Topic: Whoops out of smerit. Should there be a way to buy some from theymos? (Read 665 times)

Shitpost legendary members will find it difficult to enter DT with a positive strength to qualify for one, and even if they do, they will be dropped quickly. BTW, the buying process will not be automatic; the admin must go through the buying request and ensure that the buyer is trustworthy enough not to abuse it. We don't have a merit source on our local board, and I'm sure you know what that means for quality posters over there. I wouldn't mind trading some bitcoin for some..


If only the right requirement is not put in place.

Igehhhhh, I slightly disagree. Only quality posts indeed deserve merit. But, it's not that hard fishing merits. Even shit posters can rank up quickly. Newbies spawn up every other day on the WO thread and keep posting tweets to get some easy merits. Eventually, they get it. Suppose this structure takes into consideration. Shitposter Legendaries will take the chance. You may ask, huh? Shitposter Legendaries? Yeah, You know that already. Actmyname leaves neutral on such accounts. There are a bunch of sold accounts around us with sMerits in hand. They can easily exchange merits, and you won't notice that.


I agree with this statement. Theymos or Cyrus could decrease their skin thickness when it comes to response to established members (Like Staff, Moderators, Merit Sources, DTs)

I kinda-sorta know where you're coming from here, but I don't think merits are as powerful as all that.  They're basically just a "like" button except they're also a component of the ranking up process.  If you're already Legendary or have enough merits to get there, they're a pretty useless political tool, no? 

I'm also not sure to what extent merits have oppressed anyone's adversaries here--except for one great example: shitposters are definitely mine, and I have done my best to actively suppress them ranking up and thus earning more money by spewing crap forum-wide.  But I'm only one person with merits to give, right?  Someone else (or even a a whole lot of someone elses) could very well undo all of my suppression.

But all of that aside, if Theymos started selling merits it'd probably turn into a disaster very quickly.  Better for high-ranked/trusted members and/or merit sources who are running low to ask Theymos directly or create threads like this.  The community is often very willing to help when they know someone just wants to spread merits around.

You know the problem right now?? No matter how much sentiments you try to consolidate the whole idea with, it cannot change the fact that SELLING MERITS will automatically go AGAINST this whole meritocracy; so of what use is it to have something that every single good person is struggling for - being put in the hands of some mere low-classed dummies, only for some lame fact that they've decided enough - since they haven't had any other choice - to give everything just to get 'em?? Of what IMPORTANCE will it be to have merit as part of the ranking process when it could simply be coverted for some few bucks (cus it's not gonna look too big for the rich ones)??
Look, instead of suggesting that merits becomes sellable, I'll suggest that Theymos removes the whole system... yeah, cus there's no point and I'm sure he wouldn't wanna do such... just my opinion

Sandra 🧑‍🦰

Well dear, unfortunately merit has become a political tool, people use it as leverage to support their like minded community members and oppress their adversaries.
It could be used in a discussion to inadvertently or otherwise to silence a few selected, because if you are unaware of some facts and see people are meriting my posts against someone else, you'd  automatically assume that I'm right and telling the truth in that said discussion.

Merit is being wrongly used already, selling it to everyone could make it worse, but it could have a price so high that no account farmer would dare to think about buying them. Maybe someone is rich enough that they'd like to use merit as their political voting token. Why not?

I don't know how this whole thing sounds but I think Theymos is not gonna agree with it, since it still falls on the idea of "BUYING AND SELLING" some practical charitable advantage of 'em post makers; very optimistic and incredulous critics - per say.
I don't support merit selling and buying matterless of how you wanna see 'em; as some nuggets to grow the forum members that are doing well in your own discretion or whatsoever... That's gonna make others map out a way to change the whole essence of this idea in particular,.. that's if you're to be given a chance.That's not derogatory, no..., No hard feelings dear..

Sandra 🧑‍🦰

Care us needed to be taken into consideration when considering new alternatives in other not to complicate the whole issue, i see nothing wrong with the merit system already on ground, members should be the one to readjust themselves in posting more quality posts, engage in research and findings or do any task that could be uniquely acceptable and members will show interest in giving smerit, but for the best interest of any legendary rank who wish to have more and enough smerits to send to others, then applying for a merit source is the best to do.

