I missed this post earlier but I want to clarify a couple of things just so people aren't getting the wrong idea about how merit sources work:
Merit source are specified on particular board for awarding allocated sMerits services.
You can't apply for a merit source without specifying what board your interest is but as a regular forum user with sMerits received from other users on posts, you can still award sMerit randomly as desired.
That's not exactly true, you don't have to specify what boards you post on or merit regularly, or where you plan to spend your merits:
If you want to be a merit source:
1. Be a somewhat established member.
2. Collect TEN posts written in the last couple of months by other people that have not received nearly enough merit for how good they are, and post quotes for them all in a new Meta thread. The point of this is to demonstrate your ability to give out merit usefully.
3. We will take a look at your history and maybe make you a source.
I am especially eager to have merit sources in sub-communities such as the local sections.
And then this:
And yea merit source that does not actively award sMerits from the designated board can be probed.
So really merit sources don't have designated boards, so I don't think we can do any probing. Shucks.