People are free to give merits to whom they want and where they want. Stopping them from doing this would bring out the "Freedom of speech" thought in some people. In fact those people who are meriting ANN threads are going to be wasting their shitposter merits because they want to be noticed by the bounty manager - something like "Notice me senpai" - so it will drain the shitposter merit pool. Which is a good thing and thus I am against your idea.

Simply posting in ANN threads all day? Kinda sucks for those people. Nah you are over-exxagerating it. Getting 14activity for a fortnight just need you to make 1 single post in any section of the forum in that period. If these shitposters are brain-dead to that extent then they need to stop coming to the internet.

I think paying of a fee to start ANN threads is better. Not every ICO team will have a member here who is ready to earn merits everyday and thus get ready to be able to post an ANN. They often start with an newbie account from scratch. In another sense, it will only promote the merit sales more if you think carefully. There would start a inherent "need" for merit and there will be the abundance of merit with others. So now you can understand what may happen if this would be allowed.