POST BUT you are wearing a signature

2- you talk about merit and you are pre-merited too, there a dozen of other members who earned more merits than you and many other legendary members and are still way far from your rank, so should i start a thread demanding all the airdropped merits to be deleted?  will you stand at a better position by then?  does it even matter?

3- you mention a lot about free speech, and you are getting exactly that, you made a dozen of topics regarding your thoughts, non was deleted ( non that i am aware of) and you pretty much saying everything you want to say. how much more of freedom are you looking for ?

The only valid case that you have( IMO) is the negative trust you got from marlboroza, and i would also agree that marlboroza and suchmoon should not even leave you a neutral trust with such feedback as i strongly believe that trust rating is only meant for trading related subject and nothing else.

so if you would narrow down your list of demands to only that, i will be first to support you as am sure many others will, but as far as the "gang" thing goes i will just have to wish you luck.

Good post and I am glad you made the effort to make it. However I am unable to merit it at this point. I will though in future if it is proven to make my post redundant and demonstrate it is of zero merit value. However I expect all merits removed from your post if it turns out to be a bunch of words that does not rebut my post nor even tackle the prime points I make.


This post is a prime example of what exactly I am talking about. So either people in meta are unable to understand what it is that I am saying or there is something very strange about meta in deed. Or that I am having problems with understanding how to interpret observable events. So let's find out.

Let me accept as I am open minded then you COULD be correct about some things. Let me then find the optimal and true answer by having a sensible debate. If you are correct then I will retract my post and put a big RED statement that I am wrong at the top.

Or will I here now provide reasonable and corroborating evidence that this is a post that gains a bunch of merit for something that tries to refute something that is clearly provable and observable???

and therefore not only should it not get any merit it should actually get negative merit for trying to convince people of something that is clearly NOT true.

I mean when someone clearly breaks down a system and tells you how it observable operates and the dangers of it operating like this and the possible ways to improve then another post tries to claim that it is a conspiracy and the system is fine the way (with some minor abuse perhaps) it is then does not even attempt to provide any reason why my proposed solutions would not bring improvement then that counter post to my own is indeed negative post and stands in the path to moving to a more optimal solution.

let me find out because if it is that kind of post I would expect that adds serious weight to my argument and demonstrates that you need to bring the exact changes that I have specified.

Each person should remove your merits for that post if you can not prove what you have said is correct relating to my post. In adding merit to a post that is negative and not adding merit to a post that is correct and pushes towards improving systems he demonstrates are not only open to corruption but are being used by a gang to stifle free speech......that is a system that needs to be fixed or removed. With that in mind all merit scores would be null and void and any meaning read into them should be struck away. To even consider more systems built upon a broken system like that is not going to go well.

So anyway let me break your post down so I we together can examine it..



1. Explain my conspiracy theory in detail so that I can see where I am going wrong and why it is a conspiracy theory not something clearly observable. Which part of my theory is conspiratorial exactly?

2. Do you think giving the people that control rank (merit) and trust (dt trust) therefore total control over PAID2POST and trading - without giving them clear criteria they have to stick to and no come back for not sticking to it is a good idea. You can not see how that could be a huge error that can lead to them controlling peoples free speach here. You can not make that connection?

3. Do you think that in light of the fact that the people controlling the ability of others to participate in PAID2POST and (trading) are obviously then able to control the competition to the "exclusive" and highly paid spots that they say NO WAY IN HELL WILL THEY STOP GETTING PAID2POST WITH is ... the fact they can control their own competition with no clear mandate is not a problem you say?

4. Do you think a situation where people are telling me they support my view but are scared to comment is a situation on a board that should be allowed to exist? and that means nothing because you could power up your scores here?

5. Can you list these people I am over reaching in my mind with? I mean obviously there are some very GOOD people in these systems because some have countered the unfair red trust and also helped me also they have helped the bullied person in my first example. However I am not saying All persons in the "control systems" have to be BAD. This is not the point.

The gang knows exactly who I am referring to. This though is not the point the fact that there are no criteria and there is no real comeback for abuse in these systems (not all need to abuse) that control peoples ability to PAID2POST  their rates get they are paid and also trading to a degree of course allows them to control posting behaviour with financial carrot and stick can you demonstrate how that is not true.

