Thanks to the new merit system, i can now strain the kind of information i want to read as a new member of this community. It looks like people are "scared" to post now so it is quite easy to find good posts around and read them. I noticed that my eyes are caught by posts with merits more than those without merits( i don't underestimate posts without merits though. some of them are helpful to me). I hope i am able to learn quickly and earn merits too. I have all the time in the world to be patient.
When I first joined in October.. I didn't even want to participate because it seemed like every single response was just some garbage response from a guy who had 32 accounts and was farming posts..I actually came back to the forum when I heard from someone else on telegram how hard the new merit system was, which got me interested again. I don't like when things are spam just for the sake of being spam.. and I agree with you that my eyes are more drawn to merited responses almost right away and sure enough.. its 9 times out of 10 the most useful post on the page or even the whole article.. I think the system is definitely working, but its gonna be a slow uphill climb for most people.. what would really be funny is if the merits over time went through a "halvening" and it was harder difficulty as the years passed to be able to collect the same amount of merit.