Instead of spamming 30 days to reach junior member status we will see newbies spamming for 2-3 months until they reach member status and join campaigns, and what will they do before they reach member status?
They will create more accounts, because they will need lots accounts to get merit points and rank up to higher ranks or they will just do "scratch my back and I'll scratch yours" with other "I need merit" users.
Don't see how merit will help against spam.
As I understood, as newbie and jr. member you have no smerits. So that means that you have to be at least a member to be able to award a smerit. Correct me if I'm wrong.