YOU CAN NOT POSSIBLY ARGUE AGAINST THIS OR CALL IT A CONSPIRACY.  Do you not understand this is clearly observable? Do you not see that having a system where a tiny group get to decide who can be PAID2POST and trade whilst also wanting to be PAID2POST  at the highest rates is not an optimal system ?  please break this down for me and not just say i powered up the other month so its all okay and some how you believe that is refutes ANYTHING  that I have said. It means absolutely nothing there can be various reasons for your specific example that does nothing to refute my statements that I have formed by examining how things actually work and having people tell me they are scared to post what they like.

6. Can you find some negatives and post them here now to the improvements/solutions I have provided in my post. Detail them all for me now. I will like to explore these most of all.

7. Can you tell me how this war started and how you conclude I started it and detail it here for me to understand. Do you mean raising factual important points is starting a war over nothing?

8. I  will then if anyone wants drill it down post by post and detail what I say each person has done I was trying to not make it become about individuals and keep it at an overall system level discussion where the biggest changes could be discussed and the biggest improvements made. 

9. Are you in agreement that these statements are true.

a. - most pre merit legends are spammers?
b. - that I am an idiot and incorrect to believe that some of the 99.93% of current posters (not top200 merit hoarders) are able to make posts as good if not better than some of the 0.13% of the board (top 200 merit hoarders)

10 - Do you think we should be critical of people coming here to milk this board like a cash cow and monetise their posts whilst we are making the most money via PAID2POST?

11. Can you tell me the what % of your merits came from bitcoin discussion or alt coin discussion and which communities here you belong to which enable you to give a comprehensive view of how merits are being deployed over a wide and varied group of members here to compare to your own experience. Do you believe if your specific example somehow refutes any of the claims that i have made and if so please present this case in detail.

12. My motive is simple I want fairness for all and equal opportunity for all hence why I love all projects that further an end to end decentralised and trustless arena where this is an unavoidable consequence.


I mean surely for my post to be of "lower value 0 merit" than your own your post (multiple merit) that seems to present rebuttal to my own must be able to prove that my points are incorrect and that yours are correct and that your post is pushing toward a more optimal solution than my own.

I have nothing against you  and you sound like a very nice and reasonable individual. Even very fair in your assessment of my situation and you are CORRECT to recognise some of those inside these control systems should be there. None of those refute anything I have said though and I am sure they were able to recognise my post is not pointed at anything they have done wrong either. I am not a person to ever forget those that have stood up for me and what I believe to be true and fair.

I do not actually even look at statements or assumptions as MINE and YOURS i describe them as mine or yours here so people can see which posts I refer to only without describing them all over again. There are just 2 views. I would like to use this EXACT THREAD TO DEMONSTRATE just how much things need to change to allow optimal views to flourish. I am not for stamping out any persons views at all. All people must have fair chance to present their views on this board that is exactly my point. If you believe something you must be allowed to post it. You though must allow anything you post to be examined and evaluated in public in a reasonable logical way. If you get something wrong you are not losing anything you are actually gaining from others time and effort spent to help you upgrade your views and assumptions for free.

Let us in public now explore all of this and find the truth or which post of the 2 is more valuable.

I am very open minded and fully accept I could be totally wrong about everything. Honestly I have no problem adapting my views to adopt views that are more optimal. You will be helping me. I will honestly believe that I have gained by actually being proven incorrect.

Help me now.

Once you have helped me change my views on the things that I have said then I will certainly reward you will a big chunk of the merit I have got to give away.

You see what I believe is happening here is a lot of people feel that I am being negative about the systems and their lack of a clear mandate and clear criteria ....they do not realise that you can look at it like I am merely observing how it works and suggesting improvements to help. But to do that I must demonstrate the need for that and the fact it is open to gross abuse and is in it current form a dangerous system.

I don't think anyone in their right mind can draw any other conclusion that it has become sadly personal if you examine the evidence this gang is is a terrible thing to see and the fact they are in both control systems needs to be addressed

Read the threads starting here

https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/negative-rating-from-the-pharmacist-5063753

1st ...https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/posting-in-forums-with-moderators-who-give-no-smerit-solutions-5081670  more coming
2nd  https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/top-200-merit-receivers-without-merit-from-the-top-200-merit-receivers-5084723
3rd https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/cryptohunters-problem-with-the-top-200-merit-receivers-5086297 more coming
4th https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/m.48751215
5th https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/cryptohunters-problem-with-the-top-200-merit-receivers-5086297

6th https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/m.48790244

I will of course detail exactly each and everyone if I have to. However it is enough for me to say they are completely moronic and pathetic and have achieved absolutely nothing of note. These individuals behaviour (although I admit my own had been a little extreme of late when realising just how dirty these scum are) is not important they just serve to demonstrate the systems in place do not keep these in check.