What you don't have, you can't abuse! The old Legendary account would require a large number of merits in order to have smerits for farming. If this new structure is implemented, only high-quality posters will benefit.

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The Bitcoin for Merits will be fantastic, but it should be limited to only DT1 with a positive strength to abuse.

There are bunch of quality posts on the Nigeria Board- someone can throw some there.

Placing merit here in the forum as additional rules and policies is something that gives reason that every community should be responsible for what they post here.

      And I don't think you have an obligation to give merit to anyone here, it's still better to give what you think is deserving of the person to receive merit from you, the wellspring inside that did it. It's just that sometimes I see some people who make sense in the posts of others here, but I don't see that merit is thrown at them, but the topic they made really makes sense. Then the others were only posted briefly but immediately received merit, although it is their freedom to whom they want to give merit. This is the only thing I noticed, actually.

Having a 1:1 ratio would be 1 merit per a merit received, If you get loyce correctly, I think the account farmers already have some sMerits in possession due to their legitimate activities in the forum. Hence if they decide to disseminate 100 merits amongst the legendary accounts in the farm they'll never run out of merits, it'll definitely get useless for Legendary accounts. For instance, 10 legendary accounts managed by one member who has 100 smerits can easily share those merits amongst account 1 that'll receive 100 sMerits for receiving 100merits then it'll forward to account 2 that'll receive same number of sMerits for receiving 100 merits and so on. If the merits keeps circulating amongst their legendary accounts they can boost the number of merits to any amount they wish by meriting themselves for 100 sMerits. The only way the sMerits they own would depreciate is when the farmer tends to build a new account to full member by gradually sending the 100 merits to the new account that'll in turn get 50 sMerits then it reduces down till the new account now realizes about 195 merits; new account receives 50 smerits for 100 merits, then 25 smerits for 50 merits, 12.5 smerits for 25 merits and till it fades, as the legendary account receives the same amount of smerits per Merit sent to them by the new account.  That'll be an abuse, though such activities can be tracked, but they shouldn't be a room for that.

Let's say for arguments sake that it becomes 1 : 1 for legendary members only going forward from the change. Would it really mean unlimited sMerit for "account farmers"? Won't these members still need to actually acquire the merit in order to farm more accounts?

I understand that the numbers are incorrect, the idea itself to slightly tweak sMerit distribution however, I think can help to solve the issue DaveF is facing without massively effecting the value of Merit.


My mistake 

That would introduce exponential growth, and old Legendary account farmers would have unlimited sMerit to farm more accounts. Basically, the Merit system would become worthless.

It's 1 sMerit per 2 Merit received.

Chill bud. The numbers are an example. They can easily be modified as to what is seen fit by those who make that kind of decision. The point of the ideas are to vary the amount of sMerit per user rank. Not to increase the circulation of Merit. You raised a great point here:

But again, that is the problem with the numbers. Not the idea itself (to vary sMerit based on user rank).

Are you for real?
Forget about Idea 1. Even if Idea 2 take into consideration. There is no need for Merit sources anymore. Currently, we receive 0.5 sMerit for each merit we get. If Legendaries receive 1.5 sMerit per Merit, they receive. It's 3x already. Then you suggested the same thing for other ranks up to Full Members. Well, In no time, You will see more merits than posts made per day. No offense, but I wouldn't say I like the idea. People won't have posts to spend their merits. Suppose I received 500 Meits and I have 600 Merits to spend. When I spend 600 merits, someone else will have more merits to spend as well. The Merit circulation will explode.

According to the DdmrDdmr's Merit dashboard^[1], 21,926 Merit was transacted in March 2023. In Comparison, only Legendaries received 11,884 Merits (54.2%). Forget about Hero, Sr, and Full Members. In Comparison, 1948 Merits were obtained by Member, Jr, Newbie and Brand new (8.88%). Imagine what will happen there. Once again, No offense, But it's not a good idea.

