Quote from: hilariousetc on August 17, 2018, 10:47:03 AM

This isn't a decentralised forum and never was. It's a centralised one with owners and rules in an attempt to keep order, only the limited amount of rules aren't being enforced much and people are bending and breaking them in an which way they can, and as such the forum has become unfit for purpose. Merit was a way to try combat the abuse of account farming but it needs some adjustments and other rules or restrictions need to be put in place.

The problem is that Theymos can't make up his mind whether he wants to run the forum centralized or decentralized (or rather the problem is that he doesn't make it run simply centralized, because the forum technique is not suitable to run it decentralized).

He seems to prefer it decentralized, given subjective implementations like the trust en merit systems. He also expressed his irritation about the centralized cluttering of trust (which apparently isn't the way he wanted it to be). But then he does nothing to bring about a change.

And at the same time there are some rules and some moderators, which is again a move to centralization.

That's why I wrote several times in different places that the forum governance isn't executed from principles. It is patch work with a bit of rules here, a bit of merit there, a patch of trust, a patch of moderating, patch, patch, patch. It's a big mess! And a clutterance of long standing members are taking full profit from the situation. But perhaps that is the way Theymos wants it because perhaps he profits from it too. Who knows what's going on in his mind? [EDIT] This forum really needs some professional updates and some clear, intelligent principles.

Quote from: theyoungmillionaire on August 17, 2018, 12:07:25 PM

I don't really agree with that. ~~Olichargy~~ Oligarchy by its delineation as per wikipedia a form of power structure in which power rests with a small number of people, may be distinguished by nobility, wealth, family ties, religious or military control. Have you seen people controlling the merit system?

People are controllng the merit system as merit sources. Just as people are controling the trust system through DT membership. I see lots of good posts which I cannot merit because I ran out of merit. I also see plenty of trustworthy members who's trust display won't change when I, and a thousand others, tag them positive because one DT member decided to tag him/her negative. That's ~~olichargic~~ oligarchic rule.

Quote from: theyoungmillionaire on August 17, 2018, 12:07:25 PM

A humble advice, merit is hard, merit ruins life, merit is good and blah blah blah- it is all in your mind.
Whatever your mind has defined, it will be your reality.

But truth and reality simply aren't in the eye of the beholder. They stand independent.