Now of course all of that gang pouring over my post history looking for some technicality to have me silenced is not a collusion nor conspiracy of any sort or nothing personal.

However I believe it makes them even more net negative to the board than they already are for making some people if not many scared to voice their own views. I mean for me if a copy and paste was to help someone gain greater understanding or help them find the truth then that person is to be commended and is still actually net positive even on that case alone. I have often posted mining guides and answers to people I can not say for sure that I have always posted a link.

People have been telling me you better review your entire post history for any possible mistake because these system controllers will try to find any error you have made whilst helping people to get you banned.

FUCK THAT. I will not be scared of these system abuser. They are whack a mole nothings, the sort of snitches at school you bitch slap for telling the teacher your swore last period. I will never be afraid of them.

I go further to suggest that people causing anyone net positive to be extracted from this board who is hugely net positive then become net negative themselves. That is without them clearly casting a shadow over this board where people dare not speak out against them.

This though more personal issue that has blown up is not my main concern here at all. I am preferring here to concentrate on the system level changes we should implement. I will only bother to continue to contain the personal element in this thread if it is called for by others.

My focus here is to get off of this path entirely or implement 100's of other legends to the merit sources and DT lists to at once to dilute down any collusion that is taking place.

I still stick to the fact that removing the sigs for everyone is the most sensible solution. All of my other suggestions are valid and essential.

Let's stick to the numbered points for a start.

I am busy lately this is why I have take a time to reply and that will be the case for a few days due to xmas poor pre planning.

To the persons who have messaged me saying do not be worried and upset. I think you are fantastic and to the one person trying to stand up for my views chosen username  you are more of a LEGEND here than any of this gang that dress up nothing and illogical nonsense as sensible valuable posts to spam their "EXCLUSIVE AND HIGHLY PAID SIGS"  AND "NO WAY IN HELL WILL THEY REMOVE THEM" to set a good example or to not look like total hypocrites for saying financially motivated post with a straight face and saying their greatest achievement is since being here "GETTING INTO AN EXCULSIVE HIGHLY PAID SIG CAMPAIGN". Morons of the highest self attributed merit making these statement about this the greatest board on the net and the most important website in the entire world that can bring real change and is bringing real change bigger than even the internet itself. On this board they dare to say though with impunity and their self given high merits scores that

a. - most pre merit legends are spammers?
b. - that I am an idiot and incorrect to believe that some of the 99.93% of current posters (not top200 merit hoarders) are able to make posts as good if not better than some of the 0.13% of the board (top 200 merit hoarders)

you disrespect 99.93% of users and the people that started this you filthy cowardly jackal hiding in your gang??? on this board in the sub board that controls this place. NOT ANYMORE FUCKTARD I AM HERE TO STAND UP TO YOU IF NOBODY ELSE WILL AND AFTER ME THERE WILL BE MORE COMING HERE.

This board is the best board on the net and what ever happens to cryptohunter his spirit will live on through his friends with very similar views and very similar ways of presenting them what ever happens to him.  A merry xmas to all of you that really support the ideologies that drive forward to a goal of an end to end trustless arena for all.

I look forward to keeping this debate going and going... until one view is clearly accepted as being correct.

A little xmas mention to anonymint a person that made fantastic arguments here on all kinds of things not just technical matters  and a far smarter person than the vast vast vast majority here and of infinite more value than all of the GANG here including laudaM (now lauda)that scam promoting piece of shit that promoted him getting banned.

I can tell you now that chosen username (who ever you are) you are worth infinite everyone who dares not speak out about the gang taking over this board and of infinite value above those that will oppose observable instances and events to suite their own personal selfish agendas. You will not be forgotten here forgotten here.

People do not understand how important this board is for making big changes in the world in the future and how important it is that people get to post exactly what they like so long as it is accompanied by corroborating events or observable events and therefore is entirely reasonable. 

To those other members  (actmyname) that have stood up for me and pushed back the abuse of the sytem by nulling their attempts to silence me (not that red trust means shit to me since I don't trade at all) but still anyone standing up for what is right is demonstrating they deserve to be in a position of responsibility. All the others remaining silent trying to not get involved you need to start doing your jobs or pass these positions to those that will.

I am not intending on staying forever in meta nor wasting my precious time on most of the dogs and ass lickers lurking here trying for some power and influence or merit crumbs from a broken and abused system in fact i tell you now it is a cancer here and a method of control that needs to be deleted or reset with clear criteria and clear punishment for abuse and to be able to reverse it if later merits were given for provably incorrect statements or assumptions.