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[1] https://public.tableau.com/app/profile/ddmrddmr/viz/shared/4S8ZR5P6X

I would not say this would cause people to are earn "lots" more sMerit. The concentration of sMerit would go to those who would be better distributing it (higher ranked users) and would not effect the vast majority of the forum (Full members and below). Not to mention that the amounts could definitely be configurable (reduced or increased based on what is seen fit). The point in the idea is to address the problem that people who are distributing merit to good posters are running out, not considering the "merit source" idea that is currently in place.


Overall I think that a better system needs to be in place than a manual application system. To combine the two ideas, after reaching a certain amount of merit, one can create an automated support/oppose application that can be made once every X time (for example once a year) where at least 80% of (insert user condition here) must support for it for a user to become a merit source.

Many ideas can be discussed. Though if one thing should be taken into account from all of this, it's that things should be carefully made to be more automated than reliant on manual things like applications. Very old school, I'm surprised that's the current approach

That can result in abuse in power by some. Filtering the application reduces its chances.

Your idea is not bad, it can definitely help in some cases. But I don't think of it as one of the conditions that this system should change and the forum should implement this idea. Obviously your idea is to help users earn lots of sMerit every time they earn merit, but I tend don't see many cases where admin have to upgrade the merit system as long as merit sources are everywhere.

Merit sources don't work like robots to detect all quality posts, but there are ways to get them to pay attention to those posts if they do. I think this thread is one of them:

1. [self-moderated] Report unmerited good posts to Merit Source

It seems like the system just needs a tweak to fix this problem. I came up with two ideas.

Idea 1: Adjust sMerit per merit based on user rank from the time it is integrated forward. For example:

Legendary: Receives 2 sMerit per Merit received
Hero: Receives 1.5 sMerit per Merit received
Senior member: Receives 1.2 sMerit per Merit received
Full member and below: 1 sMerit per Merit received (No change)

Idea 2: Adjust sMerit per merit based on user rank and apply it to the Merit system being integrated forward. For example:

Legendary: Receives 1.5 sMerit per Merit received going forward + receives Current Merit +50% in sMerit 
Hero: Receives 1.2 sMerit per Merit received + receives Current Merit +20% in sMerit
Senior member: Receives 1.1 sMerit per Merit received + receives Current Merit +10% in sMerit
Full member and below: 1 sMerit per Merit received (No change)

The difference between idea 1 and idea 2 is that idea 1 adjusts the system going forward, while idea 2 applies the to all past merit. I believe that either of the ideas shouldn't saturate the Merit ecosystem too much. Presumably, idea 1 would not saturate it at all, it would just increase future distribution. While idea 2 would instantly increase circulating Merit.

The limit is 100 Merit per post.

I think your intention are to become a merit source well, that's a good thing its also mean there will be more smerits in circulation but i think option of buying copper membership is not fair as there will be no governance remains on platform. Like the one with good content quality but with no or less money will remain behind in the race of merit number and the second is who do not have good posts quality but have money then they can buy those smerits and can share among his/her favourable person because if that person has no sense of making or contributing to the btt then how can be the decision of them sending merit to each other will improve like i know you can give smerits to anyone you want but if you walk around only few board and section the the circulation will narrow down to only few seekers.

Sencodly, if you want to become a merit source then you can learn from these profiles.

• Applying to be a merit source by hilariousetc
• Application to be a Merit source for Bangladesh Thread by The Sceptical Chymist
• fillippone Merit Source Application by fillippone

well you if you are so determined to contribute btt by encouraging newbies or low rank member making beautiful content for btt than i must say until you become a merit source you should apply for getting merits from other merits sources here is the three merit source options that i think you should apply.

• [Merit] Share your best posts/threads with Fillippone to be merit assessed
• [Merit] Share your best topics with Merit Source
• [self-moderated] Report unmerited good posts to Merit Source

maybe there are more on the list but i just familiar with these three and they are active. Well overall, if you became a merit source then try to remain active and i really appreciate your enthusiasm towards community.

Dave, I would like to share my opinion.
Everyone will suggest you share the best post to merit sources if you are out of sMerits. There are a couple of threads where merit sources gave a chance to people to inform them about their excellent posts. But I understand you don't want to post there just for a few posts. Or, it's more accurate to say it's easy for you to merit the post you wish to instead of waiting for someone to do it. Everyone has a different point of view. In your opinion, a post may deserve a couple of merits, while others can argue.

