Are sMerits not be used here as a kind of payment form? That's a serious question.
Didn't I just answer it? While it is frowned upon (at least partly because it leads to shenanigans like this), it's not against the rules unless you're a merit source. At any rate, it seems clear that alia_armelle is not an alt of nullius.
Yes, I understood that. But now everyone could argue that they would send sMerits for reason X. If that is the case, the merit system makes no sense and in this case, this thread makes no sense. On the one hand, other people are taged negatively (justifiably) because they reward shitposts with sMerits, but on the other hand, such behavior is tolerated? That makes no sense to me.
Even you are a quality posters or shitposter there are no different, because like what the thread says it was abused.
That thing was create a lot of question in to my mind:
1. How they can says that users are abused the merit system without enough and concrete evidences?
2. Is linked enough to says that users are abusing the merit system?
3. Are giving merit to the users are fair? (If you have a lot of friends in bitcointalk you can possible gain a lot of merit even you are shitposter or not, right?)
4. I can see that even you have a good poster or quality poser if you are not popular bitcointalk you can't gain merit. That's why even how hard you worked if there's no people appreciate you, you have no chances to earn merit, right?