Coward jackal gang.... whilst browsing my post history for excuses to shut this account down and wishing you were me ..please can you spell check and paragraph it nicely and all that shit too. I would like it done by the new year and there is a bunch of you working on it as I can see from your comments...... no excuse with such man jackal power not to have the entire thing reviewed by then all nearly 13k posts. I like to enjoy a great book in the festive periods too.

Although you all complain about alt discussion ......... i can't wait to return you feel all dirty and contaminated after a long spell in meta it seems.

All I wish for xmas is ......... some changes back to the path of free speech here and merit and the trust systems are the proven and obvious enemy of such a thing.

I would prefer to move this to a more system level discussion but I will not shrink away from naming gang members here if people drive for it.

merry xmas to all though - even jackals and cowards should enjoy some rest and to... lick their own ass ( ha that just hits me with a very fitting  description of how the merit system is operating right now...)

merry xmas and a happy new year indeed to chosen username and those that have done the right thing since I have been here.

mikeywith probably said everything that needs to be said, but if certain people are causing you so much annoyance it's probably best to just ignore them and your problems will probably go away. Take a few days off for the holiday if the board is getting to you but things aren't that serious and there's really no grand conspiracy here.

I'm having a bit of a change in attitude towards life. Up until now I've been more interested in the macro-economic and political issues related to Bitcoin and crypto, and those boards are thhe ones that seem to attract the sig spammers. I'm getting more interested in the inner working of Bitcoin,and the way it will shape our futures. The technical boards seem to be well moderated, and much more interesting.

Maybe Theymos sees the tech boards as the real function of Bitcoin Talk, and the other boards as an income source, and a search promotion aid to help spread the more serious Bitcoin message.

@mikeywith already gave a very apt response.
The system which governs operations on this forum might not be perfect, but it keeps the forum running, and we still have quality content providers. Although we have lost some great posters, i do not think it was due to spam or conspiracy theories.

Any changes made to the system could tip the balance of the system over and would spark changes in other aspects as well.
Theymos as i have come to know is reluctant to make major changes on the running of the forum, and not too quickly as well. There's no point over analysing every situation.

This forum is pretty retarded now but the history of it is cool.  Its mostly  members posting for their signature campaigns to make bIg mOneY  and "legendary members" trading merit back and forth.    There are some fun conversations in a few sections though and it's still a lot better than reddit.

I would just remove all signatures, would clean this place up REAL QUICK.

 I supported your case against the negative trust you got from marlboroza and many others did, including  some other DT members who gave you a positive trust as a counter for marlboroza's trust, or at least supported your claim, as it was very obvious that you did not deserve a negative trust just because someone thought you were "trolling" regardless of the fact that you were trolling or not.

and marlboroza removed the negative trust as i see now on your profile, which is probably the result of people standing up to you.

but with that being said , i think you have taken this too far personal, you became so doubtful by implenting the theory of conspiracy in your brain.

I understand that your goal and intention might be so kind and innocent. but you are also over-reacting and accusing some people who may have nothing to do with the gang that you are trying to implement in your own mind.

while i agree with some of the parts you say, and i think everybody knows that

1- some members are probably abusing the trust system.
2- some members are probably abusing the merit system.
3- some members are only here for money.

My grandma never had a computer and she can bet the house on these points.

but in general, it's not as bad as you or any other person would imagine.

I recently joined the forum, and only started to be active last month, i ranked up to full member straight away , got almost 100 merits in a month and i know for sure that i can easily rank up to Legendary member or at least get the merits needed before i had spent a whole year around, because I know i don't shit post and many people find my posts to be helpful.

non of the DT members ever bothered me, in fact i was scammed once and Ognasty helped out in my case and was very responsive, the Mods of the boards where i usually post are very helpful and kind.

there are for sure some bad DT members, some bad Mods, some bad legendary members and indeed some bad in everything in life.

I might be new to this forum , but i would assume i am older than you, and here is my advice, for any thing you type, you either have to enjoy it or, make money of it. so if you are enjoying launching this war ( apparently you ain't getting paid) i suggest you start it a step by step, take one person at the time, provide whatever proof you have against their actions.

there is no point of deploying a war against a dozen of a mysterious gang that may not exist in the first place.

So meta has been fun and it is always good to kick the hornets nest now and  give things a shake up...see what shoots out...