I would say, Why not Apply to become a merit source since you are an Established forum member? Spending money on the forum just to merit posts won't be a good idea.
I understand your concern. Don't take it as an obligation. You are an active member and you spend a decent time here. You will spend your sMerits without realizing that it's getting finished just like The Sceptical Chymist. It's volunteer work. You don't have to worry about that. At least, I feel this way.

Tacked on 12 more I wanted to see if a post can read over 50 merits as 50 is the monthly limit.

First post now reads 60 merits as I gave 48 in dec and 12 now total of 60 merits.

That is great. I hope I didn't offend you because I already add the phrase 'just kidding' as it was not meant to insult or provoke you at all. TBH, they are your sMerits and so your choice to give them to whomsoever you want to.


That is highly commendable (applaudable) 👏


I get your point there, but I also asked a question and maybe you could help.

Should a legendary be allowed to buy just sMerits (sendable merits) only or will it also add up doubled number to their total earned merits too?

Good question and it is not the first time I heard it 😉
For me being a merit source means you have a burden (unspoken as no one is forcing you) to perform a job that is given to you. You want it or not, you will feel a pressure to yourself if you regularly do not look at posts from others and evaluate them. But when I am not a merit source, I am free. I will send merit to when I like, whoever I like. No one can justify my job as I am not in a commitment. It's the commitment that I do not have to be a merit source yet. If I ever feel I am ready then I will give it a go for sure.

If anyone is not willing to give the time to find only 10 posts that worth receiving merit then he does not deserve to be a merit source before anything else 😂

I have 1000 merits to give as I type. I am a merit source. It is tiring to give merits out and I know Dave since 2014 maybe 2013. He lives in the Next state and does a lot of business in my state. He is level headed and if he wants merits he got what I could give him.

I have given more than 10000 merits as a source it is work. I run my signature as a public service almost all the time. (I did a 4 week paid  campaign this year) 1st one in over 4

years.

I do think that a legendary person looking to buy merits in December is not a bad idea.

all year long it is a lousy idea.

available to every member it is a lousy idea.

If I understand correctly, are you proposing to buy just sMerits (sendable merits) only or will it also add up doubled to you total earned merits too?
I'm too skeptical on this but I think merit sources already get enough sMerits to distribute between the community for their contribution, the only exception are the ones who are not doing it because of their respective reasons. Theymos may consider to take away those unused sMerits and recycle them by circulating them among active MS instead of allowing to buy sMerits.

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Sorry for the interruption but is that an sMerits bribe or a way to say that my part is done, now you may continue?
Just kidding 

I hit my limit of 50 a month for 1 member by giving you the 48.

As for the topic :

Maybe it is a legendary perk only?

Just relay them to me and I'll have them merited until you get a replenishment.

That's the thing: I don't think some merit sources see the postition as an honor--particularly those who didn't apply but who were made sources back in 2019 (I'm one of them).  I'd imagine the people who went through the trouble of creating an application thread and got accepted do see it that way, but not everyone had the same path to becoming a merit source.

And yes, any merit source who isn't circulating merits at an acceptable rate (but who knows what that is?) should be replaced.  The problem is that nobody knows what Theymos is thinking or if he's keeping an eye on the data.

One good thing is that there hasn't been an outcry from the community that it's become way too difficult to rank up.  I'd think that if there were far too few merits going around, members would be creating threads in Meta stating as much (or they'd be starting up obvious merit-begging ones).  So the system might be running pretty smoothly.

You don't just consider yourself to be a MS and then you get it, there's a procedure through applying for the position and being a reputable user, though there are some MS's that were personally approached by theymos himself for the position. Thus even if you merit good posts often, it doesn't mean you automatically get the voluntary work, you still have to apply, and since there are quite a lot of MS applicants waiting to be selected, i think it somewhat discourages users from going through the stress of collecting ten undermerited posts in order to apply to be a MS.

Since you feel so sometimes or lately as you said, then why not consider being one. I thought merit source is given to people that merit good posts often even though it’s a voluntary work. If you run out of Smerit and still feel like given more good posts that are worthy of it, then consider being a merit source too, it’ll be helpful to forum and you’ve contributed well here too.

