Absolutely sir, I have been trying hard to capture the heart and the mind of so many veteran members of bitcointalk to get at least 1 merit ( I could jump high celebrating from where I am standing right now seeing a merit in my account) for all the replies, quotes and post I am doing. But life's too hard for it. I thought I should pass over a needle hole before I could get at least 1 merit. Too bad but I am still hoping and never giving up finding 1 kind heart veteran.
Allow me to be very pretentious by quoting myself, whilst giving you some valuable advice:
Don't wanna sound all mellow but I think the idea of contributing positively to the quality of the forum, is already a reward on its own. In return, you get quality threads and quality replies from other members. That's at least how it's supposed to be: getting rid of all those useless spam replies.
Gaining Merit, thus gaining other members' respect, as well as receiving higher bounties, makes that reward even more worth the effort. But if receiving Merits to get higher bounties is your only purpose, you're condemned to leading a very bitter life, my OP friend, cuz you'll be searching so desperately to write something down that's been done before anyway, that you'll be making a complete fool of yourself.
And just in case this still wasn't clear enough, let me say it in another way:
If you would jump high celebrating for a Merit, you don't need to get Merit.
You need to get a life, man. Or sir.