THESE ARE LONG POSTS BUT DO YOUR BEST TO READ AND UNDERSTAND FULLY BECAUSE YOUR FUTURE TO POST AND SAY EXACTLY WHAT YOU WOULD LIKE TO SAY DEPEND ON IT.

I have never had an interest in this sub board since I just thought it was theymos and some mods that ruled over the forum and I had never had any reason to think things were not fine as they were...from a moderation level

Then someone asked me to help some newbie who was getting a bit bullied around by some others so I took a look... just to see what they meant. I read over it and thought he was getting a bit of rough deal so decide to just try to help him out a bit.

https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/negative-rating-from-the-pharmacist-5063753

I think noticed during all all this talk about red trust and DT lists.... what is all this stuff I asked myself? i wondered why some scum bags had given me negative trust for busting their scam projects but i didnt start glowing red with warning I am a scammer on it..

So to meta board then to learn more about all these strange things.

After a few weeks here In meta I have become rather more concerned about this board. I will tell you why.

If it were just theymos and some mods working according to some criteria and their own human common sense to make reasonable and fair decisions and that is where it ended then fair enough. Everyone gets roughly the same treatment... we hope.


However, what I have come to realise is that ICO's presented us with new problem the board was not ready for. .Paid2post incentive.

PAID2POST is the motivation for 99% of people here now including most people who are part of the control systems that grant the access and rates of the payment for posting.

PAID2POST (and trading on forum to a far smaller degree) is the fuel the control systems run on and give them the power to influence posting behaviour more than even the mods and theymos at this stage.

So it is quite simple for me to see how it is working now after just a few weeks of being here in meta.

You need to understand that if you can control peoples rank (through merit) and peoples trust (no red trust you can control the entire board  if the if the vast majority of people are financially motivated to post (or want to trade).

It should not be that hard for people to recognise this.

You need high rank (depending on merit)  you need zero red trust for most campaigns now too (depending on DT lists trust system).

Therefore those (merit sources) and (DT trust lists members) control your ability to participate in PAID2POST (and trade to a certain degree) and your rates once you are even granted access.

So when you then start to discover the same people are starting to control rank via (merit - merit sources) and can if they chose give you red trust at will with almost impunity. Then you start to see the issue. I mean the same people starting to get quite substantial control of both systems.

Now that may be quite worrying. Then when you realise these same people are also determined to participate in PAID2POST and get into the most exclusive and high paying slots then you start to see the problem.

There is no doubt in my mind this PAID2POST  is not a motive limited to newbies alone everyone wants some of this except older legends or anyone who made a fortune already...they tend to not bother or just support projects they believe in or the person who is running it. I have challenged some of the controllers of these 2 systems to remove their highly paid signatures and was told in no certain terms something along the lines of NO WAY IN HELL WILL I REMOVE MY PAID SIG by a member whom is both a DT list member and a merit source.

Now if all members start to require the approval of those controlling those systems and there are no clear guidelines/criteria they the "system controllers " must abide by or no comeback at all for abusing those systems you can start to appreciate the problem.

People start to have no choice but to adopt these "system controllers" ideologies and become afraid to refute their often quite insane claims. I have had conversations with LEGEND members whilst I've been "debating" with these system controllers on meta. These LEGENDS  told me they would like to support my views in public and stand up for my side of the debate but they were scared because it would have clear implications for them and their future on this board in many ways.

Now I say my side of the debate but after having had this debate it is clear that is how things are. The hostility to my proven view backed with stats that there is huge huge merit cycling within 0.13% of active posters. The results when eventually I pushed them into providing them demonstrated around 80% reductions of their merit. I mean I wasn't initially even saying this was a result of deliberate cycling and even now I accept it is likely due to more collisions between mediocre posters sharing views on a small volume (in terms of users) board. However after a time I certain get the feeling there is a bit of gang mentality that has formed already.

So anyway now you have a board where people are not able to post in a normal way and express their views as they like without considering the implications not of the mods but rather of these system controllers. They need to actually support those system controllers or remain silent when they are confronted with the "system controllers" ideologies and claims. This power is far more apparent over new members or anyone who wants to progress up the ranks or continue trading without a red scam warning flashing next to you.

I mean I was shocked that some very high merit high rank individuals can make statements like

"most pre merit legends are spammers"
 
and

that I was an idiot and totally incorrect to claim that some of the 99.93% (the rest of the 150k posters in the last month) of the board are capable of making posts as good or better than the 0.13% (top 200 merit hoarders) of the board

and not get called out on this to explain by nobody except myself.