I don't think more Merit sources are needed in the forum because the ones we have now are crying of lacking or out of source Merits before one or two weeks. And these merit sources have been asking theymos for top up of merits but theymos has not been able to even allocate 50 extra to one source therefore if all the legendary members who has 5000 + merits become Merit source where will theymos have the merit to allocate to all when the present ones also need merits. My opinion in this merit issue is that, theymos should increase the allocation of the merits for the merits sources both the local boards sources. Or if there is enough merits in his merit generating bank then more Merit sources are needed but if it is not then he should increase the present sources allocation.

The merit sources are ready to work now and the merits are not enough for them so theymos should look into the matter. No community population is bigger than it resources...

I wish I could help with large number but consider at least some better than nothing from me.

Lately are we running out of sMerits? Few days ago it was The Sceptical Chymist, now it's you. I am not a merit source, I don't want to be too, not in the near future but sometimes I feel I don't have available sendable merits too.

That is a good point but aren't we all able to understand while they are distributing merits among them? I mean, everyone here is quite smart to understand the difference between a spammy post and an original/valuable post.

But I admit these business-minded people will surely find a way to make it look real 

That would be much more work to implement than just making OP a Merit source. He Merits the right posts, so why shouldn't he be one? For now, I'll just send some sMerits his way the old fashioned way, by Meriting his good posts.

I don’t particularly like the idea of being able to purchase sMerits, even if those allowed to do so were cherry-picked by the Admins and/or Merit Sources. Essentially, the wrong message could be read on the forum, whereby some privileged people were purchasing Merits (the word-of-mouth would probably spread that Merits were being purchased, not sMerits).

An easier to sell concept would be something like this:
The above idea would easily fit the narrative of more people acting as Merit Sources (albeit by delegation), having no buy/sell ties to the concept, but rather extending the idea of trust as a basis (the Merit Source trusts the dMerit Source enough to pass on a certain amount of sMerits to another person).

The board rules may need to be given a thought (i.e. only applies to Merits Sources above with a certain threshold of sMerit – not the smaller ones), but it doesn’t seem like something too complicated from a conceptual point of view.

Shouldn't now be the right time to effect the Matthew principle of taking from those who don't have and pilling it on those who have and implement it as a practical reality here then? I don't see any reason certain MS will go to sleep after their honourary selection for a task. It will do the community a lot of good if their merit "sourceship" is revoked and handed over to those whose applications for merit are still pending. I think it will be better that way.

I run out of smerits quite a lot these days, or get close to being totally out, as like to keep <10 smerits in my satchel for emergency situations, where I see a really exceptional post. With a pending merit source application, the best I can do is wait and try to earn more merits.

Reporting here is an option, but doesn't cross the mind often.

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I briefly thought about a thread where reputable members (who ardently give out merits),, can report their accounts to be merited by sources, with the sole purpose of getting more smerits.
Some could see it as a way for users to abuse the system and blur the lines that define "reputable", but for me, it doesn't matter if a few users get more merits (they should be above 1000 to qualify), as long as it's circulating around more.

I believe the idea has some appeal and it could have some benefits, one of the main problems I see it would be the indirect encouragement for the creation of a market for merits, since we would be fixing an "official" price in satoshis for those bought merits. So I remain mostly leaned not to implement this.

On the other hand, if the administration decided to give this idea a try I would personally recommend to set some restrictions on those bought merits, to avoid abuse by some users: restrict this offer to reputable members of the community, daily/weekly limit to send those merits, etc.

I believe things work good enough as they are and it would be bad to over-complicate things.

Would not be more interesting for us to have the chance to revert 3 of our received merits into 1 smerit? So if someone actually wants to send (and does not have any smerit), there would be a path to, with an intrinsic "tax" to discourage abuse

My two sats.

I don’t think theymos selling merit would be a good idea because it would somewhat establish a market for buying/selling merit that would likely be abused. It also seems a little backwards, as handing out merit is a bit of a job, not some great privilege. If anything, those handing out merit honorably should be getting some sort of support from the forum, not the other way around.

It does feel like that, especially since they keep respawning. But the solution is easy too: just send more at once. So there you go: apply to be a Merit source

Buying sMerits from theymos sounds like a bad idea. You shouldn't (have to) spend money to Merit users.

