> paying senior members to post an ANN thread
True, but is that allowed by the rule?
Afaik yes, but there are downsides of this approach. And it's "not nice".
If the ANN poster is not part of the team you may have bad surprises, maybe not now, maybe in a few years...
> User wants to buy merits too
True, but is that allowed by the rule? To a newbie like me, if copper membership can be bought rather than earned, why can't merit?
No. Buying/selling merit is against the rules. Period. Correction: it looks like they are not against the rules after all (
see this thread), but it's not a trustworthy action and there's a good chance that doing that will get somebody give you red feedback.
And
ranking up needs more than merit, you'll see especially for the high ranks.
There's also a confusion here. Copper member is not a higher rank member, the rank is kept. It's only that
the user is allowed some things here and there, basically to allow exactly to post ANNs.