I have joined the Merit network since the idea is in itself quite mind boggling. The mission of achieving a more effective decentralization than most of the other coins out there through a system of invitations is great.
However after having joined the network I'm having a few doubts. First I had to beg for a few invitations which I could use to convalidate the invitations I would make for my friends. Then, once I've finally managed to invite two friends whom I could validate, now I am unable to supply them with invitations that THEY can use if the want to invite anyone. In other words, the growth of the network in my direction is stuck and so it will probably stay, since we won't spend our time begging for more invitations because we are not beggars, and if it has happened to me and my friends that would probably apply to most of newcomers. Of course, beggars will possibly succeed in getting more invitations, in which case the system is likely to select a population of beggars, not the kind of community I'd like to be part of.
This means that once again early adopters got too much advantage over later adopters, which is the same paradigm of Bitcoin and the other coins - in other words the mission of a better decentralization will probably not be achieved by Merit either.
If I'm wrong I'd like to hear why. If there is no smooth way to allow me and others to perform the "Proof of Growth" without having to beg, then such growth simply won't happen.
Great points! And you are right about the current difficulty's of merit invites. Have you seen this overview video?
https://youtu.be/KrPVbkJ1IZoI don't think you need to beg to get free invites. Did you ask the person who invited you? Or did you ask on discord? Many of us hand out invites to those who need it for free!
When it comes to getting them on your own, the best place for a casual miner would be to pool mine in the parachute pool. Invites are not distributed by hash power. If you're a serious miner you shouldn't have any issues getting invites from any pool.
I hope that helps explain a few other ways. Invites shouldn't be too easy to get though!
Weeks have passed and "without begging" for merits I'm stuck, which raises in me some major questions about the functionality of this system. Yes, true, I've got 3 invites from the person who has first invited me and I've used them to invite friends, to whom of course I'm now unable to give any invites to help them grow the network since I have none any more. So that's a dead end, since we're not miners. My friends already forgot about this project and soon will I too.
I mean, I can understand your point, but invites are given out both by mean of PoW (mining) and PoS (as growth rewards themselves), which are the two metrics in the chain to determine who is actively contributing. As Kamo said, you don't even have to be a big miner, Parachute pool distributes invites not based on hash power (for reference, more than 5 invites were given to each miner last month), just need a CPU and dedicate some of its time to the mining. Or you can trade and stake, as is for other coins, this way invites are much less frequent but still there, and you can pay for them if you don't want to beg anyone.
If invites were equally distributed around it'd be too much incentive for people to create fake wallets and centralize the invites on themselves, that is not in doubt just look at every referral system ever. So, while balance could be discussed, I don't think this chain is unfair to newbies, nor that the mechanism is based on the wrong criteria. It's still a PoW chain, along the way you can increase your earnings by increasing your community, but the usual work to optimize the process is yours to be done (as above, chosing the best pool for yourself to get more invites).
I'm not saying the system is good or can keep going on long term, nor denying your point of view, just that this is "just like bitcoin" because it wants to be, but making it more rewarding for those who dedicate to it more than the average.