Which may or may not be part of the problem. If sources go inactive and are not replaced the flow may slow. Same with not treating it and lets not use the word job how about responsibility. If I were a source I would think part of that is the responsibility to send out merits.



and


That is why I said:

You could get away with it once but you would wind up burning a good account that Theymos thought was worthy of being able to buy merit and also it would be easy to see which accounts were sent to and those could be tagged too.


Because I tend to give out a lot and although I do get a lot remember you need 2 received for 1 to send so my supply does dry up now and then. If it was a 1 to 1 or 1.5 to 1 it might be a different story. Or I might have given more to some posts so would have wound up in the same situation anyway.



Since a few people did send some merits (thank you) I will keep them flowing. And now that the report posts that need merit post is back in my brain I will add to it as needed.

-Dave

I think I know what you mean, but anyway I don't agree that one should spend a few dollar for sMerit from forum. Your quality posts should be able to help you get a lot of merit where you can return half of it to the community in this forum, especially in posts that you consider quality.

Admin have confirmed that forum has sufficient funds to keep the forum running normally, they are no longer expecting donations and recently they are also not auctioning factoid slots. So I don't know what compelled the forum or the admin to agree to sell sMerit to its members. You should be able to easily earn lots of sMerit for free without having to pay anything, we know that.

Wouldn't that create a mess? Some account farmers would buy a few lots and then distribute them among their accounts to build up their accounts faster. These days there are a lot of signature campaigns around & I guess this would be a fantastic business idea for them LOL. Spammers would be everywhere; it would be hard to identify them sometimes as they would have so many earned merits.

You can make notes for deserving post & report them here- [self-moderated] Report unmerited good posts to Merit Source

Yep, it does feel like an obligation--but truthfully I can only speak for myself.  Other merit sources have become inactive and maybe don't feel like it's a "job".  The only reason it seems that way for me is because I'm an ardent supporter of the merit system and I want to keep the merits circulating. 

I'm sure you remember what the situation was prior to Jan. 2018, with account farmers and all the shitposts that resulted from people trying to rank up a million accounts in order to sell them or enroll them in campaigns or bounties.  Theymos's solution was both brilliant and unexpected--I remember having the flu really bad and waking up, checking the forum and seeing Meta explode with dozens of threads about this new thing called the merit system.  I thought I was hallucinating because of my fever!

Your idea might be a good one for trusted members, but there would certainly be attempts to buy sMerits to send to alt accounts, friends, and who knows what.  However, Theymos sent me a PM recently (after he changed my username) in which he said he had no plans to increase any merit source's monthly sMerit allocation--so I'm guessing he thinks there are already enough merits circulating and won't go for it.  Just a hunch.

I think it is better to ask to increase monthly merit amount if you are merit source. Buying merit automatically means having trade relations > trading means buying and selling > selling merit isnt allowed. Simple

To me being a merit source would probably make me feel like I have to go out and send merits. More like an obligation. If I paid for them then it's more like they are mine I can be as free or as stingy with them as I like. Just my view.



Knew yes, remembered no....   :-)

-Dave

Merit should be free in everyway it can be given to people that deserves it.

I can see that you are a good poster, applying for a merit source would be good (but theymos is not even making anyone a merit source for now).

It would be better if theymos can automatically make people that has over 5000 or more merits to be a merit source, even if only little would be given. I see people having such kind of merits to be worthy of becoming a merit source and you are almost there.

If you are out of smerit, I thought you knew about this: [self-moderated] Report unmerited good posts to Merit Source

Just went to merit a bunch of posts and ran out before I finished. Eliminating the become a merit source option, how about something like a copper membership so you can post images, a way to buy some merits from the source.

Would have to be handled on a case by case basis, since you don't want to be selling merit to someone who might abuse it. But, a couple of bucks for 50 or so merit might not be the worst deal.

Or I just start making notes and when I get some I send some. Never thought about it until now.

EDIT: This is not a beg for merit since something like that would only work once (now) but a more in general thing. I get some now but run out again in 7 months and wind up in the same situation. But throw a couple of dollars into the bitcointalk treasury and get some would be a workable thing.

-Dave