Then say I have to substantiate everything I say about them or I am a liar and I will go the way of previous liars..... perhaps he means red trust or then again the fact they are going post by post through my entire post history these system controllers and their friends mean business. They have already created some 1 day old sock puppet account to present the initial report but now they have just gone all out there is like the entire gang spell checking my every posted word lol...... happy xmas enjoy the over time I won't be paying you.

 Of course they are not aware that even if their influence can force those that have the actual power to ban your account then your very good friends are fully entitled to continue voicing their own extremely similar views in an extremely similar fashion.

However, now that I have had those good legends tell me they would like to support me but will not for fully understandable reasons I start to see just how bad things are. I mean they are not saying the mods are going to tell them off or theymos will delete their very existence they are saying they are being controlled by a sub lay between usual run of the mill "normal" users and the mods. This is a layer I was never really aware existed. Merit compounds this issue and I believe is far more dangerous than the trust system.

Another issue with these top down centralised control systems is that newbies seeing these legends with their very nice PAID2POST sigs think I want some of that. Then look at the reality now of being a normal user I mean like most on the discussion boards using the board to discuss and find out about crypto currencies...not in some sub board with a handful of users talking about their merit hoards and how to stop anyone under snr member (a view i once shared) having a chance to enter PAID2POST..Whilst they need to ensure they remain clearly able to participate in PAID2POST at the highest rates ... see how that sounds??

 and at the current rate of progress to get to the level where these "System controllers " are....( I mean you can not get to that level of control of course because they are aware by letting too many people in they are diluting their own control) same as letting too many people have an equal (rank)+(clear trust) PAID2POST credentials then you will dilute their chances of taking the most desirable spots.

Since newbies realise this they consider that fact it will take perhaps 100yrs to become a legend if you post in a normal way on the discussion forums and are an average level poster then they see they have no chance other than to game the system.  I mean some merit sources have said they have the discussion boards on ignore. Which again is not sounding promising if i am a newbie who wants to use this board in the way most joining would.

Now all of this may sound very negative.

But really it is very easy to find issue but very difficult to present solutions. I think those systems were introduced to obviously improve things but sadly they are creating side effects that perhaps were not expected. Sound good intentions but I think sometimes you can stay on a bad path too long and it is hard to get off it.

So what to do now?   I am not 100% sure

I don't really know. I am in favour of removing sigs for everyone except mods and a handful of people that have  strict criteria handed down to them to keep order but it is applied to everyone fairly and equally. If not they are out new person replaces them

 Sure a lot of users vanish. That to me is not important because if they are net negative and diluting down collisions between net positive members there is no point having them obviously.

or if we are not going to do that...

The other  idea is to make it so that you can not be in the merit (rank control) system and the trust system at the same time. Have some punishment and removal process for any clear abuse of either system. Also some clear criteria brought in which need to be kept to.

Merit actually is very damaging in many ways as it is and any plans to use these scores as if they are objectively attained on the basis of some criteria that has been applied to every post here is not going to work.

 If it is to stay at all then it needs to be run through a filter like the ones I have been asking for and there needs to be a removal tool. So that if you give merit to something that become provably wrong then you can be forced to remove the merit and with too many of those taking place...bye bye merit source.  

Same with the trust ...if you abuse this system on stupid argument or petty girly fight that has nothing directly to do with being scammed and someone can prove you were being petty or trying to force your will on someone or hush someone up and using that to bully them ....then bye bye DT list position.

I see that these people will need incentive to be part of these control systems so we could let them keep sigs but they must have criteria to keep them in line and ensure they are not abusing their mandate. Not just trust them to act in fair way because that isn't going to happen with no guidelines.

Also immediately add many other legends to be merit sources and on the DT lists to dilute the central control and make it harder for complete collusion.


Perhaps both those solutions will bring their own issues and side effects  and make things worse....so some one much smarter or some specialist in game theory can create something for us. Whatever let us do it before this gets out of hand. I can't take legends saying they are afraid to post what they think.

I would still like to hear why junior boards with people being raised up via merit given under some sensible criteria is not an improvement.
With a lot more merit sources I think instead of people searching around for things to report and snitch on earning your snitcher badges...which i accept right now is needed but really is all very negative. You could be doing something positive like bestowing merit and enjoying helping others become full members getting your err quality spotter badge... I know there will always be away to game things but without some sensible criteria then it is very easy to just blatantly abuse things and people end up not having any power to fight back even when they witness wrong doing and unfairness.